More than Conquerors

Reading:  Romans 8:31-40
    
    We are in rarified air here.  Paul steps back from his arguments and gapes in wonder at what all this means.  “What shall we say to these things?  If God is for us, who can be against us?”(Rom 8:31).  We were God’s enemies, but he has bridged that gap and we are now at peace.  More than that, God is for us, actively seeking our good and receiving us as sons.  “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?”(Rom 8:32).  If he has already given us the greatest gift, how would he withhold anything that is for our good?  Paul then takes us to the courtroom where the prosecuting attorney has instead exonerated us (Rom 8:33) and the judge is pleading our case for us (Rom 8:34).  The very ones we should fear most are on our side!  If God is for us, who can be against us?

    Yet Paul remains well aware that these gifts do not eliminate trouble from everyday life.  “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?  Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?  As it is written, ‘For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered’”(Rom 8:35-36).  Paul himself regularly deals with these hardships, but he insists that Jesus’ love puts them in their proper context.  The only true threat of these problems is that they might “separate us from the love of Christ,” which they are thankfully powerless to do.  “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.  For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord”(Rom 8:37-39).  Just as Jesus has overcome sin and death, so we will overcome these physical struggles with his help.  He will love and bless us.  No force on earth can stop it.

    In Christ, we are “more than conquerors”—fully able to defeat the sufferings of life and persecutions of God’s enemies.  Of course we can always choose to walk away from Jesus and the gifts he offers, but no power or circumstance can remove us from him.  When the dust settles on all our pain, he will still love and bless us.  No force on earth can stop it.

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One Thing to Think About:  Do I struggle to believe that God is for me? 

One Thing to Pray For:  A deeper connection to the love of Christ
 

All Things Work Together for Good

Reading:  Romans 8:26-30
    
    As we await our future glorification, we groan in anticipation.  “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness.  For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.  And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God”(Rom 8:26-27).  The Spirit also groans along with us.  He groans as he intercedes for us, communicating to the Father what we struggle to say because “we do not know what to pray for as we ought.”  Especially does the focus on his groanings (v. 26) imply that he listens to our hearts and more than just our words, taking them to the throne of God.  God understands us fully—especially the great passions and longings of our hearts—thanks to the intercession of the Spirit.

    Contemplating this blessing leads Paul to a general statement:  “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose”(Rom 8:28).  This is less a promise that everything in life will work out and more a declaration of God’s consistent focus on our good.  He has done so much to benefit us:  sending Jesus, setting us free from sin, sustaining us through the Spirit, promising us great things, and hearing our prayers.  “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.  And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified”(Rom 8:29-30).  God has planned for us—foreknowing and predestining us so that we would be like Jesus.  He has then called us and declared us innocent and glorified us (the great promise we still await).  He has made it all good for us!

    Christians are the most tremendously blessed of all people.  God has shown his goodwill to us in every way and has promised greater glory to come!  Life now may not be ideal, but when we love God, he works things for our ultimate good.

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One Thing to Think About:  What emotions are these thoughts intended to produce in me? 

One Thing to Pray For:  To be further conformed to the image of Jesus (v. 29)
 

Groaning in Hope

Reading:  Romans 8:18-25
    
    As children of God, we stand to inherit with Christ—as long as we are willing to suffer with him.  “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us”(Rom 8:18).  That hope of glory buoys us through the sufferings and difficulties of our present life.  Something great is coming!  It’s going to happen to me!  “For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God”(Rom 8:19).  Paul speaks of inanimate creation longing for the consummation of God’s plan to redeem the bodies (Rom 8:23) of his sons.  Alongside our glorification, there is some kind of hope for the creation:  “that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God”(Rom 8:21).  What this will look like is not spelled out here, but Paul hints that the coming age might not mean the end of the material creation.

    This longing is described vividly as groaning.  “For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now”(Rom 8:22).  Something great is coming!  “And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies”(Rom 8:23).  We also groan because we are awaiting a better body—one redeemed and free from the taint of death and decay that comes from sin.  But our groaning is not merely complaining and frustration.  It is groaning in hope because we are assured that something better is coming that is not worth comparing to our present sufferings.

    Christians must do more than express discontent with the current state of things.  We must groan in hope—renewing our belief that something better is coming, reminding ourselves of how glorious it will be, and steeling ourselves for the time in which we must wait.

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One Thing to Think About:  Do I believe that the best is yet to come? 

One Thing to Pray For:  A spirit of hopeful groaning
 

Heirs of God

Reading:  Romans 8:12-17
    
    Since it is the Spirit (not the flesh) that offers hope of eternal life (Rom 8:11), Christians are obligated to live now by following the Spirit.  “So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.  For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live”(Rom 8:12-13).  The paths here are clear:  living by the flesh produces death while following the Spirit brings life (now and in the future).  Yet we also learn that we gain power by the Spirit to eliminate our old ways of living (“by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body”) that we did not have before coming to Jesus (Rom 7:18).

    But the Spirit also confirms a new relationship we have with God.  “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba!  Father!’”(Rom 8:15).  God has sent us his Spirit in part to confirm to us that we are more than simply his servants.  He is not merely our master.  We are adopted sons and daughters, welcomed into his family and honored to call him Father.  “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him”(Rom 8:16-17).   As God’s children, we also stand to receive the blessings of the family.  Alongside Jesus (!), we bask in the approval of the Father and anticipate the prospect of future glory (Rom 8:17).  This assurance drives us through times of suffering because we remember that Jesus suffered before his own exaltation.

    When we live according to the flesh, the “spirit of slavery” bears witness with our spirit that we are unworthy of God’s favor or blessing.  We deserve death.  Yet when we are set free to live according to the Spirit—when we start using his power to eliminate evil from our hearts and bodies—the spirit of adoption speaks alongside our own spirits that God has bigger plans for us.  He longs to bless us and make us his heirs.  So we suffer now and keep following the Spirit, knowing the great glory that awaits us.

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One Thing to Think About:  Why does suffering often precede glory (Rom 8:17)? 

One Thing to Pray For:  A deeper awareness of my acceptance as God’s child
 

The Hope of the Spirit

Reading:  Romans 8:5-11
    
    Paul has been arguing that Christians can’t keep sinning because we have died to (Rom 7:4) and been set free from (Rom 8:2) the Law of Moses.  We now have a new allegiance.  “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit”(Rom 8:5).  “Setting the mind” stresses the things we choose to continually think about and give our allegiance to.  Our minds have changed.  We do not think in worldly ways—or even in ways we once did.  “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot”(Rom 8:7).  Rather than remaining “hostile to God,” we focus on the Spirit and his leading. 

    We set our minds on the Spirit because he dwells in us as a sign that we belong to Christ. “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you.  Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.  But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.  If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you”(Rom 8:9-11).    So despite our past history in sin (“the body is dead because of sin”) we still have hope of a resurrected body through the regenerating power of the Spirit (“the Spirit is life because of righteousness”).  The hope of the Spirit is that the same power that raised Jesus will raise our bodies.  With such a hope, how could we go back to sin?

    Setting our minds on spiritual things will mean renewing ourselves in the hope the Spirit holds out for us.  My body is continually giving in to decay, but he will “give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you”(Rom 8:11).  This hope also creates a new perspective on sin:  that it could rob me of the incredible gift God offers me through Jesus.

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One Thing to Think About:  What is my mind “set” on?

One Thing to Pray For:  Renewal of the hope of the resurrection of my body