Verse 8
But if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him.
How enlightening is the fact that, after all Paul had written of faith in preceding chapters, when it comes down to speaking of the Christian's justification and his hope of living eternally with Christ above, it is not faith which is mentioned, but dying with Christ. This does not imply that faith is not required, but shows that faith consummated by baptism into the death of Christ is the determinator.
Again, Paul's tremendous "if" is hurled into the consideration of man's salvation, as also in Romans 6:5, thus stressing the conditional nature of human redemption, one of the conditions being stressed in this verse, that of dying with Christ, in the sense of being baptized "into Christ," etc.
We shall also live with him ... is a pledge reaching into the eternal world.
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