Victory over Suffering
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2012 · 8 April 2012
Many people do not know what will happen after they die. Many believe that living forever and heaven are just dreams and not real. But Jesus Himself proved to us through many witnesses that He is alive right now and that He has prepared a place for us believers in heaven so that we will be with Him always.
We've been talking about eternal security in an insecure world, and can we believe our true spiritual security? We've studied Paul’s answer in Romans 8: 28 to 30. We have learned that God is causing all things in the life of those who love him and are called according to his purpose to work for good. And we have seen God prove that, because Jesus Christ has risen, Amen?
Let us see what we learned from God through Paul, “29whomever he foreknew he predestined to become conformed to the image of his Son that he might be the chief one among many brethren. 30Whom he predestined these he also called, whom he called these he also justified, and whom he justified these he also glorified.”
God has a wonderful plan. His plan was to create a family of children that are all like Jesus, so that we can live forever with God in heaven. Once God has determined who they are He will bring them to their glorious end, so that nothing that happens in their lives can work for evil. We will have victory over suffering just like Christ.
Romans 8:31-39 explains this tonight. And it begins with where we have already been and that is in verse 31, “What then shall we say to these things?” What are all these matters of security, the purposes of God with regard to foreknowledge, predestination, calling, justification and glorification? What do we say to this plan of God to conform us ultimately to the image of his Son?
We say this: If that is God's plan then nobody can stop it. Now the Apostle Paul anticipates that some people may have problems with this and they may bring up objections, that there may be some person, or there may be some circumstance that can cause the purpose of God to be diverted.
There are people who have always believed that this salvation, which is granted in Christ can be lost. So Paul, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, wants to address this objection that some person or some circumstance could cause the forfeiture of this plan.
And first of all he wants to talk about persons and that is the subject of verses 31 to 34. Is there some human person who can cause us to loose our salvation by being against us? If God who resurrected Jesus is for us who can succeed against us?
They're always going to be people who want to assault God’s doctrine of salvation by grace alone, by faith alone in Christ alone and say that this is not enough. There are people who do not believe the bible and feel that they have to do more to be saved. The Roman Catholic Church adds good works as a requirement to salvation and thinks they have power over salvation by ex-communication. They think they can take people out of a state of grace and put them into a state of damnation.
Do I have the power to forfeit my salvation by rejecting Christ, by denying what I once believed and stepping away? In other words, is there any person, a part of a religious organization, or even myself who can interrupt and end the plan of God?
Some professors at certain universities would like nothing better than to sever you from Christ, to destroy your faith in the word of God. The amoral culture would love nothing more than through the influence of their literature and their music and their media and emphasis on their life style to divest you of your Christian convictions. Legalists would like you to reject grace alone as a way of salvation.
Satan also would very much like to strip you of your salvation. He tried it with Job. Satan tried it with Peter in Luke 22, and the messenger from Satan assaulted Paul as indicated in II Corinthians 12. There are those powers who would like to do that. And we have been pointing out that that is answered, no one is capable.
So, if we say, no created being can do it, somebody might say well God can do it. God can change his mind. God Himself can withhold us from salvation in its final sense. God can see us sinning. God can see us in an ungrateful condition, in a disobedient condition and God can take back the gift that He gave us. Is that possible?
Well look at Romans 8: 32 because here Paul anticipates this objection, “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?” This is a typical Hebrew argument: Arguing from the greater to the lesser. If God did the greater thing, that is, giving up his own Son, will he not do the lesser, that is giving us what we need to be sustained in our salvation?
God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son. That was the big gift. He gave the best. He made the greatest sacrifice. We can only in a small way comprehend the strangeness of the Father saying to the eternal Son, go down into the world, be surrounded by sinners and actually go to the cross under the hatred of those sinners and be punished for their sins. That is strange beyond strange, right?
Look back at verse 32 just some elements of it, "He who did not spare his own Son," didn't hold Him back. In fact in Isaiah 53:10 it says, "It pleased the Lord to bruise Him." How amazing. It pleased the Lord to subject his Son to a sin-bearing sacrificial painful horrifying death. Yes, because God could look past the suffering and the pain to the glory that would come to the Son through that redeemed humanity.
In Luke 22:53, Jesus put it this way, "When I was daily with you in the Temple, you stretched forth no hands against me. I was here every day. But this is your hour and the power of darkness." And at that time God gave him over to Satan and Satan used his weapon of death on Him. Satan thought he was ending the life of the Messiah. But instead the Messiah was offering himself for sin.
So the Father delivered the Son to judgment that His justice required. This was God. When you ask the question who delivered Jesus to die? It wasn't Judas for money, it wasn't Pilate for fear, it wasn't the Jews for envy, it wasn’t the Gentiles for sin, it wasn't any of those, it was the Father for love.
Is there any human who could stop this glorious salvation process? No. Would God himself stop it? No. If he already gave the gift of his Son, the greatest, at an immense and incalculable sacrifice, He'll certainly do less than that to keep those for whom He gave his Son.
Somebody might say, "Well Satan can take your salvation away." Cannot Satan sort of pull us out of this process; cause us to forfeit our right to its continuation? Well Romans 8:33 is designed to answer that question. "Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies.” Verse 34 says, "Who is to condemn?"
Who is the accuser of the brothers? According to the book of Revelation it is Satan. Satan loves to go and accuse the people of God, as he did in the book of Job. That's what he does, Revelation 12:10, “who accused them before our God day and night.”
But, he cannot read our minds. Satan is not omniscient. He can only get reports observed by the forces of evil, who can observe our conduct. The primary accuser is Satan, and can Satan go before God and bring a successful indictment? Well Paul answers the question. Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies.”
It's actually a very simple principle here theologically. God alone condemns and God alone justifies. And if God has covered us with the righteousness of Jesus Christ, if God has granted to us his own righteousness, then no accusation can stand against us.
There's a four-fold protection here. Look at it in verse 34. First, he asks, "Shall Christ Jesus who died, shall he? The point is that when Christ died he received the just condemnation that was due for all our sins. That's why He died. He paid the penalty for our sin. God was satisfied; therefore He can't condemn us because his death proves that He took our condemnation for all our sin.
Secondly, in verse 34, he says, "Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died— more than that, who was raised— who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.” Christ death blotted out our sins and God put his stamp of approval on that sacrifice by the resurrection. The resurrection proves His sacrifice was complete.
Jesus Christ was so highly exalted that Paul says in Ephesians 1:20-23, “that God worked in Christ when He raised him from the dead and seated Him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22 And He put all things under his feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.”
The plan of God literally has us dying with Christ as He bears our sins, rising with Christ in inheriting His righteousness, and actually being exalted to the right hand with Christ as we take our place spiritually in heaven and become the recipients of all spiritual blessing.
So, Paul says, no human, not some false teacher, not some person from a cult, not some legalist, not some family member, nobody has the power to break your relationship to Christ, not even you as a human. And God's not going to do it and Satan can't do it, and Christ wouldn't do it.
Well, what about the Holy Spirit? Maybe He would get upset if we quenched Him or grieved Him. Well no. Back in verse 26, "The Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words." The Holy Spirit living in us goes before the Father all the time interceding for us and He who searches the hearts, that's the Father, knows what the mind of the Spirit is because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
Somebody might say what about a circumstance? Aren't there some theoretical circumstances that could cause us to loose our salvation? So in verses 35 to 39 Paul addresses that. “What shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?”
Isn't there some kind of an assault coming against us that could possible separate us from the love of Christ? The reason He keeps us is because He loves us. The reason God saved us is because He loved us. It is the love that God has for us that binds us to Him. It is the love that Christ has for us that binds us to Him.
Do you see that your continuing sanctification and glorification is founded on God's election? It's not founded on your wisdom; it's founded on God's call. It's not founded on your personal submission; it's founded on God's justification on an otherwise obstinate sinner. It's not founded on your perseverance though that is what the Spirit of God produces; it is founded upon the power of God to keep you and what holds that altogether is love.
Now what Paul is writing here is not theory. Often times Paul experienced tremendous rejection, sometimes actual bodily harm, he was stoned, shipwrecked, he was hit repeatedly by the Jews who did it with whips and by the Romans who did it with rods.
He knew the inward stress of being squeezed in and pressed in with apparently no escape. He knew persecution for the testimony of Jesus, the suffering at the hands of those who hated the gospel. He knew what it was to feel hunger. He knew what it was to not have enough clothing in a cold and damp place, to say nothing of that being his experience in a prison. He knew what it was to be in danger.
So in verse 37 he starts out, "No, these things can't separate us because in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us." Here's the principle from 2 Corinthians 12:9-10, "in all these things we become super conquerors.” The trials, as we learned in verse 28, work for our greater good. They have the effect of making us super conquerors because in those times of weakness we are infused with divine strength.
You say well haven't there been some people who were involved Christians and they confessed Christ and they went away, they couldn't take the pressure? Of course! Jesus in the parable of the soils in Matthew 13 said some seed went into rocky ground or thorny ground, sprung up for a little while, choked out and died. But you have to understand those people were never real Christians.
I John 2:19, "They went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us they would have remained with us, but they went out in order that it might be shown that they all are not of us. 20But you, you have the Holy Spirit, the anointed." There's always going to be people who hang around, look like Christians, and then disappear under pressure, but they are not of us and the proof is that they left.
So in a final crescendo in verses 38 and 39, Paul gives us a capstone. It is a doxology, "I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor any other created things shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." What a statement.
Paul says, I am persuaded, Holy Spirit inspired, a settled conclusion, and absolute fact, I am convinced that not only death but not even life whatever it might bring with all of its dangers and all of its difficulties can separate you from God. If there's nothing in death that can separate you and there will be nothing in life that can separate you, right?
Nor things present, nor things to come, nothing here and now in the age of time and nothing in the future in eternity, no spiritual being, and no age, no dimension of time and no dimension of eternity can ever separate us from God. Today is a great day as we celebrate that Christ is risen and alive right now and because nothing will ever separate us from Him, we too will live forever with Him, Amen?