“Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died -- more than that, who was raised to life -- is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.”
Romans 8:34

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PAUL desires that all who believe in Jesus truly should have the fullest confidence concerning their eternal welfare, and their security in Christ. He is continuing to drive home that God is working all things for our good, and that it is in and through Christ that this happens to us. Having brought out and explained God’s justifying grace through Christ, Paul goes on to expand all that God has done for us in Christ by raising another question - “Who is he that condemns?”

OUR PROBLEM

All that Paul has presented to us in this letter, and the truth he has declared in the verses previous to this 34th verse of Romans 8, is sufficient, even more than sufficient, to assure us of our title to heaven and heavenly glory, but the fact is that we fail every day, and sometimes that failure is big. In this experience we have the devil to contend with who never stops seeking to find ways he can accuse us and depress us. Because of this we are prone to find our confidence in salvation shaken, and doubts enter our mind. Paul wants such doubts forever to be excluded, and that we should be at peace in the truth. This is why he presents us with another question, which is another way of showing how such doubts have no foundation. Paul wants us to meditate on his words, so that being full of the truth, and confirmed in the understanding of it and appreciation of it, we may not doubt, but be strong in the full assurance of faith.

Paul seeks this goal by taking another question that is raised in the mind, and then giving the answer which shows the folly of such fears. He also gives an answer which kills forever any idea that those who have been called into faith in Jesus can ever be condemned for their sins before God.

WHO IS THE CONDEMNING ONE?

The questions is posed by Paul in such a way as to ridicule the idea of condemnation being possible. The Greek simply says “who the one condemning”.

First of all Paul is questioning who has a right to condemn. In fact there is no human being who has the right to condemn any other human being before God. The reason being is that we have all placed ourselves in a position for God to condemn us by failing short of his glory. Even though others may have done awful things which we have never done and would never do, before God we have no right to condemn because we are sinners. Again the devil, who is an accuser of Christians, and seeks to condemn them, even he has no right to condemn because he is the worker of all evil. Even angels, who have never sinned, have no right to condemn sinful human beings. The reason is that even they are charged by God of folly, and also because they have been given no authority to condemn.

Only Jesus has a right to condemn, because all he has be given authority by the Father. He has been placed on the throne in order to rule. He will come at the end of the world to judge the living and the dead. He will reign until he has put all his enemies down under his feet. But here is the crunch impossibility for the believer in Jesus to be condemned. Christ alone has the right to condemn, yet for the those who love Jesus and are called according to his purpose, Christ has died for them. How can Jesus condemn those who he gave his life to save them from condemnation. This is a complete impossibility.

CHRIST THE ONE HAVING DIED.

This the a more literal translation of the Greek, and it is much better than the NIV expression. In this statement death as the punishment for sin is accepted. Also it is accepted that a substitute could die in the place of the sinner and so satisfy the law of God. However if another human being, however holy, became the substitute, it would not be enough because every human being has sins that must be atoned for. Neither is it possible for an angel, not even a Cherubim, to be an adequate substitute, because even they have to cover their faces before the holy majesty of God, and so there atonement could not be sufficient.

The reason it is impossible for the believer to be condemned is because of the one who has offered himself as our substitute for sin. Paul speaks of the glory of this offering in Philippians 2. Christ is God himself. He was with the Father and equal with the Father, yet he did not think this glory was to be held on to, but was ready to humble himself and become human, and as a human to offer himself in our place. As God his value as a sacrifice was infinite. As a human being he was totally eligible to be a substitute for human beings. In giving himself he obeyed the will of the Father perfectly. In this obedience he was perfect, and so was an unblemished offering. Being sinless he had no need to die. As the sacrifice for sin, he offered himself as spotless, so taking our sin upon himself, his death was totally and only for us. So when he died his offering was sufficient to appease the whole wrath of God against sin, and satisfy the demands of God’s law down to the last degree.

The impossibility of condemnation is sure because it is Christ who has made atonement for our sin. Having made sufficient and complete atonement, those for whom he died could not be condemned for their sins without such condemnation being the grossest injustice. Sins can’t justly be punished twice. If we ask whether the atonement made by Christ was sufficient, then Paul brings the next statement.

BUT RATHER HAVING BEEN RAISED.

Se how Paul piles on the evidence, and seals up the argument. Is Christ’s death a full atonement for the sin of those who believe him? How can we be certain? We can be certain because Christ was raised from the dead. The Scripture speaks of Christ rising from the dead, and that Christ was raised from the dead. It is the fact that Christ was raised from the dead that Paul emphasises here. Peter also emphasises it in his sermon of the day of Pentecost in Acts 2:24.

Why is this so important? The reason is that it is the one who gave the Law, and the one whom our sins have offended, and the one executing the punishment on Jesus for our sins, that raises Jesus from the dead. This raising is a tremendous statement by the judge of all that the punishment for sin was over, and that Jesus had fully met all his demands, and that his death did satisfy the punishment due for our sins, and had paid that debt in full. If this had not been the case, God would not have raised Jesus from the dead. God could not have raised him from the dead, because then he would be condoning evil, and allowing his holiness to be besmirched.

If Jesus had not been raised from the dead, then condemnation would still remain, and we would have no salvation. This is what Paul argues in 1 Corinthians 15 where he says that if Christ has not been raised then our faith is vain. Those who deny the actual physical resurrection of Jesus don’t realise what they are saying, and how they are leaving their souls under condemnation.

The resurrection of Jesus is fundamental to our faith. Christ died for our sins and rose for our justification. Christ’s resurrection seals the fact that Christ’s death was and is a full atonement for our sin.

WHO IS AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD.

Paul still goes on the prove that it is impossible for us who believe in Jesus to be condemned. What he has reminded us of already is enough, but he adds more. Paul jumps forward through Christ’s time on earth after his resurrection, through his ascension into heaven, to the wonderful fact that he has been placed on the throne of all at the side of God, the Father. Paul holds before us that God has put all authority into the hands of Jesus, and placed the government upon his shoulders.

We have this graphically set before us in Revelation chapter 5. There we see the Lamb (Jesus) able to open the scroll with the seven seals, which is the purpose of God for the world because he was slain, and we see him ascending the throne in order to execute the purpose of God contained in the scroll. Jesus by his death and resurrection has become worthy of this authority and honour, and on the throne God has placed into his hands the execution of this plan of salvation which he has won by his death and resurrection.

It was because of this Jesus sent the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, into the world to dispense the salvation he had won to all those called according to the purpose of God. Jesus reigns to work all things that he may present us blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 1:8).

WHO ALSO SUPPLICATES ON OUR BEHALF.

Paul is still not finished in his purpose to give us total assurance that we, who believe in Jesus, can never be condemned and punished for our sins.

On the throne of glory, sitting beside the Father, on the throne called in Revelation the throne of God and the Lamb, Jesus supplicates for those for whom he died. In Hebrews 7: 25 it is expressed like this “Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.”

This is hard to understand, but it is glorious. In Hebrews Jesus is interceding in this way because he remains a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. His priesthood is permanent. He did not stop his priestly work for us when he reached heaven and began to reign. He is always our one and only priest, and all we need for priestly office. No earthly minister has any place being a priest in the sense of mediating before God on behalf of sinners.

I don’t think we are meant to conceive of Jesus pleading before the Father for our forgiveness and justification. By his perfect work he has won such blessing already. I believe this supplication is something Jesus is permanently doing by his very presence beside the Father on the throne. He sits on the throne with the evidence of his atoning death in his hands and feet and side. He bears testimony to his victory and the Fathers acceptance of that victory by his human presence as the God-man on the throne. His presence in his human body, with the evidence of his perfect sacrifice for sin marked in his body, that is the supplication, which the Father always sees and accepts.

There is no possibility that Jesus can be dethroned. Our salvation is secure. We never can be condemned.

NO CONDEMNATION.