Charles Ellicott Commentary Romans 3:24

"being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:" — Romans 3:24 (ASV)

Being justified. We should more naturally say, “but now are justified.” The construction in the Greek is peculiar and can be explained in one of two ways. Either the phrase “being justified” may be taken as corresponding to all them that believe in Romans 3:22, the change of case being an irregularity suggested by the form of the sentence immediately preceding; or the construction may be considered regular, and the participle “being justified” would then depend on the last finite verb: they come short of the glory of God, and in that very state of destitution are justified.

Freely. This means gratuitously, without exertion or merit on their part. (Revelation 21:6; Revelation 22:17.)

By his grace. By His own grace. The means by which justification is accomplished is the death and atonement of Christ; its ultimate cause is the grace of God, or free readmission into His favor, which He grants to man.

Redemption. Literally, ransoming. The concept of ransom itself contains the triple idea of a bondage, a deliverance, and the payment of an equivalent as the means of that deliverance. The bondage is the state of sin and guilt, with the expectation of punishment; the deliverance is the removal of this state and the opening up, in its place, of a prospect of eternal happiness and glory; the equivalent paid by Christ is the shedding of His own blood.

This last element is the pivot on which the whole idea of redemption turned. It is therefore clear that the redemption of the sinner is an act effected objectively and, in the first instance, independently of any change of condition in him, though such a change is involved in his appropriation of the efficacy of that act.

It cannot be explained as a purely subjective process effected in the sinner through the influence of Christ’s death. The idea of dying and reviving with Christ, though a distinct aspect of the atonement, cannot be made to cover all of it.

Implied is not only a change in the recipient of the atonement but also a change effected without his cooperation in the relations between God and man. There is, if one may say so, something in the death of Christ that determines the will of God, as well as something that acts on the will of man.

And the particular influence that is brought to bear on the counsels of God is represented under the figure of a ransom or payment of an equivalent. This element is too essentially a part of the metaphor, and too clearly established by other parallel metaphors, to be explained away; though what the terms “propitiation” and “equivalent” can mean as applied to God, we do not know, and it is perhaps not fitting for us to inquire too curiously.

The doctrine of the atonement thus stated is not peculiar to St. Paul and did not originate with him. It is also found in the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew 20:28 , “The Son of Man came to give His life a ransom for many,” and in Hebrews 9:15, “And for this cause He is the Mediator of the New Testament, that by means of death, for the redemption (ransoming) of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.” (Compare to 1 John 2:2; 1 Peter 1:18–19; 1 Peter 2:24, and others.)