The Bible Study Podcast, episode 58. This is the seventh in a series on the book of Romans,

which I'm calling Christianity 101. Welcome to the Bible study podcast. I'm your host, Chris Christensen.

Last week we talked about Romans 4, which included the topic of justification, how we are made right with God.

And this week we continue with Romans 5, starting from the beginning.

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance character, and character hope.

And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit whom he has given us.

Let's stop just there and look at that first section there.

So Paul goes on from this topic of justification and says, okay, we've been justified.

We've been made right with God.

That separation between God and us was dealt with through Jesus, through Jesus' death on

the cross.

He says, now we have peace with God through

Jesus Christ. We've gained access by faith into this grace in which we stand. Grace again,

meaning that we stand before God now because of the gift that he has given through Jesus. And we

also rejoice. We rejoice in the hope and the glory of God. That sounds good so far.

But then Paul goes on to say this whole thing about rejoice in our sufferings. I don't know about

you, but so far, not today at least, I didn't rejoice in my suffering. And most of us don't.

But what Paul is saying here is that, and Paul is someone who knew a fair

bit about suffering, if you go through 2nd Corinthians, there's a section in 2nd

Corinthians where Paul talks about having been stoned and left for dead, having been shipwrecked

twice, having been in danger on the sea, in danger on land land and all these things he'd gone through.

He also had what he refers to elsewhere as a thorn in the flesh, which many think was a physical

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