40 DAYS – Time with God – Day 36

₁Now that we have been put right with God through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. ₂He has brought us by faith into this experience of God's grace, in which we now live. And so we boast of the hope we have of sharing God's glory! ₃We also boast of our troubles, because we know that trouble produces endurance, ₄endurance brings God's approval, and his approval creates hope. ₅This hope does not disappoint us, for God has poured out his love into our hearts by means of the Holy Spirit, who is God's gift to us.

₆For when we were still helpless, Christ died for the wicked at the time that God chose. ₇It is a difficult thing for someone to die for a righteous person. It may even be that someone might dare to die for a good person. ₈But God has shown us how much he loves us — it was while we were still sinners that Christ died for us! ₉By his blood we are now put right with God; how much more, then, will we be saved by him from God's anger! ₁₀We were God's enemies, but he made us his friends through the death of his Son. Now that we are God's friends, how much more will we be saved by Christ's life! ₁₁But that is not all; we rejoice because of what God has done through our Lord Jesus Christ, who has now made us God's friends.

₁₂Sin came into the world through one man, and his sin brought death with it. As a result, death has spread to the whole human race because everyone has sinned. ₁₃There was sin in the world before the Law was given; but where there is no law, no account is kept of sins. ₁₄But from the time of Adam to the time of Moses death ruled over the whole human race, even over those who did not sin in the same way that Adam did when he disobeyed God's command.

Adam was a figure of the one who was to come. ₁₅But the two are not the same, because God's free gift is not like Adam's sin. It is true that many people died because of the sin of that one man. But God's grace is much greater, and so is his free gift to so many people through the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ. ₁₆And there is a difference between God's gift and the sin of one man. After the one sin, came the judgement of “Guilty”; but after so many sins, comes the undeserved gift of “Not guilty!” ₁₇It is true that through the sin of one man death began to rule because of that one man. But how much greater is the result of what was done by the one man, Jesus Christ! All who receive God's abundant grace and are freely put right with him will rule in life through Christ.