What does "if God is for us, who can be against us" mean in Romans 8:31?

He says, “What shall we then say to these things?” The things are the grace and mercy which he has been unfolding from chapter 3:21, up till the end of chapter 8:30; beginning with the free gift of righteousness, held out to all, until the justified are glorified; and in all God is seen 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. What are we to say to these things? Well, he says, “If God be for us, who can be against us?” He will boast in God. And five times he, as it were, blows the trumpet, and flings out the challenge; but there is no one to answer the boasting of the apostle, or contest the victory of God.

“WHO CAN BE AGAINST US?” No one in the universe with the least hope of success. “He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, HOW SHALL HE NOT WITH HIM ALSO FREELY GIVE US ALL THINGS?” It is not, how shall He? It is, “how shall He not?” But every voice is dumb. “WHO SHALL LAY ANYTHING TO THE CHARGE OF GOD’S ELECT?” Silence throughout the universe. No voice replies. It is God that justifieth, “WHO IS HE THAT CONDEMNETH?” But the accuser hides himself, and there is no response to the challenge.

" What shall we then say to these things?" Shall we question them, or shall we affirm them? Shall we deny them, or shall we joyfully confess their truth? And if so, what room is there for human utterance in the presence of this glory, save in ceaseless and full-hearted praise of the God of all grace? Can any part of the believer's full title of blessing be now impeached or called in question? But God is for us. It is God who has wrought for us. He has wrought for us great things, and therefore we are glad. But "if God be for us, who is against us?" The world, the flesh and the devil are against us. Principalities and powers are against us. The rulers of the darkness of this world, the power of spiritual wickedness in heavenly places (Eph. 6:12), are against us. There is nothing that is capable of exciting or influencing the natural man, which is not hostile to the spiritual man. The food of one is the bane of the other. 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. This is the faithful clue placed by the Spirit in the hands of the believing pilgrim, whereby he may safely thread his way through the labyrinth of all present experiences. He is girt for his journey by the hand of God. The strength of his way is truth, and that truth is Christ.

Verse 32 contains the unfailing talisman of perpetual re-assurance to the drooping spirit of the tried believer. In truth, it is an evil and a sad thing that the thought of deficiency should ever arise in the heart of one who sets out on his course as a saved sinner under the consciousness of being, in Christ, the object of God's unutterable love. Yet so it is. And because we, in our own weakness, are ever more ready to think of what we have not than of what we have, the Spirit of God, in order to still all restless self-communings in our hearts, and to quiet the cravings of ignorance with the satisfying knowledge of truth, leads forth our souls here again to view the palpable evidences, not only of the reality of our interest in the love of God, but also of the completeness, in point of measure, of the blessing with which we are blessed. "He that spared not His own Son … how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Can there be a question in the heart of faith as to this? The gift which God gave to the ruined creature, ruined by sin, was Christ. Are then lesser gifts to be withheld? Having delivered His own Son to redeem sinners, is the Father going to deal out grudgingly the present supply of His children's need? Having reconciled His enemies by the death of His Son, is He likely to shut up His bowels of compassion from His friends? Or rather, is there any true blessing to be enjoyed which is not comprised in that which has already been bestowed?

How much is wrapped up in these few words, "God for us!" They form one of those marvellous chains of three links so frequently found in scripture. We have "God" linked on to "us" by that precious little word "for." This secures everything, for time and eternity. There is not a single thing within the entire range of a creature's necessities that is not included in the brief but comprehensive sentence which forms the heading of this paper. If God be for us, then it follows, of necessity — blessed necessity — that neither our sins, nor our iniquities, nor our guilt, nor our ruined nature, nor Satan, nor the world, nor any other creature can possibly stand in the way of our present peace and our everlasting felicity and glory. God can dispose of all — has disposed of them, in such a way as to illustrate His own glory, and magnify His holy Name, throughout the wide universe, for ever and ever. All praise and adoration be to the Eternal Trinity!

The result of all for the soul is, that God is for us. Sweet and glorious conclusion, which gives the heart a peace that is ineffable, and rest that depends on the power and stability of God — a rest that shuts out all anxiety as to anything that could trouble it; for if God be for us who can be against us? And the way of it shuts out all thought as to any limit to the liberality of God. He who had given His Son, how should He not with Him give us all things? Moreover, with regard to our righteousness before God, or to charges which might be brought against the saints, as well as with regard to all the difficulties of the way, God Himself has justified: who shall condemn? Christ has died, He has risen, and is at the right hand of God, and intercedes for us: who shall separate us from His love? The enemies? He has already conquered them. Height? He is there for us. Depth? He has been there; it is the proof of His love. Difficulties? We are more than conquerors: they are the immediate occasion of the display of His love and faithfulness, making us feel where our portion is, what our strength is. Trial does but assure the heart, which knows His love, that nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Jesus. Everything else is the creature, and cannot separate us from the love of God — a love of God, which has entered also into this misery of the creature, and gained the victory for us over all. Thus the deliverance, and liberty, and security of the saints by grace and power are fully brought out.

(Vv. 31, 32). The conclusion is that "if God be for us who can be against us?" Unbelief may look at the trials, and sorrows, and difficulties of the way, and the question may arise in the soul, "Can God be for me after all?" Faith knows that the everlasting witness that God is for us is not found in the circumstances that we pass through, but in the gift of the Son. If God "spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all", He must indeed be "for us". If He has already given the greatest gift we need have no question as to the blessings He has given and purposed for us. Having spared not His Son at the Cross, but delivered Him up for us all, He can now righteously and freely give us "all things".

God is manifestly for (working in behalf of) the subjects of His grace. If there is nothing that is not under His mighty hand — the hand displayed in the resurrection of Christ — then there is nothing that can be against those who are of Him who died for them and is risen again. The love that spared Him not, but delivered Him to judgment and death for us, triumphs in His glorious resurrection, proclaiming the impossibility of anything being charged against the elect of God. It is God Himself who justifies, and there is none to override His judicial decrees.

He whom God has raised up from the dead as justifying those believing on Him, sits now on the very throne of God itself as Intercessor — a continuous Intercessor for the objects of His love, who live through and in Him. His ceaseless intercession is in the same love in which He assumed their judgment and death. Nothing can possibly separate them from that love which even judgment and death could not overcome — the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

167 God is then for us in giving, for us in justifying, for us in caring for us in everything; even as with the children of Israel, He took care of their very clothes as they passed through the wilderness. God is for us through everything. If death stare me in the face, well, Christ went through it. If evil powers be against me, well, I have a love with me that has been tried, and destroyed that power. I learn in these very things the perfectness of the love of God. It comes out in the minutest circumstances, in every little detail. I come up boldly to this truth, that "If God be for us, who can be against us?" There is nothing that can make me say, I do not know whether He be for me or not. If it be difficulties and trials, I say, Well, it just shews what pains God is taking with me.

We are apt to over-estimate the forces against us, because we under-estimate the forces that are with us. We must not think lightly of the enemy’s power, but we want rather to grow in the sense of God’s, “If God be for us, who can be against us?” Pile up the list of opposing forces, tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword! They form only the background for the display of God’s power. “More than conquerors” is the response to that!

364 Thus we know that God is for us according to His infinite love, and according to His eternal and immutable righteousness. The first proof of it is that He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us; "how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" Yes, we can count on Him to give us every good thing; but how can He, the Holy One, be for us in view of our sins? It is just in that, that we have seen how fully He is for us, for He has given His Son even for our sins. "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" God Himself justifies us, who shall condemn us? Let us observe that all is here attributed to God. It does not say, we are justified before God, but "It is God that justifieth"; so that the apostle may well exclaim, "Who is he that condemneth," whoever he may be?

104 But further - God being for us is considered, in giving, in justifying, and in all that, as difficulty or danger, might seem to hem our way, or separate us from His love. "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" See how again, as remarked elsewhere, the Spirit reasons from what God is and has done, to consequent blessing to us, not from us to God. That is true in judgment; but in grace it is from God in all its fruits to us. He has not spared His Son, to give everything else, is, after that, a simple thing.