Only God can love you like this

ONLY GOD CAN LOVE YOU LIKE THIS

Back in the years before I was married I convinced some friends to take a trip with me. One friend suggested we explore the Badlands of Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. I had never been there but thought, “Why not?”

            What I had not considered were the rougher elements of the Badlands. For one thing, it was really hot. As well there were rattle snake warnings everywhere. Then there were the free-roaming buffalo who we found out did not like to be disturbed when they were grazing. My friend beat a hasty retreat when he quietly snuck up on one and got too close. The startled animal raised its massive head and pawed the ground giving my brave friend a clue.

            Most memorable was the five mile hike we embarked upon. Beginning low in the valley we trudged through remarkable but rugged country. It was so hot that even the water in our canteens seemed to boil. Every now and then my friend, knowing my paranoia of rattlers, would make a rattling sound. Added to that were these little hoppers who also sounded like rattlers.

            After a good two hours of suffering we reached the summit of the enormous hill we were climbing. All the weariness, sweat and toil were whipped away by a cool wind and, more so, the breathtaking view I had scarcely expected.

            If you have ever climbed a hill or mountain, straining to get to the top, forgetting why you bothered, then suddenly being amazed by the unfolding drama of the view before you, you know what I am talking about.

            Romans 8 is the pinnacle of the letter of Romans. You have trudged through the argument of Paul explaining salvation. You have climbed through rough parts, especially when your sin was put before you and you had to deal with it. Now you have reached the summit of this theological mountain and you are going to find the view breathtaking. What you will see is the astounding love of God and what it means for you. It ought to take your breath away. All the toil of the first seven chapters is now rewarded with the reason we embarked on this journey: to understand how much God loves you. And only God can love you like this.

1. God works for those he loves

 Paul presented us with the problem of our sin and our separation from God in the first three chapters of Romans. Then he revealed God’s answer to this problem in chapters 5 and 6, Jesus dying for our sins while we were yet sinners. In chapter 8 we are told how the Spirit works in our lives helping us to live for Christ and even groaning in prayer for us (8:26). Now we are told that God himself even works for us. So Jesus died for us, the Spirit prays for us and God works for us.       Romans 8:28 has been called the pillow on which we rest our heads. It tells us how God is working for us in all the things we experience. When we grow weary from the struggle and wonder if God cares we remember this verse.

            Let’s consider the bones of this favorite verse:

a) God works – Paul begins with an assumption that he is presenting something we all know. “And we know that in all things God works…” He is at work in our lives. We may need to reject the KJV “all things work together for good” because we know that all things do not always work out great. All things do not work themselves into a pattern of good. Sometimes things blow up and there is no good reason or wonderful outcome. But we do know that in all things God works.

b) For the good – God is working for the good. We can see in this our sanctification. God is working to make us into the image of his Son Jesus Christ. That is his primary work. God is not the cause of all things; not every event that happens is good or will produce good. But if we take every event together we see God at work producing good. It is like the ingredients in a cake. They are not real tasty on their own – flour, sugar, eggs, shortening and so on. But mix them together, bake it for the right amount we produce a delicious cake. One event does not define your life. God takes the sum total of your life, mixes it with his overall purpose and the lives of all the saints and produces something amazing.

c) In everything – Again, we cannot make “all things” the object of this sentence as if “God works everything for good.” Instead we should read “all things” as “in everything God works for good.” We may not see the good in tragedy, accidents, or broken relationships. We don’t see good because it isn’t there. But God is able to work something out of tragedy for good.

d) For those who love him – Here is an important limitation. God does not work for everyone’s good but only those who love him. That does not mean that God does not desire good for the unbeliever. It’s just that those who love him are receptive to the good work that God does for them. The unbeliever may actually be rejecting the work of God. So God works for those who love him.

e) Called according to his purpose – Our love for God is a response to God’s love for us. His purpose was to show us his love and create a people out of us who would serve him and bring him glory. Despite the mess our world seems to be in, God has a saving purpose for it and is working to complete it.

            The reason we fail to understand this verse is because we think it is all about us and our problems. In truth it is more about God and his work for us. We don’t always understand what God is doing; we don’t always welcome it; we are sometimes in great discomfort – we even groan; but we know that God is working for our ultimate good.

            Like many verses we often try to make it mean something that it does not mean. When someone suffers loss others may try to comfort with this verse and suggest that God has a reason for the loss. We make it too specific to our particular hurts at times that we come close to blaming God for our misfortune. Instead of “God works…” we read “God causes…” and presume that God was orchestrating our tragedy. Now we know that we are being too specific. In our pain we grab onto this verse and cling to the idea that everything has to have a meaning. What it really tells us is that we have a God who is working out a good conclusion that will benefit all his children. In the end it will all be clear.

2. God’s work for those he loves

The work God does for those he loves is explained in these next verses. “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified” (29-30).

            God’s good and saving purpose is found in these two verses. Here we find five stages of our salvation beginning with the mind of God and finishing with the glory yet to be revealed. This is the work that God does for you and me.

a) Those God foreknew – In both Greek and English the word “foreknew” is made up of two smaller words “knowledge” and “before.” Together it means to know something before it happens. Human foreknowledge is based on patterns; something that has happened before will likely happen again in the same way (eg. The sun rising tomorrow).

            God’s foreknowledge is different. The Hebrew verb “to know” is not merely intellectual but personal. God “knows” his people in a personal way. He watches over them because he loved and chose them before the creation of the world. Does God know beforehand who will believe? This is probably the wrong question to ask. It depends more on our believing than on God’s sovereign choice to love us.

b) Those he predestined – Again we run into the concept that God knew before we did that we would believe. Rather than see it that way we should consider that God decided beforehand that we should believe in his Son. That doesn’t mean that we don’t have a choice. It does mean that God decided for us before we decided for Christ. The emphasis is on God’s grace; it pleased him to choose us for his family. He has decided beforehand that we should become like Jesus. Whether we want to or not is up to us. But this work begins with God and not with us.

c) Those he called – God knew beforehand that he wanted us. He decided a long time ago that he would transform us into the likeness of his Son. Now in human history the call to accept this foreknowledge and decision goes out in the preaching of the gospel. When we respond to the call in faith and obedience, we know God has chosen us. That is, everyone is called to salvation, the Holy Spirit works to woo us and win us to Christ, but only some accept this call. Those who accept, we have to say, are chosen because their faith is wakened. This is known as an effective calling.

d) Those he justified – When we believed in Jesus we were justified. It happened the very moment you had faith in the Son of God. You were set free and declared not guilty. We have talked a great deal about this in previous chapters. Jesus became sin for us so that we did not have to pay the penalty of death.

e) Those he glorified – This is the final stage of God’s work on our behalf. We have not yet experienced this completely. To be glorified means to be clothed with the glory that God himself has. We fall short of God’s glory on our own but our hope in Jesus is that we will recover this glory when he returns. Remember that if we share in his sufferings we will also share in his glory. The work of making us like Jesus leads to glory; glory is the realization someday that we reached that goal.

            This is what’s happening to you and me. Everything that happens to us in our lives, whether we understand it or not, somehow fits into the grand plan of God to accomplish these five stages. This is the story of our salvation. This is what God wants to do for us. He does it every day, every moment of our lives, like a patient artist working on his craft. He is a carver, a sculptor, a potter and a weaver. You are his work of art.

            Five years ago in Efes, Turkey, Sharon and I visited a carpet factory. Young ladies spent hours a day working on carpets, learning their craft and perfecting their techniques. Some carpets took 6 months like the one we bought; others took up to two years and cost over ten thousand dollars.

            Quality work takes time. Quality work is a labor of love. God’s work for those he loves is not always humanly visible, but it is supremely effective. You are that work.

3. God’s love seen in the work of Christ

One event we do see the work of God quite clearly is in the Cross of Christ. Paul leads up to this revelation of God’s love by asking five rhetorical questions. These are questions that don’t need answering because the answer is obvious.

Paul’s Five Questions:

1) Who can be against us? This question begins with “if” but it doesn’t mean that God might or might not be against us. It could read, “Since God is for us, who can be against us?” God is for us. He is not against us. In the OT God said to Israel “I am against you” because of sin. But we have been foreknown, predestined, called, justified and glorified. God is not against us. All the powers of hell could be against us, but so what? God is for us.

2) Do we lack anything? Sure there are things we need. Our mortgages need paying; we need jobs and security. Will God provide? Paul points to the Cross and says, “God gave up his Son for you, won’t he give you everything else you need too?”

3) Can anyone bring charges against us? The follow up declares “It is God who justifies.” Picture in this verse a court of law. The Father’s Son would have been our prosecutor and brought significant charges against us. Instead, the Son took our place and paid the penalty for sin. Having been raised from the dead, the prosecutor has left his seat on one side of the court and moved to our side to become our defense attorney. The only one who could have accused us resigned. Our condemner became our Savior and Defender. So who is left to bring charges against us? Our conscience accuses us. Satan slanders us. Friends betray us and expose our faults. But Jesus objects to every accusation to declare us “not guilty.”

4) Can anyone condemn us? Again, our hearts condemn us for not meeting the standards we have set for ourselves. But all condemnations fall flat because of Jesus. Paul gives a short Christology in response to this question: Jesus died – rose to life – sat down at the right hand of God – intercedes for us (34). On this basis there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (8:1-2).

5) Can anyone separate us from Christ’s love? Martin Lloyd-Jones said, “We are climbing a grand staircase here” and this is the top step. This is the ultimate question. “Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?” (35). How about suffering and death (36)? None of these difficulties separates us from Christ.

Paul responds to this last question with a grand declaration:
a) We are more than conquerors – He says, “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (37). This is an interesting phrase. “We are more than conquerors” is one word in Greek: hupernikomen. Nikos is Greek for “victory” and where the running shoe Nike gets its inspiration. If we were to translate this word crudely it might come out as “hyper-victorious.” In other words, we are “super-conquerors” because of Jesus Christ on the cross. In all these things, trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, violence or any other difficulty we have the victory in Jesus and no one can take it away. Before you even face trouble, whatever the future holds – cancer, accidents, or tragedy – you already have the victory.

            Some of these circumstances threaten to overwhelm us at times. We do not feel victorious when we get bad news or experience disappointment. Satan likes to steal our joy when life gets that tough. It’s hard to feel like a conqueror when your baby dies, or your teen is hooked on drugs. Nevertheless, the reality in Christ our Savior is that you are absolutely victorious because of his love.

b) Nothing can separate us from God’s love – Paul is that sure about our status. He wrote, “For I am convinced…” He is convinced, fully and absolutely persuaded on the basis of evidence that cannot be denied… “that neither death nor life (death is the great separator from loved ones), neither angels nor demons (no spiritual force of any kind), neither the present nor the future (the past is dealt with, present and future are in God’s hands), nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (38-39).

            There is no place you can go to run away from the love of God. As the Psalmist confessed, “Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me and your right hand will hold me fast” (Ps 139:7-10).

            God could never love you more than he already does. And, God could never love you any less than he already does. You can’t get any more of God’s love, because God IS Love. We may think that God will love us more if we swear less, drink less, sin less. We may think God will love us more if we pray more, read our Bibles more, attend church more and live a better life. While these might be an indicator of your love for God…they don’t change God’s love for you one bit. Because God already loves you more than you could ever imagine.

            And nothing in this universe can ever separate you from the love of God that we know through Jesus Christ on the Cross.

• When you sit at the bedside of a loved one who is racked with pain or disease … God still loves you.

• When you sit at the graveside after losing one who has touched your heart and life … God still loves you.

• When you weep because your financial burdens seem too heavy to bear … God still loves you.

• When you see your family torn apart, or your marriage heading for disaster … God still loves you.

• When your heart aches because of a great sin you’ve committed, and you feel that God could never forgive you … God still loves you.

Let us confess this together:

Since God is for us, who can be against us? No one!

Will not God graciously give us all things? Yes!

Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? No one!

Who is he that condemns? No one!

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? No one!

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord!

Only God can love you like this…                                                    

                                                                        AMEN