God’s Passion — Romans 5:8

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8, NIV)

Introduction

Today we conclude the series The Creed of the Cross, built around the book Cruz Credo by Glenio Fonseca Paranaguá. Throughout this journey, we have been called back to the center of the gospel: the cross of Christ.

We have seen that the cross is not a religious ornament or mere devotional language. It is the place where God revealed His justice, defeated sin, and exposed the depth of His love.

We answered the question: Was it really necessary for Christ to die? We understood that the cross, as a door, opened the way for us to draw near to God. We saw that discipleship has a price. And that in the cross, the power belongs exclusively to God.

Arriving at this final message of the series, we are brought to the heart of everything we have contemplated: the passion of God. If the previous messages showed us what the cross accomplished, now Romans 5:8 reveals why it happened.

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

Paul wrote to the Romans to present the gospel in its purest form. He revealed that God’s love was not demonstrated when we were at our best, but when we were at our worst — sinners, spiritually dead, enemies. He does not merely say that God loves. He says God demonstrates. The love of God was not shown in words, but in blood. Not in abstract promises, but in the giving of the Son.

God’s passion for us was the size of the death of His Son. That is the measure of divine love — not measured by what we feel or the circumstances we face, but by Calvary.

If the cross is the ultimate proof of God’s love, what did it really accomplish — and how must we respond? The answer is clear:

1. The Triumph of the Cross — Colossians 2:13–15

“When you were dead in your sins… God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness… He has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.”

Paul described here the full scope of the work of the cross. We were dead — that was our condition. God made us alive — that was His sovereign initiative. We were guilty — He forgave all our sins. There was a debt against us — He canceled it. Everything flows from God’s action, nothing from human merit.

The cross did not improve sinners — it resurrected the dead. It did not merely relieve guilt — it removed condemnation. The cross was not defeat. It was tribunal, victory, and liberation.

God made us alive with Christ: We were dead, without spiritual response, without life before God. But in the cross, Christ did not merely die — He included us in His life. “The cross was the tribunal that sentenced ‘the death of death, in the death of Christ.'” — Glenio Fonseca. The death died when Christ died.

He forgave all sins and canceled the debt: There was a document against us — guilt, condemnation, debt. On the cross, that document was torn up. Many still live as debtors, but Christ has already paid everything. The problem is not lack of forgiveness — it is lack of faith in the forgiveness.

He disarmed the powers and authorities: In the cross, the greatest defeated was not Christ nailed to it — it was Satan! What appeared to be the triumph of darkness was, in reality, its defeat. The cross was a public parade of victory. The enemy was exposed, defeated, and shamed.

Application: The Christian does not fight for victory — he fights from victory.

2. The Healing of the Cross — 1 Peter 2:24

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.”

Here we see that the cross does not merely resolve our guilt — it treats our disease. Humanity is a multitude of the sick and wounded. That is the human condition: broken, hurt, corrupted by sin. And the conclusion is direct: only through the Cross can we be healed!

The cross heals our guilt (justification), our heart (regeneration), and our behavior (sanctification).

Application: Many want relief without the cross, change without repentance, healing without surrender. But there is no healing outside the cross.

3. The Enemies of the Cross — Philippians 3:18–19

“For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things.”

How does someone become an enemy of the cross?

By being a child of perdition: False Christians and non-Christians who do not possess true religion will perish as all sinners do. A mere profession of faith will not save them. Jesus sowed wheat, but the enemy sowed tares. There is a false spirituality that coexists near the truth, uses religious language, but was not born of the seed of the Kingdom. Not every appearance of godliness is fruit of the gospel of the cross.

By making the belly their god: This is one who is devoted to worship of their own appetites, whose life is not for the adoration and honor of God but for self-gratification. The opponents of the cross occupy themselves only with earthly things. Here is the portrait of today’s culture: pleasure, consumption, ego. How many in the church today are the true enemies of the cross — who care little for anything beyond worldly things?

By impoverishing the value of the cross: There is an impoverishment of the cross when it is reduced to a symbol without scandal, a message without repentance, or a religion that promises benefits without death of the self. The cross becomes poor when it stops confronting sin, humbling pride, and exalting Christ exclusively. Where the cross is emptied, the gospel is adulterated; where the cross is kept at the center, God’s power continues to save, break, and transform.

Application: When the cross loses the center, the gospel loses its power.

Conclusion

In the cross, Christ triumphed — defeating death, forgiving our sins, defeating the enemy. In the cross, Christ healed humanity from the wounds caused by sin. Only through the Cross can we be healed. The enemies of the cross are those who are children of perdition, who live for themselves, and who impoverish its value.

Christ is the center of all this. He did not merely die — He triumphed. He did not merely suffer — He healed. He was not merely rejected — He continues to be rejected today by those who refuse the cross.

Theme reaffirmed: The cross reveals God’s passion by triumphing, healing, and confronting.

Final question: Are you living in the light of the cross — or resisting what it demands of you?

The cross does not merely prove God’s love — it demands a total response from our lives.