99 - Eternally Secure in Christ's Love [B]

Eternally Secure in Christ's Love
Romans 8:34-39

We're in Romans 8 and in this last part we come to one of those great crescendos of Scripture where the Apostle Paul just takes us to the very heights of significant Bible truth. The focus here is on the security of the believer in the love of God. God's love for us, which is consistent with His righteousness, is not conditioned upon anything that we do. Last time, as we wrapped us our study of Romans 8:33, I talked about and reviewed us on the doctrine of justification by faith, pointing out that we're justified not by our own righteousness or anything that we have done but we're justified by the righteousness of Christ which we possess because when we trust in Him, His righteousness is then imputed or credited to us and God the Father looks at the righteousness which we now possess which is Christ's righteousness, not ours, and declares us just.

God's love is then free to embrace us fully because we possess the same righteousness that He possesses. It's not on the basis of anything we've done or haven't done because we're still sinners but above and surrounding the fact that we are sinners is this great doctrine of the imputation of Christ's righteousness. Because we possess His righteousness then Paul goes on to emphasize in verse 34 that there's no basis then for condemnation. Because we have the righteousness of Christ we are therefore secure in God's love because God's love is compatible with our perfect righteousness which comes from Christ. Therefore, there's really no basis for condemnation.

As we look at this passage I pointed out when we got into verses 31 through 39 that there are these seven rhetorical questions. The force of these questions is to cause the reader or listener to follow a certain logic chain, a logical chain of thought from his opening question, "What shall we say to these things?" This causes us to think about the application and implication of what he has said, not only in the previous three chapters related to sanctification because also to the previous eight chapters in the book as he's bringing this opening section to an end. Starting in chapter nine, which I hope to begin in the next lesson, we see a return to the theme of righteousness in terms of if God is righteousness, then how does this relate to His plan for Israel.

In these seven questions we've gone through the first four. What shall we say to these things? If God is for us who can be against us? Obviously no one. How shall He not freely give us all things and the implication of the question is that because He gave us everything in Christ, He will continue to supply everything for us no matter what suffering or adversity we might face. Then the fourth question we covered in verse 33: Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? Since God is the one who justifies there's no one who can bring a charge against God's elect.

Now the fifth question is "Who is he who condemns us?" This is followed by the sixth question, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" People say maybe there are circumstances or situations and then Paul's answer is the seventh question. "Shall tribulation or distress, nakedness, peril, sword or any circumstance separate us?" This drives him to the greatest statement here of security which comes in verses we all know very well, in verses 38 and 39 that Paul says He is confident that nothing, and he goes through a series of things that are opposites to show that there's nothing within God's creation that can separate us from the love of Christ.

So the question of verse 36, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" is answered by verse 39, the last verse in the chapter, that nothing shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

So let's look at verse 34. The question, who is it that can condemns us drives us to think about who is the one who is the ultimate judge. Before whom will we stand? Now, as believers we know that we will stand before the bema seat, bema is a Greek word meaning a high, raised platform. This was the seat upon which judges in athletic contests would sit. There were also raised seats where the proconsul would sit and they would bring before him various cases to be tried so this was the seat of the judge. The bema seat refers to the judgment seat of Christ. Christ will judge the church and evaluate us in terms of our spiritual growth and in terms of our spiritual production. This is described in 1 Corinthians 3:14-18, talking about the fact that some of our works done in the flesh, wood, hay, and straw, versus that which is done when we walk by the Spirit, gold, silver, and precious stones, is all that survives for evaluation purpose, all that is done in the Holy Spirit.

There are several other judgments that occur at the time Jesus Christ returns to the earth. There's the Sheep and the Goat judgment. There's the judgment of the anti-Christ, the judgment of the False Prophet, the judgment of Satan where he's cast into the bottomless pit in chains for a thousand years. Then there is a subsequent judgment at the end of the Millennial Kingdom, the Great White Throne judgment. The judge at that time is Jesus Christ. We know this because of what Jesus taught in John, chapter 5:22 and 5:27. Later we'll look at Jesus Christ, Himself, as the One who has been delegated the authority to judge all things at the end of time.

During the Tribulation we have the Judgment Seat of Christ, then the judgments that occur during the Tribulation and the Great White Throne Judgment are all conducted by the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus said in John 5:22, "For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son." Now the reason the Father commits the judgment to the Son is because the Son is like us. When Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity, entered into human history and became a human being, He lived His life under the same conditions that we do with one exception. He was not born with a sin nature. He did not receive the imputation of Adam's original sin and He committed no personal sin. That was His test, whether or not He would live His life in His humanity in obedience to God the Father with dependence upon God, the Holy Spirit. He passed that test in contrast to the first Adam who failed that test.

Adam failed the test in the Garden of Eden and so Jesus Christ is born in the same condition as Adam initially without sin and yet Jesus Christ passes the test that Adam failed. So because he passed those tests and then He is eventually crucified and buried and resurrected He is elevated to the position of the right hand of God the Father. And then from there he comes, as we'll see in a second, to judge the living and the dead. He is the One who has that judgment. So we are judged by a peer, one of our own, a human being who has gone through all of the tests, all of the issues, that every human being goes through. No one can stand before Him and say, "Well, we just couldn't do it. It wasn't possible." Jesus is going to be the One who says he did it in His humanity for us. He's not living His life in a redemptive aspect but in order to demonstrate that it could be done.

So judgment is committed to the Son because He is our peer. All human beings will be judged by our peer. John 5:27 states, "And He [God the Father] gave Him [Jesus Christ] authority to execute judgment because He is the Son of Man." In that verse we have the title for Jesus that relates to His humanity. He's the Son of Man. In Hebrew idiom if you are a murderer, you would be called the son of a murderer in that you portray the attributes of a murderer. If you're a fool, you would be called the son of a fool. If you are a human being, you're the Son of Man. If you're God, you're the Son of God. So that phrase doesn't emphasize derivation or procreation as much as it indicates you participate in all of the attributes of that particular noun which is the object of the preposition. So Son of Man emphasizes His humanity.

Now in Acts 17:31, "Because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed…" Again the emphasis is on the fact that it is the humanity of Christ that is significant in relation to the judgment that He brings; not only at the Judgment Seat of Christ, but in all subsequent judgments. Then Paul says, "He has given proof [assurance] to all men by raising Him from the dead." So part of the resurrection is to show that God the Father validated Jesus in all that He did but that He is also promoting Him and elevating Him to that position to be at His right hand to be qualified for the next stage in God's plan, which is to be a judge.

It's interesting that in the early church they wrote several creeds. A creed was a distillation of their basic belief systems, summarizing it in a rather short form. One of the earliest creeds that we have written in 325 B.C. at the Council of Nicea really focused on the deity of Christ. A major part of that Creed, in the middle part which is still recited by many churches and many congregations is a focus on the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. "But for us and our salvation He came down from Heaven by the power of the Holy Spirit. He became incarnate from the Virgin Mary and was made man. For our sake He was crucified under Pontius Pilate. He suffered death and was buried. On the third day He rose again in accordance with the Scriptures and He ascended into heaven, is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and His Kingdom will have no end."

Notice how in the creed they distilled the significance of the post-crucifixion work of Christ. It focuses on His resurrection, ascension, session (to be seated), and His return to judge. Those four things are emphasized in all of those early creeds about Jesus.

Another early creed from that same time period, the 4^th century A.D., is the Athanasian Creed. It was named for Athanasius, the great Bishop of Alexandria who stood his ground against those who sought to minimize the humanity of Christ and that whole battle that took place. It seemed like the victory had been won at Nicea but it actually continued for another thirty years and there were times of defeat and victory for Athanasius. He was exiled three or four times before there was a final conclusion to the debate over understanding what the Scriptures taught on the Deity of Christ, that He was fully God and fully man. In the Athanasian Creed we read, "For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and man is one Christ." That's the hypostatic union. hupostasis is the Greek word meaning a joining in one person of both humanity and deity. So God and Man is One Christ, that unity of hupostasis who suffered for our salvation, descended into Hades, rose again the third day from the dead. He ascended into Heaven, sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty from whence He will come to judge the quick and the dead." Quick is just an Old English translation for the living. So we see this same emphasis on the same four important doctrines: the resurrection, the ascension, the session, and then coming to judge the quick and the dead. So Christ ascended to Heaven. He's validated by God the Father and He sits, not on His own throne, but as Revelation 3:21 emphasizes, He sits on the Father's throne.

He is sitting as Psalm 110 says at the right hand of the Father to await the giving of His Kingdom, based on Daniel, chapter 7. When the Ancient of Days [God the Father] gives the Kingdom to the Son of Man, then the Son of Man will return to the earth and will judge the nations of the world in their rebellion at that great final battle campaign of the tribulation of Armageddon. At that point He comes, but in the meantime He is at the right hand of the Father, which is a position of exaltation.

This is emphasized in a number of New Testament passages. I'm only going to show you five of them and just briefly touch on them to show you the importance of this doctrine in the New Testament. In Acts 2:33 in Peter's Day of Pentecost message he said, "Therefore, having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father, the promise of the Holy Spirit, He has poured forth this which you both see and hear." So the giving of the Holy Spirit is directly related to Christ's ascension and session. This is the first thing that happens after the session is that He pours out the Holy Spirit on the church.

Then in Acts 5:3, "He [Jesus Christ] is the one whom God exalted to His right hand as a Prince and a Savior to give repentance to Israel and the forgiveness of sins." Notice how the exaltation of Christ to the right hand of the Father is connected to His work as Savior and granting repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. So that's how it's expressed there, indicating God's plan for Israel in the future. That's going to be a major theme once we get into Romans, chapter 9.

Then in Ephesians 1:26 "Which He brought about in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places." The writer of Hebrews stated in 8:1, "Now the main point in what has been said is this: we have such a high priest who has taken His seat at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens." This emphasizes the fact that the focal point right now is on Christ's high priestly ministry over the church, not his kingship right now. You'll often find in a lot of contemporary choruses and hymns an emphasis on addressing Christ today as King. This is not Biblically correct. Christ is not viewed now as the King but as the high priest. His kingship comes when God the Father delegates that to Him right before the Second Coming and then He comes to assume that position. He's not identified as the King of kings and Lord of lords until He's ready to come with His kingdom in Revelation, chapter 19 at the time of the Battle of Armageddon.

So right now He's in that position of being seated at the right hand of the Father in a high priestly role. That's also emphasized in 1 Peter 3:22, "Who is at the right hand of God, having gone into heaven, after angels and authorities and powers had been subjected to Him." It's interesting because in Romans 8:38-39 Paul says that he's persuaded that all these things, angels, principalities, and powers, can't separate us from the love of God. Why? Because they're under the authority of the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ. So Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father in a high priestly ministry which focuses on His role as the one who prays for us as our intercessor. 

This is an extremely important doctrine. We've already seen in Romans 8 the Holy Spirit is the One who intercedes for us in verses 23-26. "In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words." So the Holy Spirit is the one who prays on our behalf. He helps our prayers because no matter how bright you may think you are; no matter how theologically astute you might be, what the Scripture says is that we really don't know how we ought to pray. That doesn't mean you shouldn't pray. It means that you and I just don't have omniscience. We don't really understand all the facts so God the Holy Spirit helps us. He's sort of our Divine simultaneous translator to straighten out our prayers on their way to the throne of grace.

We don't pray to the Holy Spirit. Every now and then I hear people who pray to the Holy Spirit but you don't pray to the one who intercedes for you. You pray to the one they are praying to. The same is true with the Lord Jesus Christ. He's our intercessor. You don't pray to the Lord Jesus Christ. He prays to the Father for us. We don't pray to Him. We pray to the Father. Lot of people aren't clear on this concept. I had a discussion with a pastor some years ago and he was under the impression that the only reason people said that you only pray to the Father was because in every example Jesus gave of prayer he said to pray to the Father. Well, Jesus wouldn't pray to Himself so that argument doesn't follow, this man believed. That's true but the point that he missed was that's not the traditional strong argument here. The argument is you don't pray to the intercessor. You pray to the Father and the intercessor is the one praying along with you or on your behalf. Just like if you're talking to someone through a translator, you don't talk to the translator, you talk to the person you're talking to and the translator is the one translating what you're saying.

There are two keys verses on the intercession of Christ. One is Hebrews 7:25 which emphasizes His intercessory advocacy, "Therefore He is able also to save forever those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them." So He is continually interceding for us. This is another tremendous verse on eternal security that He is the One who brings our salvation to completion and He is the One who stands as our advocate with the Father. This is brought out even more in 1 John 2:1, "My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin." So right there He's showing that one of the purposes for learning doctrine and for studying the Word is so that we don't sin. It's not so that we can sin and then utilize grace to get out of it or to be forgiven but we are to study so that we do not sin. And if we do, which we will, not because we're permissive but because we recognize that we all have sin natures. "… And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world."

Christ stands as a defense attorney, advocating for us with the Father because when Satan attempts to condemn us for our sin then Jesus Christ, as it were, points to the fact that we have received His perfect righteousness and because of that our sin is no longer an issue. So He intercedes for us. In that sense, as we look at Romans 8:34, "Who is it that condemns?" No one because the judge is the Lord Jesus Christ and the Lord Jesus Christ is our peer, our intercessor, our advocate, and so no one can bring a charge that would stick because He has paid for our sin.

Now we come to the next verse. Verse 35 asking the next question, the sixth rhetorical question, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" This is followed up by a second rhetorical question which is the seventh in our list which focuses our attention a little more on what possible answers there might be of things that could separate us from God. In the sixth question the Greek word separate is chorizo. In the translation it looks like a Spanish sausage, chorizo, but it's not. I always remembered that word by the Spanish word because I needed little memory devices to remember the words. This is a word only used eleven times in the New Testament so I thought of sausage. When you make sausage you first have to divide up all the different whatever you put into the sausage before you blend it so that's how I would always remember the meaning of this word which is to divide or to separate. That's the idea here.

Who will separate us? It's a future tense verb so Paul is saying what possible thing could happen in the future that could ever separate us or divide us from the love of Christ? This phrase "love of Christ" is an accurate translation of the verb agape. It could be taken as love from Christ or love toward Christ and it should be understood here as love from Christ which is an objective genitive. It is Christ's love for us just as we'll see in verse 39 where it's God's love for us. The question is, is there anything that can conceivably separate us from God? Once we are saved, is there any way we could lose our salvation? Is there anything that we could possibly do that could cause God's love to kick us out of the family?

Paul does everything he can in verses 35 and then again in verse 38 to talk about the fact that nothing can possibly do this. I just want you to think a little bit about the construction of these two verses, separated by verses 36 and 37. He says in verse 35 "Who will separate us from the love from Christ?" Then he lists seven things: tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, and sword. All of those that can happen to us in this life, up to the point of death.

When we get to verses 38 and 39 he's going to add ten more things but these are things that are beyond the physical realm and would be beyond the material realm. Death and life. Notice they're pairs, except for one which is a three-element. These are known as a figure of speech called a merism. A merism is, for example, when Scripture says, "God created the heaven and the earth." Is there anything not included with those two extremes? The heavens represents the extremes of the skies, and the earth is the finite globe on which we live. Day and night. We are to meditate on God's Word day and night. Is there anything time frame left out of that? By using the two opposites it brings together the totality of what lies between those two opposites. So we have those pairs, and in one case three things, that indicate a totality of environments.

"I am persuaded that neither death, nor life…" This includes all our existence. Then "…angels." That refers to the elect angels, the holy angels. "…principalities or powers…" That refers to the hierarchy of the demonic powers. "…Nor things present, nor things to come…" That includes anything now, anything that could come up in the future. That again covers the totality of things. "…Nor height, nor depth…" Two opposites with everything in between.  "…nor any other created thing…" Just in case anything was left out.

Paul is saying in these two lists that anything that could conceivably happen in this life up to the point of death, and anything beyond death is covered. Every possible contingency is covered and there is nothing at all that can separate us from the love of Christ. That is because God's love for us in Christ is not based on who we are. It's not based on what we've done because we're still sinners after we're saved. We still commit sin. We can still commit sins as evil and wicked as any sin we committed before we were saved. If you're like me and you were very young when you were saved then you really didn't have the opportunity to exploit your sin nature a whole lot before you were saved. That came later, trust me. We all exploit our sin natures and we become quite good and crafty at that. Even after we're saved. But we're saved, not because of who we are or what we've done, but because we have Christ's righteousness. That's our legal possession so God's love for us is based upon our possession of the righteousness of Christ. That wasn't ever based on anything we can do. So if we didn't do anything to gain it, we can't do anything to lose it.

On the flip side, think about this: if you can do something to lose it, trust me, somewhere in the web of a person's theology who believes that you can do something to lose your salvation, they're hiding works somewhere; because if you can do something to lose your salvation, somehow you're doing something to get it. And that always seems to go together.

So let's look at this list of things that come out of our day-to-day life experiences that Paul lists here as potential things that could separate us from the love of Christ. The first two are tribulation and distress. These words often are used together as synonyms describing the totality of facing the challenges, the difficulties, the heartaches of life, all that we think of in terms of adversity. Both in terms of the external circumstances that are adverse and hostile to us as well as our inner reactions to those things. The first word is thlipsis which is a word that refers to trouble that brings about distress, oppression, affliction, depression, or tribulation. These are the ways in which the word is translated.

It is sometimes used to talk about the persecution and the distress that occurs during that period we refer to as the Tribulation even though that's not the best term to describe it. That is the term that's become the popular word for describing the seven-year period known in the Old Testament as the Time of Jacob's wrath, the time of the seventieth week of Daniel in the vision Daniel had in the time God was giving to Israel.

So thlipsis simply refers in a general sense to any sort of distressing circumstances emphasizing both external, the horrors of the external circumstances and situations as well as the internal anxiety and fear or distress that it brings about. The second word, stenochoria, also emphasizes a set of stressful circumstances and is usually translated as distress, difficulty, anguish, trouble, or affliction. The words overlap one another so by using both of them together it pretty much covers the spectrum of any kind of negative difficulty. In 2 Corinthians 6:4 Paul writes, "But in everything commending ourselves as servants of God, in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses…" Here we have both words used, tribulations is the word thlipsis, and distresses is the word stenochoria. Numerous times these are used together.

Then the next word that is used is diogmos which indicates external persecution of opposition for our faith in Christ. 2 Thessalonians 1:4, Paul says, "For we ourselves boast of you among the churches of God for your patience [endurance, hupomones] and faith in all your persecutions, diogmos, and tribulations, thlipsis, you endured." Notice how in many other passages you get this same collection of words that we have here.

Then the next word is limos, indicating hunger or famine, just going without enough food. Paul and the others, when traveling from city to city things could occur to make it take them longer than they expected. They might get trapped by inclement weather and not have enough supplies with them so they would go without. The next word gumnotes, is translated naked in modern Greek. We think of that as someone stripped of all their clothes. That's not the main idea of this word at this time in history. It more often meant just being without adequate clothing. So it was used metaphorically for destitution so Paul was left without quite enough food, going hungry at times, and at other times he didn't have enough clothes on his back. He might get caught out in weather where it was colder, didn't have enough clothes with him. Maybe some of these times happened when he was shipwrecked and other disasters so he lost what he had. So that's the emphasis there: the loss of the details of life.

Then we have kindunos meaning physical hazards, dangers, and risk and machaira, which is sword. Sword is often used metaphorically or figuratively for bringing about death. So when he talks about peril or sword, it means his life was in peril or was threatened. Now a passage that describes many of these kinds of circumstances Paul underwent is a passage you should be familiar with. I want us to read through this in 2 Corinthians 11:23. As we read this I want you to think about not just the ministry for pastors, for missionaries, for the apostles, and what is involved in serving the Lord. It's not limited to apostles, or pastors, or teachers or missionaries. This is something we are all called to do because that's the point of the passage in Romans 8 as we are called to serve the Lord no matter what it might cost us. So Paul rehearses some of the adversities he faced. He's asking these rhetorical questions because he's been coming under attack from his critics in Corinth. They've been criticizing him for any number of things so he says, "Are they servants (ministers) of Christ?—I speak as a fool—I am more so; in far more labors…" He is indicating the ministry requires labor.

Sad to say, there are too many who use it as an excuse for laziness but there are those who do that. "…in far more imprisonments, beaten times without number, often in danger of death." This refers to being flogged, being flagellated as a punishment. We only know of a few times Paul was put in jail or prison but according to this there were many more circumstances where he was under attack by local populations and was thrown into jail for a night or more. He then says, "Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine stripes [forty stripes minus one].' Five different times. We don't know of any of those. They're not recorded in the book of Acts, except for maybe the one in Laodicea. The Mishnah said you couldn't whip more than forty times so they always subtracted one in case they miscounted. So five times he was flagellated forty stripes, minus one.

Verse 25 says, "Three times I was beaten with rods…" In the south we used to call that a caning. It happened one time on the floor of Congress. Congress used to be much more physically violent than it is today. A bunch of wienies are up there now. They just yell words at each other but back in what has been called "the good old days of the early 19^th century", there were occasions when one congressman would get so angry with another that he would take his cane and beat the other one. So we just think things are violent today.

Verse 25 continues, "…once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep." Only one shipwreck is recorded in the book of Acts. Verse 27, "I have been on frequent journeys..." Paul was always on the road. I wonder if anyone has ever added up how many miles the Apostle Paul walked. "…in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the sea, dangers among false brethren." Verse 27 continues, "I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger, in thirst, in fasting often…" That's not necessarily fasting for prayer. In the context that would be going without food. "… in cold and exposure." In other words, not having the right clothing appropriate to the weather. In verse 28, he says, "Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches."

Now there's another passage in 1 Corinthians where he has a similar list of things. In 1 Corinthians 4:9-13 he said, "For I think that God has displayed (exhibited) us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men." See our witness is not only to other human beings but also before the angels. He went on in verse 10, "We are fools for Christ's sake but you are prudent (wise) in Christ; we are weak but you are strong, you are distinguished but we are without honor." He's being sarcastic here because the Corinthians thought they knew so much. In verses 11–13, he says, "To this present hour we are both hungry and thirsty, and are poorly clothed and are roughly treated (beaten) and are homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands; when we are reviled, we bless, when we are persecuted we endure; when we are slandered (defamed) we try to conciliate (entreat); we have become as scum (the filth of the world), the dregs of all things until now." 

So you see there are many negative circumstances that can occur, not that they will but that they can occur in the Christian life. In fact in 1 Timothy, chapter 4, Paul told Timothy that "those who desire to be godly will endure suffering." So this is something that is part of the Christian life. As we read in Romans 8:17 if we are going to advance and mature in the Christian life and if we are going to be rewarded as joint-heirs with Christ then we will go through suffering in this life as we seek to obey the Lord and live out the Christian life.

This is the picture we have as described in Romans 8:35 but Paul's point is that none of these things that we face mean we are separated from the love of Christ. How often when people go through hard times when they lose loved ones and near ones and dear ones due to death, when those around them fail them and disappoint them, become hostile to them, betray them, that they think God has somehow betrayed them because life has become so difficult. But the reality is that none of these things indicate that we are separated from the love of Christ. In fact, they may very well demonstrate that it is God's love that is maintaining us, and keeping us, and providing for us, in the midst of all that difficulty, just as God provided for the Israelites in the wilderness when they were under divine discipline. Now all of this can be a form of discipline, it can be negative as punishment, but it can also be positive as God is using these negative circumstances to build Christ-like character in our lives.

Then we come to Romans 8:36, "As it is written, "For your sake we are being put to death all day long; we were considered as sheep to be slaughtered." This is from Psalm 44:22. Psalm 44 is a psalm dealing with an event, not sure which event it is, in the life of Israel. It's a time when they are facing military disaster, a time when the people's security is threatened and they are crying out in lament to God in confusion because it seems as if God has deserted them and they are forgotten by Him. There are just a couple of things I want to point out. The things that they mention in this Psalm beginning in verse one, "We've heard with our ears, O God. Our fathers have told us." So this is going back to the time of the exodus. "The work that You did in their days, in the days of old. You with Your own hand drove out the nations [the time of the conquest]. Then you planted them, You afflicted the people [removing the Canaanites from the land]. Then You spread them abroad for they did not gain possession of the land by their own sword and their own arm did not save them. But it was Your right hand and Your arm and the light of Your presence, for You favored them." In other words they're reminding God that He gave them the land. It wasn't something they earned by their own military might or strength but because God gave them the victory. Then in verses 4 and following they restate their confidence in God, "You are my King, O God; Command victories for Jacob. Through You we will push down our adversaries. Through Your name we will trample down those who rise up against us. For I will not trust in my bow, nor will my sword save me."

In other words it's not against technology; it's not against military training, but it's pointing out that's not the solution ultimately. It's God and trusting in Him. It goes on to say, "You have saved us from our adversaries, and You have put to shame those who hate us." In God we have boasted all day long." But now the problem is stated in verse 9, "Yet You have rejected us and brought us to dishonor, and do not go out with our armies." This is a time of military defeat. "You cause us to turn back from the adversary; and those who hate us have taken spoil for themselves. You give us as sheep to be eaten and have scattered us among the nations." This very likely could be referring to a time after the Babylonian captivity. There's a lot of debate among scholars as to when this was written. We don't know because there's no indication in the text. "You make us a reproach to our neighbors; a scoffing and derision to those around us." They're going through suffering, tribulation, adversity, persecution; all of these things.

That's the context for this quote from verse 22 which reads in the Psalm, "But for Your sake we are killed all day long; we are considered as sleep to be slaughtered. Arouse Yourself, why do You sleep, O Lord? Awake, do not cast us off forever. Why do You hide Your face and forget our affliction and our oppression? For our soul is bowed down to the dust; our body cleaves to the ground, Arise and be our help…" The point is that they're making is that as we serve God, even our own lives become a sacrifice and an offering for the plan of God."

This reminds me of three verses that we find in the New Testament related to our lives being a sacrifice. One familiar verse that comes to mind is Romans 12:1. Then in Philippians 2:17 it says, "But even if am being poured out as a drink offering…" Paul recognized his life, as he was in prison at the time, was a sacrifice to God. "…poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I rejoice and share my joy with you all…" Near the end of the next imprisonment in Rome he says, "For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come." Then one of my favorite verses in times of difficulty is Job's statement in Job 13:15, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him…" That no matter how bad things appear nevertheless I'm still going to trust in God.

In Romans 8:37 Paul moves on and says, "But in all these things…" Now what is the "all things" we're talking about in this chapter? It's suffering, the suffering we endure for Christ, suffering with Him. "But in all these things (all suffering and adversity) we are more than conquerors (not just the noun nike where the athletic shoe get its name it's hupernike, the one who is the superior overcomer, the uber-conquerer) in all these things we are uber-conquerers through Him who loved us."

See if we face adversity on the basis of God's provision for us, then no matter what happens, even if our life is lost in the process, God is glorified and this brings honor to Him and this is part of His plan. And then Paul concludes by saying, "For I am convinced (persuaded) that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height, nor death, nor any other created things, will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." The verb that is used at the beginning is peitho meaning I am persuaded, I have come to a conclusion on the basis of evaluating all of the facts, I am convinced of something as being absolutely true. Coming from the Apostle Paul, this isn't him just expressing a human opinion but under the inspiration of God He is expressing the Divine viewpoint that all of the information, all of the evidence we have is such that we can have no other conclusion except that nothing in God's creation can possibly separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. For if we trust in Him, then Christ's righteousness is ours, God loves us because of that righteousness, not because of anything we've done but because of what Christ did. On that basis we're saved so circumstances, whether in this life or beyond this life, no circumstance, no situation can threaten our security in Christ.

I've already pointed out that these circumstances are set in groups of opposites to indicate the totality of the circumstances so that nothing can possibly separate us. It's the same word here, chorizo, that is used back in verse 35 where it says, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" Here's the answer. Nothing shall be able to, in the future, nothing shall be able to separate us from the love from God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. And that emphasizes that it's not the love from God which is in you. It's not focused on you; it's not focused on me; it's focused on the fact that we are in Christ, and because we are in Christ and we have Christ's righteousness we can't be separated from the love of God.

But there might be an objection. There might be some in Rome who were Jewish-background believers who might say, "Well, that is fine and well, but it looks like the Jewish people have suffered a lot of persecution and suffering and distress and they're under the heel of Rome and it looks like God has forgotten them. So if God has forgotten them, how can we be sure that God won't forget us?" That's the lesson that Paul answers starting in the next chapter where He's going to demonstrate that God's love for Israel has not faltered either, even though they are now going through distress and adversity and tribulation. God's love will eventually bring them to salvation, as well. So next time we'll come back and start with chapter 9.