Romans 8:18–39

Christian sufferings may be great. They often are. Yet see how he estimates them. He weighs them in the sober balances of divine truth against the glory to be revealed. He compares present sufferings with eternal glory. Weighed like this, the momentary trial of faith and patience proves to be as nothing. There is no doubt in his mind. It is a deliberate measurement of truth with truth. He sets real suffering against most real, most certain, eternal glory.

Who was ever better able to reckon on this matter than Paul? Bonds and imprisonments awaited him in every city. His was a life of constant suffering with the One he so loved to serve. Yet he says the sufferings are nothing next to the glory. What a solution of the perplexing paradox of all creation! The groans of battlefields shall cease. The misery, poverty and degradation of the multitude shall come to an end. So shall the sufferings of creation.

Co-heirs, co-sufferers, co-glorified — this is the order of Christian life and hope. And notice: we have the whole inheritance of God. So this suffering flows from the glorious position God has brought us into. It flows from our sharing in the life of Christ Himself.

The day of His glory will be a great day for us; we shall see Him glorified, and we shall be glorified as His companions. He says to His Father, "The glory that you have given me I have given to them" (John 17:22). And the world will see us displayed in that glory. By this the world is to know that the Father sent the Son, and has loved us as He has loved Him.

From that point till we reach verse 27 we find ourselves in an atmosphere charged with groaning. That word occurs three times in these verses. No surprise: the present age lies in the "bondage of corruption," and the age to come will bring the "liberty of the glory."

His mind is full of the future — absorbed with tomorrow. He is like a schoolboy waiting for a holiday, who can think of nothing else. The glory is so present that he calls the affliction momentary. The present sufferings had lost their hindering power, because he saw the power of God in them.

Knowing God as our Father only deepens our sense of the sorrows and miseries of the world we pass through. So does the blessedness of the glory ahead. But these sufferings cannot compare with the glories that are coming. The sufferings are passing, the glories are eternal.

"Earnest expectation" is only one word in Greek. It means "watching for something you expect, with your head stretched out." This word appears only here and in Philippians 1:20... One writer says it means "to expect on and on, to the end."

Creation did not fall into emptiness by its own choice, of course. It happened because of the one who subjected it. Man was set by God as the head of the lower creation. When he fell, creation shared his ruin. When Christ appears and the sons of God are revealed, we shall have proof that God made creation depend on them, and that its hope of freedom is not empty. If it was right that creation fell into emptiness when its head fell, then see how fitting it is, and how worthy of God: He redeems His children and heirs, and creation's glorious recovery follows!

The creation fell with its head Adam... But God had His eye on everything, and the fall of man did not take Him by surprise... If the creation fell under one head, He knew how to recover it under Another.

Notice: creation does not wait for the revealing of the Son of God, but of the sons of God. He has already been revealed; they have not. When the sons of God appear in glory, the groaning creation will find relief. That will be the signal for its full deliverance. Its time of bondage runs on until then.

On the outside, His sons look no different from other people in body, power, or glory. They may be weak, they may suffer, and they fall asleep or die while the Lord waits on high. But at His coming, after the resurrection or the change, they will appear in glory with Christ when He appears too. Creation also awaits this happy moment. Its deliverance from its present misery depends on them and their revealing.

Creation lies in the misery and corruption that came from the fall. It will stay that way until the sons of God appear in bodies of glory. For creatures the question is not souls that need redeeming, but bodies that decay... Creation cannot receive grace, but it will share in the glory that brings outward blessing to this world of sorrow.

Preaching, profession, or even the real faith of believers will not free creation from the emptiness it has lain under since the fall... How will this be brought about? If the deliverance of the creature depends on the manifestation of God's sons, the answer is certain. It is not in this age; for all through, our life is hidden with Christ in God. It cannot be in eternity; for that will not be until the heavens pass away with a great noise... It is between the two.

We wait to go in; the creation waits until we come out.

Creation was not made (as it now is) in decay, degradation, suffering, death. It would be hard to accept that God first designed it to be in such confusion and misery. The Scriptures teach the opposite. Creation lies under its present disorder because of man's guilt and ruin. Yet it does not long in vain for deliverance. It waits in hope for His revelation in glory. The very struggle of everything for life and against sickness witnesses that it is fallen to rise.

It is not "in relation to man generally" that the apostle tells us "he is a captive not by any choice of his own." Man is, sadly, a willing captive. It is still the lower creatures who have fallen with man, not of their own will, but as linked to him who was appointed the head of creation.

But the creation did not of its own accord — "not willingly" — become subject to vanity. It was not a moral question, as it was with man. All creation has suffered because of man's sin; the subjection is "by reason of" man, "who has subjected it."

Man was set by God as the head of the lower creation. When he fell, creation shared his ruin. If it was righteous for creation to fall under vanity with its head, how worthy of God that its glorious recovery should follow the redemption of His children and heirs!

It was God. Someone has said it would have been unthinkable for the head to fall and the creature to stand above him. So when Adam fell, God subjected the creature to the same vanity as its fallen head. Its freedom will be public when the sons of God are revealed in glory, and it must wait until that time.

Its fall, because of the transgression and fall of its head, has not been beyond remedy or beyond hope. It has been allowed to fall under one head so that it may be recovered under another. It has been made subject to vanity in the hope of being delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God.

It was not by the will of the creature that it became subject to vanity, but through the folly of man. But the glory is coming, so if the creature is subject to vanity, it is so in hope of deliverance from the bondage of corruption. If it cannot share in the liberty of grace, which sets free from sin and judgment, it will share in the liberty of glory. That liberty lifts every pressure from these bodies.

People around us form themselves into associations for the benefit of the creature, seeking to improve its lot and lessen its woes. All this may be praiseworthy enough from a human standpoint. But I say the creature expects nothing from such means. It waits for the moment when the heavens will open and the sons of God will appear with Christ. Then its woes will end, but until that day its groans must continue.

There is no reason to be surprised at such a link with men. Creation was made subject to vanity, not by its own will, of course, but because of him who made it subject. God set man as the head of the lower creation. When he fell, creation shared his ruin. The sons of God will be revealed when Christ appears. That will prove God made creation depend on them, and that its hope of freedom is not in vain. It was righteous that the fall of its head should bring creation under vanity. So how fitting and worthy of God that its glorious recovery should follow the redemption of His children and heirs!

"The glorious liberty of the children of God!" People talk of glorious liberty now. And it is indeed wonderful, blessed liberty, into which grace has now brought us. But the passage before us is literally, "The liberty of the glory of the children of God." It is the liberty of grace in which we believers stand at present. The glory revealed in us will show that we are the sons of God. That happens when Christ appears, and we appear with Him in glory. It is into the liberty of this glory — the liberty which the glory of Christ and His saints will give to the world we will reign over — that the creation itself will be delivered.

So it is not grace that the creation needs, but the redemption of power... Then creation, which was forced into corruption by man's sin, will be identified with the glory of the children of God.

It is God's honour for Christ in this creation. As man's sin dragged it down with himself into ruin, so will the Second Man raise it out of its degradation and misery. But the inheritance cannot be delivered before the heirs.

And when will its hopes be fulfilled? We answer: when the sons of God are revealed. When the children of God step into their glory, the whole creation will step with them into the liberty of that glory. Then a proclamation of liberty will go out through all the land to all its inhabitants. Then the forfeited land will be redeemed. Then men's toil and labour will cease and they will eat what the field produces (see Lev. 25:10-13). It will be the true and final year of Jubilee.

Creation will also be delivered. Now it groans, and travails in pain. Now we groan also — we who have received the firstfruits of the Spirit, we groan within ourselves... Creation waits, and we wait. Creation waits to enter into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. We wait for adoption, the redemption of our body... But God's purposes will not be fully accomplished until creation gets full deliverance. And that cannot happen until the new heavens and the new earth appear.

So the Christian is not in ignorance of the misery of the groaning creation. Led by the Spirit, believers have the mind of Christ and can say, "We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now." Those who reject the fall blame all the misery of a groaning creation on natural causes. In their folly, they imagine they can remove the misery by their own efforts.

First of all, "the whole creation" groans together in the pains of childbirth. The first reference here is to the lower creation, which the fall of man dragged down. God gave Adam dominion over all, and by his sin he ruined all. He was, so to speak, the top link, joined to the Creator with understanding, and every other link in the chain hung on him. When he fell, all creation fell with him; animals became wild and destructive. We may not have ears to hear the groan of the lamb as the leopard pounces on it, or of the fly caught in the web as it feels the spider's bite. But the groaning is there.

There rises up to God a moan from His suffering creatures on this earth, a chorus of sorrow from its four quarters, as day by day passes by.

As Christians we are not fooled by appearances, nor by the mind and will of man. Man would like to hide the evidence of his own guilt and ruin in the wretchedness of a creation dragged down by his fault. For we know that it is all in groans and pains until now. Neither Christ's coming in grace and humiliation, nor the gospel preached in the power of the Spirit sent down from heaven, set this aside. Instead they called believers to glory above it, and to virtue despite it.

The passage states plainly that this universal groan will only cease at the time spoken of here. Then, and not until then, creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption into the glorious freedom of the children of God. … How, my friends, can the world enjoy a time of universal rest, and peace, and freedom from evil, while the whole creation groans in the pains of childbirth? Impossible!

The Lord gives wars, famines and earthquakes a very significant character: they are the beginning of birth-pains. It is as if nature were pressing on toward the birth of a new and better time, and could not rest content with the present evil. … Everywhere there is an unrest that cries out for Him. He alone has said — He alone could dare to say — "Come to me, and I will give you rest." And the cry sounds in His ears, and will find its answer.

But our groaning is not a complaint, the fruit of discontent, but the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart. The Spirit directs our eye to the glory, where we shall have no more reason to groan. He leads us to feel, according to the love of God, the suffering of a creation under bondage. At the same time we feel it ourselves, because by our bodies we still belong to it.

What brought creation into the bondage of corruption? How did it get in? Through us. And how will it get out? Through us, when the glory comes! It is a beautiful thought! … We brought them into it, and shall bring them out of it.

The firstfruits were offered up in Israel as the pledge and foretaste of the coming harvest (see Lev. 23:10, 17, 20), so in the Firstfruits of the Spirit we have the pledge and foretaste of the redeemed body and the glory that is ahead.

The firstfruits of the Spirit suggest that what we have in this way is only a pledge of what is still to come. So we who have the firstfruits of the Spirit groan for that very reason. Our hope of a state so different from the present only makes us groan more over the present.

You see, the Christian is still linked to the old creation, and the link with it is his body.

It is the groaning of those who are justified by faith and have peace with God. It is the groaning of those who have the Holy Spirit living in them, bearing witness with their spirit that they are children of God. It is the groaning of adopted children who long deeply for the full results of adoption.

This groaning is not a complaint that comes from discontent. It is the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart. God permits a groan, but never a grumble.

Only the delivered soul groans, or can groan for others. We feel what is all around us, and we feel it as God feels it. That is why it says, "We groan inwardly" (not for ourselves — I do not groan for a dead thing I have been delivered from) "as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons."

In one sense we have received the adoption (Gal. 4:5-7), becoming sons of God by faith. In this case we wait for the adoption, the redemption of the body. Our bodies will be delivered from this world of sin and corruption and conformed to the image of Christ. Then everyone will see that we are sons of God. By faith we have the adoption now; in glory it will be seen.

As the order shows, this means not the forgiveness of sins, which we already have, but the complete deliverance from the effects of sin in our bodies. We wait for that at the coming of our Lord Jesus.

The Christian is always in that sense a riddle. He has Christ as his life, but not yet fully as Saviour (Phil. 3:20); he has, and he has not, salvation; he is waiting for redemption, not as regards the forgiveness of sins (Eph. 1:7), but as to the body (Rom. 8:23).

We do not yet enjoy all that is included in being "saved." We have the salvation of our souls now, and we receive it by faith. We have the forgiveness of sins, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the firstfruits of the Spirit. We are now the children of God; but we are saved in hope, as well as in present possession. We have not all the salvation now. Our bodies are still mortal. We are still in a world where the curse remains, where the usurper rules, and where one universal groan sounds out. But in hope we are saved from all this.

The salvation spoken of here is not security, or freedom from condemnation. The believer already enjoys those. It is a hope he waits for, and even groans for, though he already has "the firstfruits of the Spirit." Nor is it the death of the body, or the spirit going to be with Jesus. Just the opposite; it is "the adoption, that is, the redemption of our body." ... But the body is not yet conformed to Christ's image. The work of adoption is not complete until the body too is redeemed. It is, then, for this we wait. This is the salvation for which we hope. But this "redemption of the body" is what Christ brings about at His coming for His saints.

The redemption of the body is a matter of hope, and in this sense we are "saved in hope." The hope does not imply any uncertainty. It only means the blessing is not yet made visible.

We are saved; but it is by hope. As yet we do not see that for which we hope. If it were visible, then hope would have no place. ... But though we do not see it, yet knowledge is the ground of our hope. The certified assurance of the God who cannot lie is the pure fountain of a Christian's hope. But hope born this way creates desire. Growing desire brings a sickness to the heart. That heart now feels the coming liberty, and this makes the pressure of its still-prolonged bondage weigh on the spirit all the more. A free spirit, in a bound and lowly body, must groan.

We have the redemption through His blood and the forgiveness of sins. But the Spirit we received as a result is only the pledge of the rest. It is in this sense we are saved in hope. We do not yet have what God purposed to give us in salvation — that is, glory with Christ. But the work that saves us is done, and we have it by the Holy Spirit. We have received the Holy Spirit. So we stand between the finished work which saves us and gives title to the inheritance ... and the exercise of power which will bring the full redemption in when Jesus comes again.

Hope is an essential part of Christian character — "an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast" (Hebrews 6:19). It is not a matter of vague uncertainty. If it were, we would not wait with patience, but with doubts and fears. Faith gives the certainty that hope will be fulfilled. We do not know when, but faith also makes us content to wait patiently.

Notice that the New Testament sense of hope is never uncertainty, but immature or deferred certainty. Confidence marks it as much as expectation. So we are not left in doubt and uncertainty. Our strength lies in quietness and confidence. The world has its hopes, but they are so steeped in uncertainty that the word hope has become almost a synonym for doubt. The believer, though, is so confident about what makes up his hope that he can say, "But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience."

Hope is an essential part of Christian character — "a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul" (Heb. 6:19), not a matter of vague uncertainty. If it were, we would not wait with patience, but with doubts and fears. Faith gives the certainty that hope will be fulfilled. We do not know when. Faith also makes us content to wait. This is true "patience of hope."

Notice, it is not for the salvation of our souls that we wait and hope, but for the redemption of the body. It may be from the grave, or we may be changed in a moment. It will be at the coming of the Lord. As to the body, even we have no relief from groaning and suffering until the coming of our Lord. We do not see that yet, and so we wait and hope. It is a fatal mistake to think all this means we do not know we have salvation. The opposite is true. We know we have eternal life — "whoever believes has eternal life." There is no waiting or hoping for that. But we can wait in patience for the redemption of the body.

We are saved now in hope, but that means we do not yet have before us what we hope for. If we see it, how can we still hope for it? How beautiful a thought this is! The hope is so perfect, and carries such complete assurance, that not having it only produces patience in us — not doubt, but patience! All human hopes may disappoint, but the hope God has given us is as sure as if we already had it. We wait with patience, and the patience itself is holy discipline for us.

Can it be strange, then, that we have to keep the word of His patience? That we have to remember what holds judgment back and delays the fulfilment of our hope as Christians? Patience is not indifference about that hope, but the very opposite. If we were indifferent, we could not speak of patience or know it at all: "if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience."

With this hope shining before us, we can wait with patience for the certain glory that will be revealed in due time. We may look at the sorrows around us in a selfish spirit, or as bystanders who only draw lessons from them. Then the power of evil will make us weary and impatient. If we view it all in the power of the Spirit, we will "wait with patience."

As we look at the growing sorrows of this groaning creation, and feel our own need, we may find relief in prayer. Even then we do not know how to pray as we ought. While we are down here, we know only in part. We cannot take in the greatness and glory of Christ, or the weakness of our own flesh, or the sorrows of the groaning creation.

Our ignorance of how to pray as we ought surely shows us our need of the Spirit's work, and should make us submit ourselves to Him all the more.

Moved by the Spirit of God, we present our needs with an earnestness that no human words can express. A groan always assumes a depth of feeling beyond the power of words to utter. For this reason only God can interpret a groan. That is why Scripture says, "he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit." The Spirit expresses that mind in us by a groan.

So it is my heart that groans, while it says, "the Spirit intercedes" — oh, the wonderful ways of God! It is a great comfort to know these are not selfish groans in me. While I groan along with everything around me, I might think, "Careful, there may be unbelief in that." But it is the Spirit's groan in us. Selfish groans we find in Romans 7. There it is all I, I, I — no Christ and no Holy Spirit until the end of the chapter. Romans 8 is full of Christ and of the Spirit.

The words "for us" in Romans 8:26 are not in the best texts. Like many well-meant additions to Scripture, they only spoil it. Adding "makes intercession for us" here would suggest that the Spirit and the saints are two separate parties. It would make Him someone outside of us, praying on our behalf. The next words show that this is not the meaning. God looks down into the heart. He sees there the desires and prayers the Spirit has worked in. That intercession, made inside the saints and on their behalf, is according to God.

Aaron and Hur held up his hands, one on each side… What divine strength this gives in the hour of strong temptation. On one side is the exalted Son of God, in the very presence of God, holding up the hands of faith and making intercession. And on the other side, down here, in the believer, the Holy Spirit is making intercession. How doubly we are held up!

God searches all hearts, and He knows the mind and desire of the Spirit. The Spirit's desires and prayers match the mind of God exactly, whatever our own desires might be. So God hears according to the Spirit's desires, not ours. We can be very thankful for that.

In earlier times, under the law, people always thought of God as the Searcher of the heart, the One who tests the inner life of people. He searched hearts to reward each person according to his work. But the apostle reveals God as the Searcher of the heart with another intent. "He who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit." He is not searching the heart to reward the works, or even to refine it as gold is refined. In His search of the heart He finds the inner exercises of the spirit. His search does not end in finding evil, but good — good that He owns as fitting Himself, not evil that He judges and punishes.

The verse credits the thoughts and feelings God searches out to my heart, because the Spirit works in my heart. But it goes on to the source: in my heart it finds the mind of the Spirit... and last of all, it is the Holy Spirit Himself who makes intercession in the saints. It is me, because it is produced in my new nature; but as to the power that produced it, it is not me. The Holy Spirit does it in and by me. It is me as to the act, but it is He as to the source.

The words "for us" in Romans 8:26 are not in the best texts, and, like many well-meant additions to Scripture, they only spoil its perfectness. "Makes intercession for us," inserted in this verse, would give the idea of the blessed Spirit and the saints as two separate parties, with Him making intercession for us from outside of us. The next words show that this is not the sense... So God looks down into the heart and sees there the desires and prayers the Spirit has worked in. And the intercession the Spirit makes there, on behalf of the saints, is according to God.

It is a far deeper thing to have the right desire than to have the right words... "He makes intercession for the saints according to God," in complete agreement with the character and will of God. How much uttered prayer is after all no prayer at all! How useless is eloquence, in view of these groanings which cannot be expressed!

But the God who searches our hearts knows perfectly the mind of the Spirit — what He is working in us. Our imperfect, faulty words go up to Him and reach His ear. They fall far short of expressing what the Spirit means, yet He gives them all the value of His own mind.

He intercedes along that line. His aim is not to make the circumstances of our lives down here easy. He prays according to the aim that God Himself has in all the circumstances He takes us through. God's own finger marks out our whole path, and that path is meant to prosper the work of God in our souls.

We have an Advocate with the Father, but also the Holy Spirit, who has come from the Father and from the Son to be the advocate within us. Part of His action is that He carries on intercession for saints according to God... The twofold divine advocacy covers all our need effectively. Wherever we have a difficulty, wherever a trial, a sorrow, the Spirit never fails. Wherever we are weak or ignorant, the Spirit comes to our rescue.

Even Paul, in 2 Corinthians 12, did not know what to pray for as he ought. But the Lord was faithful and showed him that His grace was enough — an answer far better than the prayer. And not Paul only — we too know that all things work together for good. Not merely that they will one day — they do it now. And this holds for others as well as ourselves, for those who love God. Without this, sorrows only irritate. Here they are blessed twice over: a blessing to those who go through them, and a blessing to other children of God.

All things — not one is left out. The bitter and the sweet, adversity and prosperity, sickness and health, yes, tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger or sword: all are only instruments in the hands of our God to work out the end He has purposed. How calmly then we may rest in Him and in His love!

We may not always see how this loss, or that trial, is working for our good, but faith knows that good will be the result in time and eternity. We may have to wait before we understand how all things work for good. It was so with Peter, when the Lord told him, "What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand." Someone else has said, "The sorrow may not be remedied, but the sorrow is blessed."

His complaint was, "All these things are against me." And so indeed it appeared. He had yet to learn that all these things were part of God's plan for his ultimate good. At the end of his life he could speak of "the angel who has redeemed me from all evil" (Genesis 48:16).

The fact is, the expression "those who look for Him," like "those who love God" (Rom. 8:28), is simply a Bible way of describing believers. If a man does not love God, and does not look for Christ, he cannot be called a Christian.

What underlies Romans 8 is that we know God and we love Him. It is not merely that God loves us; our affections are with Him and in line with Him.

To assure our hearts that all is working for good, we are reminded that we are "the called" of God; and, if called, God has a purpose for us. God saves us because we need saving; God calls us because He wants us. All God's ways with us in the present have in view the fulfilment of His purpose for us in the future.

This is carefully stated here, in case our love toward God should weaken the thought of grace on His part. That is why purpose, and calling according to purpose, are put forward.

And what is the "good" that God has in mind? I believe we must take this section as a whole. The great thing in mind is that God will conform us to the image of His Son. Could you think of any greater thought than that? Divine love has set itself firmly and constantly to bless us, and has entered with sympathy into every circumstance we could pass through.

Notice something important. The apostle does not speak of a passive or bare foreknowledge (v. 29), as if God only saw in advance what some people would be, or do, or believe. His foreknowledge is of persons, not of their state or conduct; it is not what, but "whom" He foreknew.

In eternal love He foreknew each of the individual people in His purpose... And those whom He foreknew in this way, by an absolute and sovereign purpose, He also predestined to the blessing appointed for them. Being conformed to the image of His own Son is the destination of those He foreknew. It is not glory in general, but the exact likeness of Christ, that is the destiny — and, in a sense, the definition — of each individual saint.

Next is predestination to be conformed to the image of His Son. Mark it well. This is not merely predestination to be saved. It is predestination to future glory, conformed to the image of Christ, who is Himself "the image of God." The moral side of the truth is surely the prominent one here. The purity, holiness, and every other blessed virtue of our Lord will have its bright reflection in His saints... Elsewhere we also learn that even our bodies will be made like His body of glory (Philippians 3:21).

It is possible to walk as He walked. In that sense we can be like Christ in character even now. But for conformity to His image we must wait for the coming glory. We are still in these lowly bodies. We are subject to sickness and need, and exposed to danger and death.

His title here — "the firstborn among many brothers" — is clearly about priority in His Person, not about being born first. Colossians 1:15-16 confirms this principle about the "firstborn." Christ is "the firstborn of all creation." Why? "For by Him all things were created."... The title is an official rank, far above any question of time... Yet we may thank God that in grace He has "many" whom He is not ashamed to call brothers (Hebrews 2:11).

We were called according to purpose, and as foreknown of God. He has predestinated us to be like His Son — but note, it is that HE might be pre-eminent, the Firstborn in that happy circle in heavenly glory.

From God's foreknowledge of us in eternity past to the finished glory of the future, the chain of blessing is perfectly linked. No link in it can ever be broken. God's purpose is that Christ His Son should be a Firstborn among many brothers... Here He is seen as man, a "Firstborn," and that word implies others... God's purpose therefore includes, of necessity, these. If it failed as to the brothers, it would fail as to the Son of His love. They are bound up together in His thoughts.

After predestination came the effectual call that reached us in the gospel. Here we come down to time, to the moments in our different lives when we believed. The next step came at almost the same moment, for when we believed we were justified, not just called. Last of all: "those whom He justified He also glorified." Here our golden chain, having dipped down from eternity into time, loses itself in eternity again.

Notice here that "those who are called according to purpose" are only "those who love God." This is not the same call as in Matthew 22:14 — the call of grace to everyone, which many refuse. Here it is the call of God's purpose, a call no one can refuse — in fact, one that "the called" would never think of refusing.

The Christian is called by God — called with an effectual calling, spoken to by a voice that makes the dead alive. The believer is called in a double sense. As a sinner made alive, he is called from darkness to light, from death into life. And as the one God foreknew for His own pleasure, he is called out of the secret of God's purpose into the open light of His glory as revealed in the face of Jesus Christ.

The calling of the gospel is to believe in Jesus. The soul made alive hears and obeys. But the effect of faith is justification, as we have seen. Now justification is an act of the One who justifies, not of the one justified.

Justification has the glory in view. God does not justify us so that we can be lifted high in this world, but so that we can be glorified with Christ in the world to come.

Then notice that "glorified" appears in the past tense, just as much as "justified." This is the style of the prophets. Everything is viewed from God's side, so although the glory is still to be accomplished, it is seen as if it were already done. If God calls what does not yet exist as though it did, that pledges its existence beyond all doubt.

This is why this beautiful and precious climax leaves out sanctification and the life in us. The Spirit had already taught our souls about these things at the start of the chapter… Here we have certainty and security, resting on what God is and on His purposes. He has foreknown His children. He has predestinated them to a certain glory, a certain marvellous blessing: to be conformed to the image of His Son. He has called them, He has justified them, He has glorified them. God has done all this.

Here there is no uncertainty. God Himself has secured the sure salvation of all believers. No power of man or Satan can break any one of those four links… This divine statement of eternal security takes no account at all of our imperfect state and our weakness. "God for us" brushes aside every difficulty. It is the weakest believer's triumphant answer to every doubt of unbelief.

The "things" are the grace and mercy he has been unfolding from chapter 3:21 to the end of chapter 8:30. It starts with the free gift of righteousness, held out to all. It runs on until God glorifies those He has justified. In all of it, God shows Himself to be for us. So the apostle asks, what is to be the reply of our hearts to this revelation of the grace of God.

But "if God is for us, who can be against us?" The world, the flesh and the devil are against us. Rulers and authorities are against us. The cosmic powers over this present darkness, and the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places (Ephesians 6:12), are against us... All these things, then, can be and are against us. But God is above these things, and He is for us. This is the immovable rest of faith.

We tend to overrate the forces against us, because we underrate the forces that are with us. We must not make light of the enemy's power. Instead we need to grow in our sense of God's power: "If God is for us, who can be against us?"

The result of all this for the soul is that God is for us. It is a sweet and glorious conclusion. It gives the heart a peace beyond words. It gives a rest that depends on the power and stability of God. That rest shuts out all anxiety about anything that could trouble it. For if God is for us, who can be against us?

Unbelief looks at the trials, sorrows and difficulties of the way. Then the question rises in the soul: "Can God be for me after all?" Faith knows where the everlasting witness lies that God is for us. It is not in the circumstances we pass through. It is in the gift of the Son. If God "did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all", He must indeed be "for us".

God is for us in giving. He is for us in justifying. He is for us in caring for us in everything. It was the same with the people of Israel: He took care of even their clothes on their journey through the desert... I learn in these very things the perfectness of the love of God. It comes out in the smallest circumstances, in every little detail... If it is difficulties and trials, I say, Well, it just shows what pains God is taking with me.

How much is wrapped up in these few words, "God for us"! ... We have "God" linked to "us" by that precious little word "for". This secures everything, for time and eternity... If God is for us, then one blessed thing must follow. Nothing can stand in the way of our present peace and our everlasting happiness and glory. Not our sins, not our wrongdoing, not our guilt, not our ruined nature, not Satan, not the world, not any other creature.

"Who can be against us?" No one in the universe with the least hope of success... But every voice is silent. "Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?" Silence throughout the universe. No voice replies. It is God who justifies. "Who is to condemn?" But the accuser hides himself, and there is no response to the challenge.

See how again, as noted elsewhere, the Spirit reasons from what God is and has done to the blessing that follows for us. He does not reason from us to God. That is true in judgment; but in grace it flows from God in all its fruits down to us. That He did not spare His Son, and then gives everything else, is after that a simple thing.

God did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all. What, then, will He withhold that is fitting for us to receive? Chapters 1 to 3 of this letter have shown what believers, whether Jews or Gentiles, once were. No one could question for a moment what they deserved. Yet God gave up His Son for them. Now, are we to think of this merely as a record of the past? Far from it. This record of the past is to give us unbounded confidence in our God in the present and in the future.

The word to Abraham is "take your son," telling us that God "did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all" (Rom. 8:32). Then Abraham is told that he is to take his "only son." Three times in the chapter it is stressed that Isaac is his "only" son (vv. 2, 12, 16). … Further, Abraham is reminded that the son he is to offer up is one "whom you love."

We are spared because He "did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all" (Rom. 8:32). For all eternity we will thank God for His wonderful love. That love made Him give His own Son, and not spare Him, so that we might be blessed.

Some claim that He only became Son when He was born of a woman. That claim violates the language used. Worse, it robs these passages of their clear and obvious purpose. That purpose is to stress the immensity of the love and grace of God the Father in sending His own Son. From all eternity that Son was the object of His deepest affection and delight, one with Him in nature and being. The Father sent Him to bear the judgment of sin in our place.

The love that did not spare Him, but delivered Him to judgment and death for us, triumphs in His glorious resurrection. That triumph proclaims that nothing can be charged against God's chosen ones.

The gift of the Son carries with it every lesser gift that we can hold along with Him. Notice, in verse 32, the word "freely," and also "with Him." Do we want anything that we cannot have with Him? In our folly or haste we may sometimes want such things. But when we think it over, we would not take for one moment anything that separates us from Him.

"All things … with Christ" — in fellowship with Him. Health or sickness, poverty or riches, I am in each state with Him, and I have Him in each state. According to the apostle's reasoning, the greater includes the lesser. We have and enjoy the lesser along with the greater.

Are we not ashamed of our unbelief, of the doubt that trembles under circumstances? Is work scarce at the moment? Do things press on us and look very dark in this wintry weather? Do we feel we do not know how we will have food for our little ones next week? Has the living God given His Son, or has He not? And "how will He not also with Him" — blessed association! — "graciously give us all things?" Who has ever answered that question? Who can answer it?

"Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? Shall God, who justifies?" These three verses give us three steps. First, God for us. Second, God blessing us. Third, God justifying us — clearing us from every charge. For who has the right to bring a charge against us? God alone has such a right. But will He do it — when He is the One who has justified us instead?

Notice how the passage attributes everything to God. It does not say that we are justified before God. It says, "It is God who justifies." So the apostle may well exclaim, "Who is to condemn?" — whoever that person may be.

God Himself is not only the Source of our justification but the One who justifies us. "It is God who justifies" (Rom. 8:33). From His lips came the sentence against us as sinners. Equally from His lips comes the declaration of our clearance as believers in Jesus. Our justification is therefore complete and authoritative. No one can condemn us.

"It is God who justifies" (Rom. 8:33). Justification is an act of the Judge. He passes a sentence of declared righteousness in favour of the one He justifies. Justification is not something that happens in the heart of a sinner, but a change in his standing before the Judge. The sinner once stood guilty, waiting to be banished forever from the face of the Judge. Now he is justified — declared not guilty — and received into God's eternal favour. This is what God does for the repentant sinner who puts his trust in the work of Christ on the cross.

God Himself raises this question, and then at once goes on to say, "It is God who justifies." He has cleared us of every charge our guilt could bring against us. And He has done it righteously. He sets us in His presence completely clear of all charge, just as though we had never sinned at all. No accusation can be brought against us. God has justified us. Election is with God — that is His side. Our side is that we came to Him in our need as poor sinners and obtained salvation.

God brings no charge against His elect. Instead He justifies them — people who loathe themselves before Him, admitting not only their sins but that their nature is vile and corrupt.

"Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?" Paul here issues a challenge, just as we see the Lord issuing one to Satan on behalf of Joshua (Zech. 3). "Is not this a brand plucked from the fire?" The answer lies in the question: who will dare accuse these people before God? It is God who justifies — God who has chosen them.

Satan — the enemy — may still accuse. He can list sins no one could number. But if God has justified the man, Satan protests in vain. No court will hear his charges, for God has decided the case, and there is none higher than God.

The apostle Paul cites this passage in Rom. 8:33, and applies to the Christian what the Spirit here says of Christ... it is a precious hint that the same Spirit now applies to us what He said then in God's vindication of the rejected Christ.

Secondly, "Who is he that condemns?" If God justifies, who can condemn? To answer this question the Apostle brings together in one verse, the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ. The letter has already shown that God justifies the believer through the death of Christ. It also shows how perfect this justification is in the resurrection of Christ. Now in the glory He intercedes on behalf of those whom He has justified. If there is an active enemy ever ready to accuse the saints, there is a living Person who intercedes on their behalf.

Notice how the words build: "rather," then "even," then "also." The apostle boldly challenges the right of any to condemn... Christ has died for him and borne the condemnation of sin in his place. How then can that condemnation fall on the believer? But more; He has risen again out of it, above it, and above the place it brought Him into. So where is the accusation of sin now, or the condemnation?... He goes on: "who is even at the right hand of God." There He must be out of reach of every accusation. On top of that He "makes intercession" about the sin whose judgment He bore, and out of which He has risen... The One who took that sin on Himself and became answerable for it is now not only risen, but at the right hand of God. His place there, and His title to be there — which God Himself has owned — would have to be overthrown before anything could be charged to the believer now.

The answer is "It is Christ that died." By His death He made full expiation for all our offences. But how do we know that? "Yea, rather, that is risen again." His resurrection is God's seal upon the value of His death; the proof that the price paid in it was enough... "Who is even at the right hand of God." His exaltation is the declaration of God's entire satisfaction and delight in His work which He accomplished for us. The believer's Substitute and Representative is at the right hand of God. Could He have been there if one sin had remained on Him? Impossible!

Some say this means He appears for us on the question of sin. It is nothing of the kind. Intercession means going to someone, on behalf of another, to get what you want for that one. It is the same word in Romans 8:26 and 34; the Spirit works in our hearts, but He does not appear anywhere for us. But Christ is standing in the presence of God, and He is the One actively engaged in obtaining for us all that we need. It is not that we go to Him, but that He goes to God for us. He is our righteousness there, He has made propitiation, and therefore He can use the grace that is in God... He ever lives to carry on this constant service on our behalf.

Now the enemy who deceived Eve would step in here and say: All that is true if you never sin after your conversion. But if a Christian does sin, surely that sin will separate him from the love of Christ. Dear young believer, make sure your shield is not down when the devil gives you this thrust. Precious answer: "Who also makes intercession for us."... From how many sins does that intercession preserve us!

There is however one mention of Christ in heaven... How wonderful to think of this. Men rejected Him. Now, in His place at God's right hand, He is occupied with intercession for those who have trusted Him. On the cross He interceded for sinners; on the throne He intercedes for those who have believed on Him.

Hostile powers surround us. Enemies hate us. We battle with circumstances, we may face death, we endure hardships. In the middle of all this a third triumphant challenge rings out — and like the other two, it finds no one to take it up... What answer is there to this? We should listen to the one man able to answer — he had gone far in the school of suffering. "No," he says, "in all these things we are more than conquerors, through Him who loved us."

This leads to the third challenge, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" The Apostle lists seven forms of trial. Every kind of evil we meet as we pass through this world fits under one or another of these trials. In varied measures and at different times we may have to face some of these trials, but not one of these things can separate us from the love of Christ.

Christ is set before us in the full extent of His work: His death on the cross, His resurrection, and His place now at God's right hand, where He intercedes for us. That is the ground of the challenge: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? But there is more. The difficulties and dangers and sufferings along the road are also lined up in full strength, to prove how faithful that love is and how deep beyond measure... Which of our afflictions was He a stranger to? He felt them far more deeply than we ever could, for His person could measure and bear what we cannot. So they became simply the proof of His perfect love to us.

He went down to the depth for us, into sorrow and into the ruin of man. He has risen in power and victory over it, and He is now the exalted Man. He is interested in us and intercedes for us, so that we find the help and mercy we need. What then shall separate us from His love? Here it is the love of Christ, so that we may know Him and His love — a Man who went down to the depth and has gone up on high, still interested in us and caring for us. In verse 39 it is the love of God in Christ, so that we may know this love to be divine, supreme and unchangeable.

None of these physical sufferings can separate us from His love, though often our souls may lose the sense of it. Then we get downcast and prone to complain in the middle of trial: and so Satan gains an advantage. But if our hearts are right, and we are dependent on the Lord, our great Intercessor, the tribulation only drives us closer to Him, and makes us prove again how blessed that love is — a love greater than the greatest trial.

What about all those things that try our faith and test our heart? To the natural eye they can look like a contradiction of God's constant, unfailing care for souls... Are they not rather the very occasions that throw us more upon that love?

They were "killed all the day long" for Christ's sake, dying a slow death, so to speak, because of Him. Danger and the sword chased them and they lost everything here. Yet the love of Christ remained to them. It was their security, their sun, their shield, their everlasting arm, their unfading treasure when everything failed.

They are cast off and scattered. The enemy and avenger is among them; they are scattered among the nations, sold by God for no price (v. 17-22). Yet they have in no way swerved from their integrity. On the contrary, it is for His sake they are killed all the day long, and counted as sheep for the slaughter. (Note, the moment the Messiah was rejected, this began in principle: compare Rom. 8:36.)

It was necessary to point out our distinctive position before quoting a psalm (v. 36) that pictures us in circumstances like theirs. Both are true. We share much with all saints until Christ comes. But we and they each have what is our own and distinctive.

On turning to Romans 8, we find a quotation from Psalm 44 — "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered" — and there the apostle stops. Turning to the psalm, the next words are ones a child of God could not now speak, for the Father loves him as He loved His Son. They could be the words of a Jewish remnant, who do not know the Father, nor the blessedness of the redemption the Son has accomplished.

Believers were "killed all the day long" for Christ's sake — living a chronic death, so to speak, on His account. Danger and sword pursued them. They lost everything here. Yet the love of Christ remained theirs. It was their security, their sun, their shield, their everlasting arm, their unfading treasure when everything else failed.

It is for Christ's sake that these afflictions are allowed to come to the believer. They come to prove more deeply the reality of His love, and the power of that love. When that love is known in the soul, it is far more than a match for the worst ordeals anyone can face. We know this has been proven in practice in the cases of countless martyrs.

Paul quotes it as evidence of the portion of the remnant (v. 22 with Rom. 8:36), and since the Holy Spirit recognises it as the portion of the accepted remnant... it was evidence of anything but their rejection. And so the testimony of evil becomes the evidence of acceptance, to secure the faith of those on whom the evil falls when it comes...

The conquerors whose names stand high in the world's temple of fame won their great place by killing. They strode through seas of blood to the goal of their ambition. God's children become more than conquerors by being killed, and killed all the day long... Those who killed them did so for their own pleasure — "to make a holiday for Romans," or to stamp a hated Name out of the world. Yet they did not know that they were crowning their victims with imperishable crowns.

To suffer reproach, to be misunderstood, to be pushed aside, not to be wanted — in all these things we may be more than conquerors, if it is all for Christ's sake... His love is the great compensation, and no suffering can separate us from His love. On the contrary, suffering gives Him the opportunity to make His love a living, bright reality.

Paul, in closing this unfolding of the Christian condition, names the strongest things that could dare to rise up against the saints, and sees in them only powerless obstacles in the presence of the love that God has shown us in Jesus Christ. This eighth chapter, as it has been expressed, sets out by saying "no condemnation," and ends by adding "no separation."

The answer is that none of these will separate us from the love of God for a single moment. That love rests on us in Christ Jesus our Lord. He is the worthy and all-glorious Object of that love, and we are in it because we are connected with Him. The love reached us in Him, and we, now in Him, stand permanently in that love. If Christ can be removed from the embrace of that love, we can be. If He cannot be, neither can we.

The love of God finds its anchorage, not in the feeble faith of His people, but "in Christ Jesus our Lord." No storm can drag the anchor from there. It is assured for evermore.

Here we have still deeper difficulties: not the visible but the invisible, the spiritual. But sum them all up as the apostle does in his climax — they are only the creature. They stand lined up at their strongest only to be wiped out as nothing in the presence of the all-conquering love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Can death? That was the very thing in which it was expressed in all its greatness. Can life? Love is the very thing that has made me alive, and I have found that all life is in the love of God… Can angels? They are only the servants of that love, sent out to minister to those who are its objects… Can things present? These all work together for good to those who love God… Can height? It is in the height of heaven that we know it best. Can depth? Nothing can be deeper than the judgment we lay under, and love reached us there and removed the judgment from us. Can any other creature? No, because it is only a creature, and the love we boast in is the love of the Creator Himself.

Here, as the fitting close, note that it is the love of God, rather than of Christ as in verse 35. Each is exactly in place. The love of Christ showed itself in suffering to the utmost for us here, and He carries that same love into His intercession in heaven for us who still suffer where He suffered. The love of God is no less real if less in sight. This is His immense and unchanging love, whose grace planned all, gave all, forgave all, justified all, sustains all, and will bring all to that fulness of love and joy and glory that can satisfy such a God and the redemption of such a Saviour.

Now the apostle says, "I am persuaded." He does not say the Romans were persuaded. It is our privilege to be persuaded as he was, but he does not say we are… He was personally persuaded, but he was as fully persuaded about the Romans as about himself.

The apostle Paul puts the stamp of absolute finality on this… If Paul speaks so confidently, without any doubts, what about each of us? Should we not honour God with the same simplicity of faith? To doubt this would be to dishonour His own word.