But we *do* know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to purpose.
Paul has just said that we often do not know what to pray for. This verse answers with something we do know. It ties three things together: the reach of "all things," the people who love God, and the purpose behind their calling.
This promise sits right next to our failure in prayer. One commentator notes that we know it now, and that it holds for other believers as well as ourselves.
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.
Nothing sits outside the word "all." One writer spells out the list.
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!
Faith can hold this promise long before it can trace how it works.
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."
Jacob, in the book of Genesis, had lost one son and feared losing another. He read those troubles the opposite way from this verse.
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 promise names a group, so it is worth asking who belongs to it.
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.
Another writer points out which way that love runs.
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.
The verse does not rest our assurance on our love alone. It also points to God's call.
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.
Kelly explains why calling and purpose are brought in here at all:
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.
Our idea of a good outcome may not be God's. One writer looks at the whole section to find what God means.
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.
- Known, not felt — the verse starts where prayer breaks down. It promises a sure outcome, not an explanation of how.
- All, not most — bitter and sweet, sickness and health, persecution and sword are all tools in God's hand. He leaves nothing out.
- Called, not merely loved — our love marks us out as believers, but our assurance rests on His calling. God saves us because we need saving; He calls us because He wants us.
- Conformity, not comfort — the "good" God aims at is likeness to His Son, so today's circumstances serve tomorrow's purpose.
- Jacob's error, our warning — "all these things are against me" was his verdict on events that were working for his good.
Because whom he has foreknown, he has also predestinated [to be] conformed to the image of his Son, so that he should be [the] firstborn among many brethren.
Romans 8:29 lifts the reader out of present suffering into God's own purpose. That purpose starts before creation and ends in glory. Two questions press for an answer. What does it mean that God "foreknew" people? And what is He shaping them into?
The verse does not say God knew what people would do. One writer points to the wording itself:
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.
Predestination here carries a destination with it.
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.
The likeness reaches both character and body:
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).
The full likeness is still ahead. Yet something of it can show now.
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.
The title given to the Son is not about the order of births.
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).
The purpose does not stop at our blessing.
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.
The certainty of the outcome rests on the Son Himself.
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.
- Foreknown — God's foreknowledge here fixes on people, not on their conduct: "whom," not "what."
- Predestined — the choice comes with a destination. Not glory in general, but the exact likeness of Christ, which defines every believer.
- Conformed — His beauty of character is mirrored in us now; our bodies share the likeness at His coming.
- Firstborn — the goal above our blessing is His rank; He stands first in the family, and He is not ashamed to call us His own.
- Unbreakable — the many are bound up with the Son's own honour. So no link from foreknowledge to final glory can ever snap.