As we begin our journey together, I’m grateful we’re starting with Romans 8:1. There’s no better place to open our first devotion than with these words: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” That single word now immediately catches my attention. It signals a change—something decisive has happened. What once was true is no longer true. Our status before God has been radically altered.

Paul has spent the earlier chapters of Romans explaining the seriousness of sin and the helplessness of humanity apart from grace. But here, he pivots. Now things are different. For the believer, life is marked by a clear “before” and “after.” Before Christ, condemnation was our reality. After Christ, it is no longer so.

When Paul uses the word condemnation, he’s not speaking lightly. As Leon Morris helpfully points out in his commentary on Romans, condemnation includes both the sentence and the execution of that sentence.* In other words, it’s not just that the guilty verdict has been overturned—the punishment itself has been completely removed. Nothing is hanging over our heads. No penalty is waiting to fall. Why? Because Christ absorbed it all.

Think about how freeing that is. Not only has the sentence been canceled, but all the paperwork has been wiped clean. Every citation. Every charge. Every record of debt. Scripture elsewhere describes it as a list of accusations nailed to the cross. The punishment we deserved was carried out—not on us, but on Jesus.

That’s why this verse also reminds us of a hard truth: before grace, there really was an offense. We weren’t simply missing something in our lives and then adding Jesus as an upgrade. The other day, my BBQ sandwich was missing the slaw, and I’m afraid we treat Jesus like the missing slaw. Just an add-on that makes things better. He is more than that. We were guilty. In a very real sense, we were cosmic criminals—people who had sinned against a holy God. Romans never minimizes that reality. But it also never minimizes grace. Through faith in Christ Jesus, the entire debt has been canceled.

This is where condemnation becomes the flip side of justification. Earlier in Romans, Paul tells us we are justified—declared righteous—by faith. Here he shows us the other side of that declaration: if we are justified, then condemnation is gone. Righteousness is credited to us, and punishment is removed from us. Both are true because of Christ.

Finally, Paul makes something very clear: this promise belongs only to those who are in Christ Jesus. That phrase will appear again and again throughout Romans 8, and it’s essential. Being “in Christ” is not the same as being religious, moral, or even affiliated with the church. It’s about faith—real faith that results in transformation by the grace of God.

This verse is both an encouragement and a warning. An encouragement for those who are in Christ: there is no condemnation, now or ever. And a warning for those who are merely near Christ but not connected to Him. Romans 8 will help us understand what it truly means to live in Christ Jesus, and I’m thankful we get to walk through it together in some future posts.

Grace and peace,
Paul

References:

*Leon Morris, The Epistle to the Romans, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1988), 300.