What does it mean that the gift of God is eternal life (Romans 6:23)?

155 This is an immense privilege, this growing up into the knowledge of God and intimacy with Him, acquaintance with God. Will never can do this. But in our right place with God we grow in His knowledge, we live more in those things that are found with Him - that He takes pleasure in; and that is holiness. Obedience is not holiness, a heart given up to obey God; but it is the path in which holy affections, springing from Him, and free before Him, are found. The end is everlasting life, received in its full result in glory, as it is in the purpose of God. But that is the gift of God. The path to it is the path of obedience and holiness, but itself is the gift of God. Death we have earned - it is the wages of sin; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is not merely that eternal life is the gift of God, but the gift of God is nothing less than eternal life. Death is purposely looked at in its simple character of death. No doubt it is judgment on sin here in this world, and implies, unless redemption comes in, the judgment which comes after. It is the present effect of judgment on sin, and the divine officer and witness of sin, to conduct us to judgment, according to wrath revealed from heaven. But here it is the end of life which fruitless sin worked. It does lead to judgment - judgment of works done while living. God gives eternal life.

"For the wages of sin [is] death; but the free gift of God life eternal in Christ Jesus our Lord." This is a summary of the general truth; it is the result on man's side and on God's. He does not limit it to transgression, though of course its wages are no less; he takes man, the Gentile sinner, as well as the Jewish transgressor. Both were sinners; and the wages of sin is death. But the blessing is quite as rich and free: eternal life is the need of the Jew no less than of the Gentile: it is God's free gift, and thus equally open to either or both. Let it be carefully noted that the Holy Spirit, by the structure of the phrase, carefully avoids intimating that the wages of sin are limited to death; for in truth judgment remains, and is appointed to man no less than death. Together they are the full wages of sin. Nor would it be safe to affirm that even eternal life exhausts the free gift of God; for, as we shall find in Romans 8, no less than in many scriptures more, He gives the Holy Ghost to be the portion of the believer, not to speak of the relation of son and the accompanying inheritance. Boundless indeed is His grace to us in Christ Jesus our Lord.

First, we have "life;" and this in the next chapter (v. 23) is expanded into "eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." It is not merely life from another source, but life of an entirely new character and quality; not a restoration of the failed and forfeited life, but a life infinitely higher — a divine life. There is but one life which is eternal, and "in Christ Jesus our Lord" declares its source to be in a divine Person, and now become man. Nor only so, for the force of the expression is precise. It is not correctly given in our common version, but in the revised it is, as I have quoted it. It is "in," not, as the common version, "through;" and "Christ Jesus," not "Jesus Christ." Such differences, minute as they may seem, are in Scripture never without significance. "Jesus Christ" is the Lord's personal name emphasized; "Christ Jesus" emphasizes His official title. It speaks of a place now taken through His work accomplished. In the eleventh verse it should read similarly, "alive to God in Christ Jesus." Again we have it in the eighth chapter, "no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus;" and in the second verse, "life in Christ Jesus." Elsewhere we have "sanctified" and "saints in Christ Jesus," "created in Christ Jesus," "of Him are ye in Christ Jesus," and so repeatedly. Except once — Peter (1 Peter 5:10), no inspired writer uses this order of words, but only Paul. "In Jesus," or "in Jesus the Christ," we are never said to be, but only "in Christ," or "in Christ Jesus." The special force ought to be therefore clear.

In receiving eternal life the believer is privileged to know that it never had a beginning, that Christ Himself is the eternal life, that he entered upon it the moment he believed on the Son, that it is eternal. Separate it into two parts by the fraction of a second or the breadth of a hair, it is no longer eternal life. It is the believer’s inalienable possession—“the gift of God”—but it is “through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

Our first three scriptures deal with the soul’s reception of this great blessing, not simply from the viewpoint of Divine sovereignty, but from that of the soul’s response to the Gospel, the word of God. First, the dead hear the voice of the Son of God, They are not said to have life before they hear; but “they that hear shall live.” The responsibility of hearing and the sovereign work of the Son of God in quickening power are put together here. Wonderful it is that God has decreed that by the word of God soul s are born again (1 peter 1:23) AND POSSENSS OVERLASTIN LIFE (John 5:24). This verse then emphasizes hearing the voice of the Son of God, and living thereby the life that is eternal. 1 John 5:1 has told us that “whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.” New birth, birth from God, certainly imparts new life, the life which is of God, eternal life. But new birth is in contrast to our natural birth as children of Adam; and it stresses the precious fact of a vital, real relationship with the eternal God as Father. “As many as received Him (the Lord Jesus), to them gave He power to become the sons (or children) of God, even to them that believe on His name, which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12,13). Thus by new birth, the relationship of children to the Father, through the Son, is eternally established. How precious beyond thought this is! And of course this could not be possible without the possession of eternal life. Here too personal faith is seen as a requisite in new birth. Eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of Man is an absolute necessity to the reception of eternal life. In John 5, hearing the voice of the Son of God was indispensable: now eating and drinking is also insisted on in John 6. Both go together: one cannot be without the other for faith in the Deity of Christ means faith also in His true Manhood, His suffering and death. For this eating and drinking means a spiritual taking home to the soul of the truth of the Gospel, the necessary death of Christ for our sins. Indeed, this was actually in spite of the fact that they could not enter into and understand the full significance of His words at the time. Having faith in Him personally, they did, in spirit, partake of the value of His sacrifice, His sufferings and death, before the cross actually took place. Peter shows this in his loving words following, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that Thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God;” John 6:68,69. Our verse therefore shows that the death of the Lord Jesus was an absolute necessity in order that eternal life might be possessed by men: it is life vitally connected with the sufferings and death of the Son of Man, which is the very food of eternal life. It was of course in anticipation of Calvary that God could and did give eternal life before that time. Quickening (or making alive) is said to be by the Son in John 5:21: and “with Christ” in Eph. 2:5. If new birth emphasizes relationship with the Father, quickening emphasizes the power of God in bringing life out of death. New birth does not in itself intimate that man was dead, but that in his Adam-nature, corrupted by sin, he could not inherit the kingdom of God: he required a dew nature from God. But quickening supposes a state of death, in which Divine power must work, to bring life. Here too the resurrection of Christ is introduced, and the believer linked with Him in such a life. It is of course the same eternal life, of which we have been speaking, but seen now in resurrection power. Power then, linked with eternal life, is predominant in the thought of quickening. “I give unto them eternal life.” Here it is the Son who gives life, while Romans 6:23 tells us, “the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Num. Bible) If new birth stresses relationship and quickening stresses the power of God in bringing life out of death, these verses stress the grace of God in communicating eternal life. It is a wonderful act of Divine favor, apart altogether from any merit on the part of the recipient, a gift freely given of God. It is totally God’s sovereign work. Precious grace indeed! “Partakers of the Divine nature.” Peter tells us that it is by the “great and precious promises “That we have become this. This certainly connects with the fact of the word of God being that by which new birth is accomplished: and this Divine nature is of course to be identified with eternal life: it is the life of God (Eph. 4:18). But this verse emphasizes the blessed fact of God’s sharing with us this blessed nature, that it might manifest itself in every godly virtue, as a representation of Himself in an evil world. “If any man be in Christ, it is new creation.” Each individual believer is “created in Christ Jesus unto good works.” Eph.2:10.

First, then, we have "God hath given to us eternal life:" what a sentence that is! It begins with the giver, "God hath given;" it closes with the gift, "Eternal life;" and this, bear in mind, God's own witness, record, testimony. What is eternal life? Nothing less than the very life of the One who died on the cross as substitute for His people, and rose again from the dead; in His death He closed their history as children, not only of wrath, but of Adam; and in resurrection He became the Head of a new race, and as such communicates His own life; "He breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost." (John 20:22.) So now of all who believe in Jesus, who receive the record, testimony, witness of God, it is true they have passed from death to life, they have Eternal Life — they are not in the flesh. So then under the first head or testimony we have God's record of Himself, His Son, His gift; the blessed giver God Himself — the source and spring of it all; His Son the Lord Jesus, the One in whom it is all made good, for it is in Him all that God bestows is found; and then His gift, Eternal Life.

The truth is, eternal life is the gift of God. As Paul expresses it: "The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 6:23). Here we have the principle on which God grants this inestimable boon. It is not the reward of good works, or it would be a debt (Rom. 4:4); it is the gift of sovereign love to those who could neither do nor pay anything in order to secure it. The ground on which eternal life is given is fully expressed in our Lord's familiar words to Nicodemus, recorded in John 3:14-16. His cross, the satisfaction of God's righteousness and the mighty expression of God's love, has made it possible for Him to confer eternal life on all who obey the Gospel.

What a contrast between “wages” and “gift” wages earned—death, the judgment of God in all its terror. Gift—what can you do with a gift? You cannot buy a gift, or else it would be a purchase. You cannot earn a gift or else it would be your due. All you can do with a gift is to receive it, and thank the donor. Our natural life is forfeited through sin, but life, eternal life, is God’s gift procured for us at the cost of the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ when He died on the cross of shame, meeting God’s righteous demand and setting Him free to offer this priceless gift.

Eternal life is bestowed on man by God — it comes to us solely by way of gift there is none other way of obtaining it, "The gift of God is eternal life." He bestows it as it pleases Him, yet the gift is "in Jesus Christ our Lord" (Rom. 6:23), it is not given by God to us except as in Christ. "God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." (1 John 5:11.) It is not the believer's in any sense apart from or independently of the Son. If we have Christ we have the life of Christ: "He that hath the Son hath life." If we have not Christ we are dead in our sins: "He that hath not the Son of God hath not life." (1 John 5:12.) The life and the Son go together; the gift of life is communicated with the Son.

What does that mean for us? I hope that everybody who is present here can say, “Well, yes, I have received that eternal life even if I don't know everything about it, the depths of its meaning, but I have it.” Eternal life means that we have received divine life, but that this life is present in the Lord Jesus in us. He is our life. And this is one of the reasons which prove that a true believer can never be lost again. Could Christ, his Life - far be the thought - be lost with him? Impossible. Eternal life means that God has given us His own life as revealed in the person of His Son who is Himself Eternal life. He is the true God and the Eternal Life.