Moments With God

Romans 8:30-39

As children of God we have victory in Christ Jesus, our Lord! We need to fear nothing, for the Lord is on our side! Nothing can separate us from the love of God! What an awesome thought, and what an awesome promise! In light of all this there should be overflowing joy in our hearts!

What wonderful victories, blessings, and promises we have in Christ Jesus, our Lord! God choose us and called us from eternity to be His own. Romans 8:30b says, "those He called, He also justified; those He justified, He also glorified." We not only have the forgiveness of our sins, but we have a secure eternal future in Christ. This eternal future is so secure in God's plan for us that Romans 8:30b speaks of this eternal future as if it has already taken place!

We are secure in Christ for time and for eternity. "If God is for us, who can be against us?" (Romans 8:31b) Sometimes we may feel as if everything is against us, but the Word of God teaches us that the great God of the universe is always for us and is always with us! "He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all-how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?" (Romans 8:32) God proved His love for us by sending His only Son to die for our sins. Surely we can trust Him to provide us with everything we need for time and eternity. No one or nothing can ever oppose us as children of God and ultimately succeed. In the dangers, trials, and uncertainties of life we can rest in the Lord. We have the Lord God on our side, and we are victors in Him!

We have absolute security in Christ in all things, because He died for our sins and freed us from the guilt of our sins. Christ is also in heaven sitting at the right hand of the Heavenly Father in the position of power. Nothing will happen to us that is not in God's plan for our lives, so we need not fear. Finally, Christ is always interceding for His children. What a blessed promise!

In light of all this, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" (Romans 8:35a) The answer is that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ! No matter what hardship, trial, or trouble we may be experiencing in our lives at the moment we are never separated from the love of Christ. In fact, trials in our lives are part of God's plan and purpose for our lives to mold us to become more like Jesus in our character and attitudes. "No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us." (Romans 8:37) We become conquerors through the trials of life by patiently enduring these trials and by being submissive to the Lord's will. We become "more than conquerors" by using these experiences to grow in our love and service for the Lord. Also God will always see us through these difficult times and bring us to ultimate victory. Victory is always assured for the Christian if not in this life, then in eternity. Absolutely nothing will ever separate us from the love of God and the victory we have in the Lord Jesus Christ! "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." (Romans 8:38-39) Praise the name of the Lord for our victory in Him!

Romans 8:28-29

Romans 8:28-29

Romans 8:28 is a promise we can rest on and trust in when our world around us seems to be falling apart. It is a blessed promise, but it is also a promise with which we may at times struggle. We can believe and trust this promise, however, even when we are overwhelmed and puzzled by adverse circumstances all around us.

The writer of this devotional remembers struggling with the promise of Romans 8:28 when her dad was suffering the excruciating pain of cancer and radiation. She wondered how "all things" could possibly be working for good in this case. What could possibly be good about cancer and severe pain? For that matter what could possibly be "good" about any pain or heartache or trial?

But God's Holy Word says that God works "all things," not some things, or even most things, but "all things" for our ultimate spiritual good; if we love Him. The key to understanding this verse is to realize that not all things are good in themselves. Sin has wracked havoc with our world, and there are many experiences in this world that are not good or pleasant in themselves. God, however, works both the "good" and the "bad" events of our lives together for our ultimate good. It has been said that life is like a tapestry. When you look at the backside of a tapestry it does not look beautiful. There are knotted off ends and threads that seem to have no meaning or beauty. When one turns the tapestry over, however, one sees a beautiful picture or design. When we see life's trials and difficulties we see the backside of the tapestry of life. God, however, is bringing all the threads or events of our lives together, both the good and bad, into a beautiful tapestry. The Lord already sees the top part of our tapestry of life. The Lord already sees the beautiful end results of what He is accomplishing in our lives. When we do not understand the reason for the difficult circumstances in our lives we must simply trust that the Lord is working out all things in our lives for His glory and to accomplish His plan. He is also working out all things for our ultimate spiritual good.

The ultimate spiritual good that the Lord God is seeking to accomplish in our lives is that we might become "conformed to the likeness of His Son." (Romans 8:29) It is God's purpose and passion for us that we become more and more like the Lord Jesus. He desires that we become more like the Lord Jesus every day in our thoughts, attitudes, and actions. In order for this to happen there must be a conforming process taking place in our lives. This conforming process often can only occur during times of trial and difficulty in our lives. Gelatin is only able to be conformed or shaped to the mold into which it is placed after it has been dissolved in hot water. So we too often have to go through the heat of trials and difficulties to become more conformed to the image or likeness of Jesus Christ. God has the pattern for our lives all figured out. He knows and understands the beautiful tapestry that He is weaving for our lives. He knows the beginning from the end. We must trust the Lord to do His beautiful work in our lives even in times when life's events and circumstances seem very difficult and overwhelming!

Romans 8:17-27

"In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express."

Romans 8:26

As children of God we have everything we need for time and eternity! We are "heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ." (Romans 8:17) Along life's way it is inevitable that we will have a certain amount of heartache and pain, but we have the absolute assurance of God's presence with us throughout our entire lives. We also have the assurance of a future entrance into our eternal inheritance in Christ Jesus.

The heartaches and pain we suffer on this earth are temporary, and they can not begin to compare to the glory we will have with the Lord Jesus some day. Paul said in Romans 8:18, "I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." Even creation is presently affected by sin and it's consequences. So the children of God also "groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies." (Romans 8:23b) We already have the Holy Spirit in our hearts as a deposit or promise of what is to come in our glorious eternal futures. We already have the forgiveness of our sins in Christ. We are already free from the penalty and power of sin, but sin and its effects are still present in our lives. So we groan in excited anticipation of the day when we will be completely free from the presence of sin and its consequences in the world and in our lives. We presently "hope" or look forward with absolute certainty to that blessed eternal inheritance that we have in Jesus Christ! Romans 8:25 tells us, "But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently."

As the blessed assurance of our eternal inheritance and future in Christ sustains us, so the Holy Spirit helps us in our prayer life. Romans 8:26 promises us the following, "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express." Have you ever tried to pray and felt so overwhelmed with some heartache that you did not know how to pray? Have you ever felt that you could not find the words to express in prayer the depths of your feelings and needs in your heart? God understands our weaknesses and has provided us a helper in our prayer lives. That helper is the Holy Spirit Himself! The Holy Spirit prays in and through us. He also prays for us especially during those times when we are too overwhelmed with heartache to find the right words to express our pain to the Lord in prayer. The Holy Spirit understands our sorrows and is our prayer helper, and He "intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express." The Holy Spirit Himself pleads and intercedes for us before the Heavenly Father! The Holy Spirit is our perfect intercessor before the Heavenly Father, "because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will." (Romans 8:27b)

Praise the Lord for His infinite blessings! He is our salvation. He is our source of strength, promise, and hope. He provides for every need in our lives for time and eternity. The Lord provides us the Holy Spirit to help us to live for the Lord and to help us in our weaknesses. Finally, the Lord even provides the Holy Spirit as our prayer helper and advocate! What a glorious God we serve! Praise His name!

Romans 8:1-17

Romans 6 and Romans 7:15-25

"In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus." Romans 6:11

Jesus Christ has died on the cross to pay the penalty or punishment for our sins. We now have a righteous and pure standing before God. When God now looks at us, He does not see our sins, but He sees Christ's righteousness! We are now free from the power or tyranny of sins. As a child of God we have the power to say, "no" to the devil and "yes" to God. We as believers, however, will not be completely free from the presence of sin in our lives until we go to be with the Lord.

As a child of God we must struggle against the sins still present in our lives. Romans 6:2b tells us, "We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?" We already have a righteous standing before God because of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. Now we need to struggle to show practical holiness and righteousness in our lives. Because we are united with Christ through His death and resurrection our old sinful selves were "crucified" with Jesus Christ so "that we should no longer be slaves to sin." (Romans 6:6) As children of God we have already experienced new spiritual birth in Christ. Now we need to increasingly display that new life in Christ in our struggle against sin and in practical holiness in our lives.

Hence, Romans 6:11b tells us that we must count or consider ourselves "dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus." We must choose against sin, and we must choose for the Lord. We must do all we can to guard against our sinful natural appetites. We must do all we can to live in the light of the truth found in God's Word. We must saturate ourselves with His Holy Word. Romans 6:13 tells us that we must seek to do all we can to reject sin in our lives, and to offer ourselves "to God as those who have been brought from death to life." We must offer ourselves to God as "instruments of righteousness." We must experience in practice what we already are in position-dead to the devil and sin and alive in Jesus Christ.

We have a choice, either to be a slave to sin and the devil, or to be a slave to obedience and the Lord Jesus Christ. Slavery to sin leads to destruction and death. Slavery to Christ leads to life and righteousness. We must not let sin be our master, but Christ must increasingly become the Master and Lord of every area of our lives.

We will continue to struggle against sin our entire lives until we go to be with the Lord. Paul said in Romans 7:15b, "For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do." Paul said this was because of the sin still living or present in him. In frustration Paul said in Romans 7:18b, "For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out." We, as believers today, also struggle against sin in our lives. This constant struggle against sin is a cause for tension and confusion in our lives at times. What is the answer to all this? Paul tells us the answer to this question in Romans 7:24b-25a, "Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God-through Jesus Christ our Lord!" We will and must continue to struggle against sin in our lives, but we must increasingly grow in practical holiness in our lives. The Lord Jesus must increasingly become Lord of every area of our lives. Then we will have ultimate victory in the Lord!