What is the Romans Road to Salvation?

As Christians we should know the true Gospel and we should also know how to explain it. The most important message that all of humanity needs to hear is the message of the Gospel or Good News about Jesus Christ and His finished work on the Cross.
One of the evangelism tools that presents a simple guideline for Christians to explain the Gospel is The Romans Road to Salvation.

The Romans Road to Salvation is a wonderful evangelism resource which takes all its Scriptures from Paul’s letter of Romans and provides steps through the Scriptures to help a person to understand why he/she requires salvation through Jesus Christ.

Below are 5 “Stops” along the Romans Road to Salvation which Christians can use to explain the Gospel of Jesus Christ

Stop #1 – Romans 3:23 – for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God

Stop #1 focuses on the fact we are all sinners by nature and by choice. Therefore we are not inherently good according to God’s perfect standards. All human beings are sinners before a just and holy God. We are all guilty of breaking at least one or more of God’s Ten Commandments. We each need God’s eternal forgiveness because we have all sinned against Him.
So by nature and by choice we have failed to meet God’s perfect standard of righteousness. We cannot meet God’s perfect standard of righteousness with our own effort even if we tried to. This is what it means to fall short of the glory of God: we always miss God’s perfect standards because of our sin nature.

Stop #2 – Romans 6:23 – For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Stop #2 focuses on the fact that sin has consequences but God can offer salvation as a free gift.
So according to Romans 6:23 “the wages of sin is death”. This means that the impact of sin in our life is that it brought both physical and spiritual death to humanity. One day we will all die a physical death.
And if we do not get saved before we die, the Bible says we will also experience a second death because of sin (Revelation 21:8). This second death is eternal punishment in hell.
However thankfully there is a way that humanity can escape the eternal wages of sin. How?
The answer according to Romans 6:23 is that God offers salvation or eternal life as a free gift through Jesus Christ. Therefore even though we deserve death as a wage because of our sin, the grace of God is such that He offers us salvation as a free gift.

Stop #3 – Romans 5:8 – but God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Stop #3 focuses on how and why God offers humanity the free gift of salvation. It also focuses on God’s love even for people who are at enmity with Him.
Romans 5:8 speaks of the love that God has for sinners. Therefore God loves us so much that He does not wish to leave us in a state of sin forever and neither does He desire to see us suffering from the eternal consequence of sin.
As sinners we cannot earn our way into heaven through our own effort to be good or by our own righteousness (Ephesians 2:8-9). We cannot pay our own debt for sin because we constantly miss God’s perfect mark or standards in our daily life.
Therefore God sent His Son Jesus Christ who lived a perfect earthly life to become humanity’s perfect sacrifice for sin. Jesus came to redeem us and pay the debt for sin that humanity could not pay. According to Ephesians 1:7 in Christ “we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace”

Stop #4 – Romans 10:9-10 – because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

Stop #4 focuses on helping a person to make the most important decision of his/her life. That decision is to trust in Jesus Christ as personal Lord and Saviour. We are saved through trusting or believing in Jesus Christ (John 1:12).

Romans 10:13 says: For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

So through faith in Jesus Christ we become children of God and part of the kingdom of God. We become born again Christians or followers of Jesus Christ. We have eternal life because we have believed in Jesus Christ and accepted the finished work He did for us on the Cross. We are saved from eternal punishment and are promised eternal life and an eternal relationship with God.

Stop #5 – Romans 5:1 – Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Stop #5 gives us assurance that through faith in Jesus Christ – we are no longer at enmity with God. Instead we are now at peace with God because we belong to God’s family.

Romans 8:1 says that there is no longer any condemnation for those who are in Jesus Christ.

Therefore our salvation is not based on our individual effort because we are not justified through our works.

Instead our salvation and relationship with God is based on the perfect work of Jesus Christ through His death on the cross and resurrection because it is through faith in Christ alone that we are justified.

Conclusion

Learning The Romans Road to Salvation provides a great method and guideline to share the Gospel and lead a person into a relationship with Jesus Christ
May we always be ready in season and out of season to share the gospel of Jesus Christ.