What does it mean that all things work together for good (Romans 8:28)?

And what is in mind is to bring us to the appreciation of the blessed fact that "all things work together for good to those who love God." The activities of the Father, the activities of the Son, and the activities of the Holy Spirit, would bring us to this definite conclusion that "We do know that all things work together for good to those who love God," (Rom. 8:28 N.T.). 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. I ask, could you think of any greater thought than that? Divine love has set itself solidly and constantly to bless us. Divine love has entered sympathetically into every circumstance we could pass through. And what has it in mind? To bring us to the realisation of this very fact that God will conform us to the image of His Son; every feature of the first man gone, and we fully conformed to the Second.

The second thing that lies in this scripture is, that even now God is working towards this end. In all His present dealings with us, in all our varied experiences, in all the trials, sorrows, dangers, and persecutions that attend our path, God is leading us, and using all these seeming adversities, as the sculptor employs his chisel, to produce conformity to the image of His Son. The full result, as will hereafter be seen, is never attained here, but this is the end God has always in view. Knowing this, for He reveals it in His own word, we can with confidence adopt this language, and say, "All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose." What an unspeakable consolation to our souls! All things — not one is excepted, but all things, the bitter and the sweet, adversity and prosperity, sickness and health, yea, tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril or sword — all are but instruments in the hands of our God to work out His purposed end. How calmly then we may repose in Him and in His love! Like Jacob, we may often be tempted to say, "All these things are against us;" but no, they are for us, working together for good. We may not see the need of this trial, or the reason of that sorrow; but God is watching, noting everything — what we require, and what the effect produced upon us. Our future condition is before Him, and He leads us by a right way to secure the blessing for us.

The Apostle has shewn how blessedly the Holy Spirit works in us by the new life in Christ, and the indwelling Holy Spirit, producing spiritual experiences. Now we learn that not only is God the Holy Spirit in us, but that God is for us in "all things" that are taking place around us. In regard to all the circumstances of life, the trials, the sorrows, the conflicts and the difficulties, we may not know how to pray as we ought; but this we do know, "That all things work together for good to them that love God". 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. To understand the way in which all things work for good we may have to wait, even as the Lord said to Peter, "What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter". Another has said, "The sorrow may not be remedied, but the sorrow is blessed".

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.

Thus He who searches the hearts, and scrutinises what is found there, finds, not our poor selfish feelings or complaints, but the mind of the Spirit - what the Holy Ghost has produced in them; for the Holy Ghost Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. He makes intercession for the saints according to God. Wonderful privilege in our sorrows and sufferings, that, when God searches the heart, He finds the mind formed by the Spirit there, the Spirit itself, as in us, making intercession for us according to God! It is a privilege to be in suffering thus, God by His Spirit taking part in it. As Christ personally felt all the sorrow perfectly through which He passed, so we through grace by the Spirit take our part in it (not according to selfishness, but) according to God, with the increased sense of our infirmity and weakness of our dependence and connection with a fallen creation from which we cannot escape down here, and feeling it so much the more as we see the glory, but given by the power of the Spirit to take part in it according to God - to be its voice, so to speak, in grace felt by ourselves, though having part in it. It is the mind of the Spirit in it which God finds in us when He searches the hearts, and the Holy Ghost Himself is there making intercession for the saints according to God. It is wonderful grace: the heart of man is searched; the mind of the Spirit is there, because the Holy Ghost Himself is there interceding, but, though Himself, in groans which are in our hearts. But (for such is the force of it), though we do not know "what to pray for as we ought," we do "know that all things work together for good to them that love God." God works of and from Himself in our favour - and makes everything work together for our good. We know not what to look for. Perhaps in the present state of things there is no remedy, no direct setting aside or remedy for what makes us groan; but this is certain - God makes all things work together for good to those who love Him. The sorrow may not be remedied, but the sorrow is blessed. We are called according to God's purpose, and God orders everything for our good.

In Romans 8:28 there is the following statement: “we know that all things work together for good to them that love God … ” For a long time I wondered exactly what “all things work together for good” might mean. In recent years I have realised that the “all things” are not only the pleasant events that occur in our lives but also those things which become a burden or trial. We feel it is a blessing when the burden is gone, and we can look back and review what has happened and appreciate how the Lord has brought us through. But there is also great blessing to be gained if in those same situations we put the burden or trial into the hands of the Lord and leave it there for Him to deal with. It is with these thoughts in mind that I would like to consider several Scriptures which highlight some aspects of the value of prayer and indicate how committed and energetic we need to be in our prayer life.

In Romans 8: 28 there is the following statement: "we know that all things work together for good to them that love God..." For a long time I wondered exactly what "all things work together for good" might mean. In recent years I have realised that the "all things" are not only the pleasant events that occur in our lives but also those things which become a burden or trial. We feel it is a blessing when the burden is gone, and we can look back and review what has happened and appreciate how the Lord has brought us through. But there is also great blessing to be gained if in those same situations we put the burden or trial into the hands of the Lord and leave it there for Him to deal with. It is with these thoughts in mind that I would like to consider several Scriptures which highlight some aspects of the value of prayer and indicate how committed and energetic we need to be in our prayer life.

We are called according to His purpose, which will soon be fulfilled, and even now everything in the world today is working together for the good of those who have been called by the gospel. God has a definite purpose before Him, and He is working all things in accordance with that purpose, and nothing in the universe can hinder Him from carrying it out to its glorious completion. He works all things according to the counsel of His own will, that we should be to the praise of His glory.

And when we know this we also know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are called according to His purpose. Everything must contribute to the end God has in view. The circumstances of the way must be used to that end; the exercises produced by them keep us from settling down here and drive us nearer to heaven. And the Trinity are of one mind as regards the saints. Counsels belong to the Father, and the Son has declared the Father, and wrought a work on the ground of which those counsels can be fulfilled, and the Holy Spirit has taken up His abode in us to form us according to eternal counsel. We are predestinated to be conformed to the image of the Son of God, and it is for His glory, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. This is what God had in view when He took us up, that we should be like Christ to the eternal delight of God. To bring about this Christ gave Himself for us, and to that end the Spirit works in us. There can be no failure in all this. "Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son." This was His eternal purpose, and it must be accomplished. If we are predestinated, there is no fear of our not being called. Whatever dark corner of the earth may contain us we must hear the call of God; He will send His word to us and draw us from our hiding-place and bring us to Himself. And He will not fail to justify us: "And whom he justified, them he also glorified." The purpose of God cannot be defeated—Father, Son and Spirit work to one end.

All Things Working for God. — We may not at times know what to pray for as we ought, "but we do know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose" (28). For the end is sure, being the subject of Divine revelation, though about all that we meet with by the way we may not at the time have an understanding. Looking back on the past, we may see the wisdom and purpose of God in former difficulties abundantly made plain. Hence experience might suggest that all will turn out well. Poor Jacob said in the bitterness of his grief, when asked to allow Benjamin to go down into Egypt with his brethren, "Me have ye bereaved of my children: Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away: all these things are against me" (Gen. 42:36). We are to use very different language, for God's purposes about us now stand revealed. "For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren. Moreover, whom He did predestinate, them He also called; and whom He called, them He also justified; and whom He justified, them He also glorified" (29, 30).

The apostle looks beyond all this discipline — beyond the ways of God on the road, which are only the instruments to work out His purpose. It is Satan's world in a certain sense, though he cannot take things out of God's hand. He could go to the Chaldeans and say, Take the cattle; and how little they knew they were doing God's will all the time, and that the hand of God was in it! They are all the ways of God with a view to His purpose, making everything work together for good, "for whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren." That is His purpose, and we are even now nigh enough to see and trace His hand — anyhow we shall see it soon, if we do not now.