Dan Herold | Romans 8:35-39 | 8/20/2017
What would you think if I were to tell you that I could tell you your future? You’d probably be at least a little skeptical. I know I would be if someone told me that they could tell me my future! But I can! I can, right here and now, tell you your future. I don’t need the assistance of any special props, I do not need to wear a special costume, and I am not going to charge you anything at all to hear me reveal to you your future.
Throughout history there have been lots of people who have claimed to be able to see into the future and tell people about it. But when you look into it many of those fortune tellers are just playing tricks. They try to come up with something so general that it could apply to anyone and be true for anyone. But what I have to tell you today is a personal message for each of you. The glimpse into the future that I am going to share with you is 100% true and it is 100% unique to every person listening this morning.
Like I said before I don’t need any props or costumes in order to pass on this message concerning your future. And unlike so many other so called fortune tellers I am going to be honest with you, what I am about to tell you is not an original message. It’s one you have probably heard before! It’s one that millions of people have heard throughout history. But like I said, it is 100% true and it applies uniquely to each and every one of us.
The message concerning your future that I have to share with you this morning is the same one that Paul shared with the Christians in Rome almost 2000 years ago and it can be summed up in one little word—Inseparable. It is the undeniable truth that as your loving and almighty Father in Heaven, God will not let anything separate you from his love no matter what trials you face or what troubles come your way. And the reason I can say that with such certainty is because God, the almighty creator of the universe who can see all things from all times, says that with absolute certainty.
As we have been walking through the book of Romans the last several weeks we started out with the foundation of our faith—that salvation is ours through faith in Jesus our Savior who has rescued us from sin. Then the book of Romans made a transition and began to tell us about our lives as Christians, and today Paul is still going to teach us a lesson about life as a Christian, but he does it in a unique way. Today, Paul teaches us about the comfort we have as God’s children by describing one of God’s attributes. What Paul writes about in Romans 8:35-39 is called God’s providence, or God’s ability to see and to know all things.
That means that wherever you are God can see you and he knows even the most boring details about what is going on with you in your life at that specific moment. But, his knowledge isn’t limited to moments—in fact it isn’t limited by anything at all. God knows everything at every time. He even knows the things that could have happened but didn’t. There is nothing God does not know. To us, who stand on the firm foundation of Jesus and place our trust in him, there is nothing more comforting to know that God knows absolutely everything about our lives.
That’s why Paul says that we are “more than conquerors.” To be a conqueror is a great thing. History remembers conquerors very well—men like Caesar Augustus, Alexander the Great, and so many others were known as conquerors. In fact Paul lived during the height of the Roman Empire. He lived in the times of great conquerors, but he said that,
“in Christ we are more than conquerors.”
We are greater than the greatest men in history. Paul says that for a very specific reason. Every great man in history, every conqueror, was ultimately separated from what made him great.
Alexander and Augustus both died and their empires disappeared. Great athletes suffer injuries or retire and someone else follows them and breaks their records or wins more championships. Great leaders pass on and a new president is elected or a new king takes a throne and writes his own legacy over the previous. It is different for Christians—it’s different because what makes us great is Christ and nothing can ever separate us from him.
Paul asks the rhetorical question is verse 35,
Serum testosterone would be injection into your body, which helps spreading blood in different parts of levitra 10 mg the body. A healthy and happier lovemaking session is obtain at link buy levitra expected for couple’s relationship. Unfortunately, email-author impersonation is not the worse form of identity theft include: *#people running up gas or electricity bills on your account *#hi-jacking your telephone account and using it to make long-distance phone calls *#criminals getting hold of medicines like click these guys now generic levitra has become very easy. Right now, there are actually order viagra plenty of solutions to waning or lost interest in sex is now also available to women.
“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?”
and then he asks,
“Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?”
And then he quotes a verse from Psalm 44 that seems totally out of place. Paul writes,
“For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
Now, why would he quote that verse while he’s talking about how great we are—more than conquerors—and how nothing can separate us from Christ. This is the point of Paul’s lesson today. The life of a Christian comes with numerous promises—promises which our all-powerful God has sworn to uphold, but nowhere in all of Scripture does he promise that the life of a Christian is going to be free of trouble or suffering. In fact you can point to numerous places where he promises the opposite—that the lives of believers will be full of trials and troubles.
The world looks at Christians as sheep to be slaughtered because to the sinful world Christians often appear weak. We appear weak because of where our priorities are. We appear weak because we heed our Savior’s words and “turn the other cheek.” The great men of this world, the conquerors, fight tooth and nail to store up wealth, to win wars, and to build empires—but, Christians know that their treasure in heaven and that the things of this world fade away as quickly as they spring up and to some that makes us seem weak… “Like sheep to be slaughtered.”
And all those things Paul lists,
“trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword,”
he lists because those are things Christians will face. Now, as citizens of the United States we have been blessed with incredible freedom, and at times that freedom might blind us from the fact that a life of faith is a life of suffering. But, in one way or another most of us have probably faced some sort of trouble or hardship or persecution for our faith.
If you’re a Christian you can probably think of at least one time in your life when someone made a snide comment or put you down for your faith. Some of you may have even suffered the others; famine, nakedness, danger, or sword for your faith. But if you haven’t suffered those things, be careful that you don’t just breeze by these words. You have brothers and sisters in faith around the world who wish they only had to deal with name calling for being a Christian. You have fellow believers even some in your own Wisconsin Synod family who live in places where danger and sword are an everyday part of life as a Christian. Remember them in your prayers—remember them as your brothers and sisters because God most certainly remembers them as his children!
Not even the most severe troubles not danger, sword, nakedness, or famine can separate one of God’s children from his love. God knows when his children suffer—he knows when they face earthly trouble and danger…he even knows if they are put to death for their faith. But remember, not even the sword can separate you from God’s love…sinful persecutors in this world can take away the lives of Christians but they can’t take away the Savior of Christians.
Take a look at verses 38 and 39. These two verses are a bold confession of faith. They are a confession written by a man who very shortly after he wrote these words would be put to death for spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ. These verses are a confession written for a church that lived in the center of Christian persecution at their time. These words are bold, they are impactful, and most of all they are comforting…
“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
That confession which the Apostle Paul wrote is your future. No matter what you face, not even life or death, angel or demons, height, depth, or anything else in all creation will ever separate you from the love of your Savior who laid down his life so that you could live eternally in heaven. I can’t tell you if or when you will face any of those things because God doesn’t tell us exactly how our lives will play out. What he does tell us is that he never loses track of us, he never stops loving for us, never stops caring for us, and never stops guarding our souls. And that’s what matters…things of this world will come and go, but heaven is forever. That’s why we are more than conquerors…not because we have accomplished anything great, but because our Savior Jesus loves us with a love that doesn’t quit and one day will bring us safely to our eternal home in heaven. God sees all and knows all. Nothing will ever separate us from his love.
Amen.