Who shall separate us from the love of Christ (Romans 8:35)?

(V. 34). 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. Already the Epistle has shewn that God justifies the believer through the death of Christ, and sets forth the perfection of this justification 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.

(V. 35) This leads to the third challenge, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?". The Apostle enumerates seven forms of trial. Every form of evil that we have to meet in passing through this world can be ranged under one or other 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.

Who shall Separate? — Nor is this all. In the presence of hostile powers, exposed to the malice of enemies, battling with circumstances, facing death perhaps, and enduring hardships, a third triumphant challenge is boldly thrown out; but like the others to find no one to take it up. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, For Thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter" (35, 36). What answer is there to this? We may well listen to one who was competent to reply, having graduated very high in the school of suffering. "Nay," he says, "in all these things we are more than conquerors, through Him that loved us (37)." Circumstances, then, however adverse, cannot separate us from the love of Christ, nor powers, we next learn, from the love of God. And here again Paul, so competent to speak, acquaints the saints in Rome with his firm persuasion as to it. "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers" (for in such order we should read these clauses) "nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord (38, 39)." Bold yet sober language, evidencing the confidence of faith, very different from vain boasting, or bombastic utterances, I am persuaded, writes St. Paul. He had proved what God's love was to him in the past. He could count on it throughout his whole career. No power had deprived him of its enjoyment, no power could, he was sure. And if he were to be alone, as at times he was, that love would reach him and sustain his heart — the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord, the love of Him who gave His Son for Paul. What creature can hinder the outflow of God's love to the objects of it? Creatures however formidable, what are they when opposed to God?

Or, on the other hand, when He has shown such a positive, infinite love for us, “who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Is it a possibility? What of all those things that try the faith and test the heart — things which may to the natural eye seem to contradict the constant, unfailing care of God for souls? “Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Are they not rather but special occasions of casting us more upon that love?

So the questions end with v. 35, but there is the written word quoted to confirm the soul as to the last one — “As it is written, For Thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” It is for Christ's sake that these afflictions are allowed to come to the believer — that they may the more deeply prove the reality of His love and the power of that love, which, when known in the soul, is far more than a match for the most terrible ordeals that may be known. We know this to have been proven practically in the cases of martyrs unnumbered.

And so, in writing to the Romans (Rom. 8:35), exposed as they were to persecution and hatred on all sides on account of their Christianity, the apostle says, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Could he have furnished better cheer or kinder comfort to them? Impossible! “Killed all the day long” for Christ’s sake, living a chronic death, so to speak, on His account, pursued by peril and sword, losing all things here, to them the love of Christ remained. It was their security, their sun, their shield, their everlasting arm, their unfading treasure when everything failed.

Once more the challenge goes out: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" Every enemy that might be thought likely to do so is named—tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword—and in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us. These are the enemies that are found in the wilderness; they are not the inhabitants of the land of promise, not the wicked spirits in the heavenly places. But these things cannot separate us from the love of Christ, though they may separate us from our best friends upon earth. But the truth is, it is for His sake that all these things come upon us. But He holds up His hands in intercession for us; they never grow weary. And His eye sees all the difficulties of the way, and He knows all our sorrows, and He sympathises with us and ministers to us all the grace and strength that we need. We are more than conquerors, for tribulation will work patience, and we greatly profit by all our exercises.

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 singles himself out three times in this epistle in this way, once in the second verse, where he says that the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus had made him free from the law of sin and death. This is so experimental that every one must speak for himself. Then again in verse 18 he says, "1 reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory "that shall be revealed in us." It is not every believer who reckons in this way. We surely ought to reckon as he did. And now again for the third time he has to say something of the way in which he views things, and he is persuaded that nothing is able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. He was personally persuaded, but he was as fully persuaded about the Romans as about himself. Death, life, angels, principalities, powers, are more spiritual foes and more terrible to meet than those in verse 35; but they cannot separate us from the love of God. Death cannot separate us from the love of God, it is in death the love of God has been expressed to us; it is the witness of the love of God to us. Life cannot separate us from it, for the love of God is the life in which we live and shall live for ever. Angels cannot separate us, for they are appointed in the love of God to minister to us in our journey through an evil world. And they are greatly interested in the grace that has come to us in Christ. And as to evil angels they are powerless to hurt us. Neither can height nor depth rob us of that love. It has been expressed in Christ, and it has found its resting-place in Him, and God has brought us to Himself in the One in whom it rests, and therefore we are persuaded there can be no separation from it. If there is no separation from the love of God for Christ, there is none for us, for it is in Him that that love is ours.

The roll of enemies is called. Tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword. Can any one of these, or all of them together, separate us from the love of Christ? They may separate you from the love of relative and friend, and even to a great extent from the love of the brethren. Paul has to say that all in Asia had turned from him, and could only mention one who was not ashamed of his chain. And, he says, “at my first answer (before Nero) no man stood with me, but all men forsook me” (2 Tim. 4:16). Persecution had separated him from every friend he had about him at the time. But what about the love of Christ? Did it fail? “Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengtheneth me.” “And,” he adds, “the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto His heavenly kingdom; to whom be glory forever and ever.”

In this world, which we know so well, there is a whole range of adverse powers. Some of them are exerted directly by evil men, such as persecution or the sword. Others of them are more indirect results of sin in the government of God, such as distress, famine, nakedness or peril. Will any of these things seen and felt, separate us from Christ's love? Not for one moment! Again and again has a timorous convert been assailed by brutal men, who have said in effect, "We'll knock these notions out of you." Again and again has the effect of their persecution simply been to knock the truth securely in. He has not only won in the conflict but come out of it an immense gainer, and so more than conqueror. By these very things he has been rooted in the love of Christ.

But see what precedes and follows the verse quoted, and you will then understand the secret of this victory, and see how it is possible for us, who are by nature always self-centred, to rejoice in suffering. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or sword?" (v. 35). None of these physical sufferings can separate us from His love, though oft-times our souls may lose the sense of it. Then we get downcast and prone to murmur in the midst of trial: and thus Satan gains an advantage. But, if our hearts are right, and we are dependent upon the Lord, our great Intercessor, the tribulation does but drive us closer to Him, and we are thus made to prove afresh the blessedness of that love which is greater than the greatest trial. Then can we glory in tribulation: then do the dews of sorrow shine like to precious gems, and we are content and happy with God's way for us, and are true overcomers. Then follows the blessed conclusion: "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (vv. 38-39). If the first list are physical trials in which we need the love of Christ as our support, here are spiritual foes, and against these God Himself is opposed. They cannot separate us from His love, for His love is greater and mightier than them all. All the power of these spiritual things was marshalled to separate us from the love of God and to hold us in bondage, but the cross of Christ destroyed their dominion, and through His precious death, the love of God has secured us in spite of them all, and since this is a glorious fact we need not fear. Oh, may the light of this matchless love so fill and move our hearts that we may be always ready to be killed all the day long for Jesus' sake, and so be more than conquerors through Him that loved us.

As the abidingness of His love has been attested by the sufferings He has endured — sufferings beyond our telling — so we may be encouraged by the knowledge that no suffering through which His own may be called to pass, nor circumstance however testing, can ever diminish His love. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" This is faith's confident challenge. "Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that love us."

Paul added his own triumphant testimony, "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." And we are taught in Romans 8:1 that we are where divine love is resting — "in Christ Jesus."

Who is able to pluck us out of His hand? None; neither Satan, angels, nor men. Who is able to separate us from His love, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord?" Let the prince and god of this world set himself in array against us with all the forces of this world; they cannot separate us from the love of the Father, as little as the whole arsenal fraught with all the weapons of persecution, wielded by Satan, neither tribulation, nor distress, nor persecution, nor famine, nor nakedness, nor peril, nor sword, shall be able to separate us from the love of Christ.

"For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."