ROMANS 5:7

“For one will hardly die for a righteous person; though perhaps for the good person someone would even dare to die.”

I would not hesitate to give my life to protect my family – any of them. I love them that much. I even have some friends who I would die for. I pray I never have to make that choice, but if I do, I pray that I would not blink an eye. After all, death for a believer is just a portal into an eternal life with Christ. I am not in a hurry to die, but I am also ready to go whenever.

Paul isn’t trying to paint a morbid picture of death. He is setting up a thought which we will see in tomorrow’s verse. He does give us something to think about, though, in today’s verse. Would you die for “righteous person” or a “good person”? Albert Barnes says it well. “It is an unusual occurrence, an event which is all that we can hope for from the highest human benevolence and the purest friendship, that one would be willing to die for a good man. There are none who would be willing to die for a man who was seeking to do us injury, to calumniate our character, to destroy our happiness or our property. But Christ was willing to die for bitter foes.”

APPLICATION

It is important to explain what Paul meant by “righteous person.” He was not referring to someone made righteous through Christ, but rather one who is righteous in his own eyes. They may be moral outwardly and do what is “expected.”. Perhaps Paul was thinking about the Pharisees he used to be a part of. They seemed righteous on the outside, but inwardly they were just rule keepers.

“A good man” referred to someone who as Gill describes as “a liberal and beneficent man, who was very bountiful in his charitable distributions to the poor, and very liberal in contributing towards the charge of sacrifices, repairs of the temple, &c. and did more this way than what the law obliged to.” Paul says by chance someone might die for that man.

The whole point of this verse will be revealed in the next verse (which we will see tomorrow). Laying down our life for someone is a big decision. Some people are easier than others to die for. Let me ask you – who would you die for? If giving your life for a perfect stranger meant that person coming to Christ, would you do it? Christ did!

Lord, I lay down my life for You. Take it and use it however You think best.

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