Explain please the phrase in Romans 5:10, ‘We shall be saved by his life’

This text is from a transcript of a talk by David Gooding, entitled ‘God’s Power for Salvation’ (2005).

It is in the result of our justification: 'We shall be saved from the wrath of God through him' (Romans 5:9), that is, through his death; he died for us. But now, in addition, 'if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, shall we be saved by his life' (Romans 5:10). The contrast here is between the death on the one hand, and the life on the other. And therefore the contrast is deliberate.

The death of Christ must have caused God infinite pain. If we are reconciled to God by what caused him infinite pain (the death of his Son) how reasonable would it be now that Christ who died for our sins, is risen and alive, that God would turn against us? No, indeed not: 'we shall be saved by his life'.

And the question of salvation is, of course, a very big question. We are saved in the sense that we have been saved; we have been forgiven; we have been justified. By grace we have been saved. But there is more to salvation than the past—the 'we have been' part. There is the present. We are being saved, because he is an intercessor for us. 'He is able to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them' (Hebrews 7:25). So he is our present Saviour, constantly is he our Saviour. And he shall be our Saviour, for we wait for the Saviour from heaven, who will transform this body of our humiliation and fashion it like unto the body of his glory (see Philippians 3:20–21). So we shall be saved. And the wrath of God is not only presently expressed on certain types of sin, but there will come the great 'day of wrath' (Romans 2:5). In the Bible, the day of God's wrath is future, of course, and believers shall be saved from it.