The Two Ways to Choose From Presented in Romans

Moses confronted Israel with the basic choice at the conclusion of his lecture on the law (which we know as Deuteronomy).  He told them to choose (continuing) life or death–to follow the way set forth in the Torah or to ignore it in favor of some other wisdom or god.

In Romans Paul does the same.  He sees two possible responses to his message.  One is the way of mockery.  To claim that we must do evil that good may come, or to claim that we must remain in sin that grace may abound, and to blame god because he used Israel’s disobedience and yet still hold’s them accountable.

Paul responds to that path by appealing to the uniqueness of God (in that God may use our unfaithfulness to prove faithful) and to the uniqueness of the age of the Law (which is now over so that we are not under law but under grace).

That is the way of death.

The way of life is to learn from the cross that the Christian life is cruciform.  We are to learn that just as god saved us when we were “weak” and did so through the death of His Son, so in our weakness all things work together for good.

That is the way of new life.

Thus we are to learn from how God saves us, not that we may arrange evil but that we can trust God to bring glory out of the evil that we suffer.

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