Romans 8:31-39. August 18th 2024.
Let me begin with a question: What has the proclamation of the gospel achieved?
Let me think like a skeptic for a minute: Here at All Saints, the gospel has now been proclaimed for almost nine years. What has been accomplished?
Now, if you are a reasonable person, there are various things you could talk about, but if you are a skeptic, you could also count many things we haven’t achieved:
The city of Amersfoort is not noticeably more Christian than it was in 2015. I don’t know, but it’s probably less Christian than it was then.
We don’t have any noticeable influence in the corridors of power in the gemeente.
It’s not like anybody in the Tweede Kamer cares what we think.
We don’t have a Christian gemeente or province.
We haven’t changed the trajectory of our denomination, and we haven’t even accomplished that much in terms of numbers.
Don’t misunderstand me—I know that this church has remarkably grown over the last eight years, and if we gathered everyone who has walked through our doors since 2015, it would be a very big crowd.
But compare the kind of impact Greta Thunberg has achieved in the last four years since her famous “How Dare You” speech. How massive the climate change message has become over the last nine years!
Or consider the kind of cultural significance Taylor Swift has had in the last nine years.
What has the proclamation of the gospel accomplished?
Paul, as he puts pen to paper to write this letter to the Romans, is at a pivotal moment in his career.
Ten years before, he had set off from Antioch to begin his first missionary journey, and for ten years he has been laboring, traveling around, preaching, and planting churches in the Eastern Mediterranean.
And now, as he sits down to write this letter, he thinks he is just about done. He is ready to sign off on that work in the Eastern Mediterranean and move on to the next phase of his ministry: Spain via Rome.
And if you were to ask Paul, “Paul, after ten years of proclaiming the gospel in the Eastern Mediterranean, What has been accomplished?”
I think this is what he would say:
Some people have believed. Scattered throughout the Eastern Mediterranean, there are little pockets of people who, when they heard the good news of the Lord Jesus, responded with faith.
What has been accomplished after eight years of gospel proclamation at All Saints? One way of answering that question is that ‘some people have believed.’
And you might think, “Is that all? It doesn’t look impressive, does it?”
Now, this morning, we are in Romans 8:31-39, and these famous verses are the conclusion to Romans 8, but they are also the conclusion to Romans 5-8; and really, I think they are the conclusion and climax of the entire letter so far.
Ever since Romans 1:18, Paul has been explaining why he feels he is in debt to proclaim the gospel to everyone.
And his argument has centered around what he believes the gospel accomplishes when people believe it.
And here, in these eight climactic verses, he is ready to draw everything together. This is what he believes the gospel of the Lord Jesus achieves—some people believe it, and that is an extraordinary thing.
Or, as Jesus said in our gospel reading, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over even one sinner who repents.
Two points:
- We are the irrevocably justified people of God.
v.31 What then shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? v.32 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? v.33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. v.34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.
We are back in the courtroom. That’s where we were in chapters 1-4, and here we are again.
And he structures these verses around three questions that take you through the entire legal process:
v.31 Who can be against us?
v.33 Who will bring a charge?
v.34 Who is the one who condemns?
He’s walking us through the whole legal process, and the answer to all these questions is: No one.
There is no one to be against us, no one to bring a charge, no one to condemn.
And not because there is a shortage of applicants. There are plenty of people who might apply for these jobs, and Paul knows that.
For the last ten years, Paul’s ministry has been, I suppose, one court case after another.
Paul has been tried by Jewish courts and Greek courts. He has been sentenced, he has been imprisoned, he’s been beaten up; indeed, soon after writing this letter, he is going to be arrested to protect him from an assassination attempt.
It’s not that there is a shortage of applicants for the position, but none of that matters.
v.32 again: If God is for us, who can be against 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?
God is on our side. He gave his Son, the Lord Jesus, for us. How can he possibly NOT be on our side?
It’s quite a thought, is it not? God is for us. God is for you.
When you are alone, or guilty, or rejected, or afraid. What a thought!
God is for you. He is on your side.
I’m not the type for tattoos, but if I ever get into some mid-life crisis and decide to get one, it will undoubtedly be this verse: God is for us; God is for me!
v.33 Who is to bring a charge against us?
God has chosen us, and it is God who justifies. In other words, the judge is on our side. No prosecutor is ever going to be able to make a charge stick on the people God has chosen, the people who God justifies.
v.34 Who then is the one who condemns?
No one.
Our condemnation has already fallen on the Lord Jesus Christ.
…‘Christ Jesus, who died, and more than that, who was raised to life.’
Which means he is not condemned anymore. He was sentenced to death, and God put that into reverse and raised him to life.
And not only that, he is now seated on the highest throne in the universe: at God’s right hand, interceding for us.
You see, all through the legal process, God is on our side. He is the prosecutor, he is the judge, he is the executioner, and he is on our side.
It’s a bit like those shady mafia trials where, before the trial, the mafia boss slips an envelope of cash to the judge, an envelope of cash to the prosecutor, and he buys the jury and the public gallery and the prison wardens just in case, so that everyone is on his side.
It’s a little bit like that—every part of the legal process is on our side. Except it’s not really like that, first because it’s not corrupt.
But more importantly, it’s much more certain than that.
See, in that mafia situation, when you turn up in court, there is always the possibility that the judge might have had a sudden crisis of conscience; that somebody who hates you slips much more money to the judge and the jury, etc.; that more investigation is done, and the ruling is overturned.
In other words, there is always a risk, even if only a 1% risk. You think you’ve bought justice, but you just can’t know for sure until the judge makes the ruling.
But that’s not the situation we are in. As Christians this morning, it’s not just that we know what the verdict will be—a verdict to be made in the future.
The point is that the verdict has already been given. Jesus Christ is not dead in his tomb. He has been raised, and he is seated with our righteousness safely kept with him at the right hand of God.
And so, for us to be condemned, if we are Christians, Jesus Christ would have to be taken out of heaven and put back to death in a tomb; which is not going to happen.
We are the irrevocably justified people of God.
Which means that, frankly, it doesn’t matter what the court of public opinion thinks or what the social media influencers and the zeitgeist might make of us; what the power brokers in our denomination do with us, the authorities in our government or our universities, or the HR in our workplaces, the judiciary, the Tweede Kamer, or the Supreme Court think.
It doesn’t matter what anyone thinks of us—you can go home this evening, enjoy your glass of wine, and sleep peacefully.
Because God has picked a side, and it is your side.
If God is for us, who can be against us?
- We are the inseparably loved people of God (v.35-39).
v.35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? v.36 As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
Well, the theme of these verses is love:
v.35 the love of Christ
v.37 him who loved us
v.39 the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And a lot of commentaries make the point that Paul now moves from the legal in the last paragraph to the relational. We’ve left the law, and now we are on love. And I can see why.
But there is a point to be made that Paul is still using a legal metaphor.
You see, when you are charged and a verdict has been returned, there is a final stage: sentencing.
And in the Old Testament courtroom, what is the sentence? What is the sentence for Adam and Eve? They are sent away, separated. Exiled. Out of the garden, never to return.
What about Israel? What was the sentence? Again, when they were found guilty and condemned, they were sent away. Exiled. Separated.
And that list in v.35—tribulation, distress, famine, nakedness, danger, sword—whatever else it is doing there, I think it is meant to evoke the experience of exile, of being separated.
And v.36 is a quotation from Psalm 44, which is a Psalm of lament. Israel is complaining that God has abandoned them into the hands of their enemies: “we are regarded as sheep for the slaughter.”
In other words, we are at the end of a legal chain here. No one is against us. No one can charge us. No one can condemn us. But is it still possible that we can be sentenced? Sentenced to separation from the love of God?
And the answer is an emphatic “No!” (v.37).
But then he says something quite extraordinary:
v.37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
What Paul doesn’t say is that we will not experience these things—danger, famine, tribulation, sword. He is not saying these things won’t happen to us.
He says in all these things, in the midst of these things, we are more than conquerors—which, by the way, is the word in Greek from which Nike gets their name—hupernikao, hyper-victorious, or you could even say superheroes.
In other words, it’s not that these things will never touch us; it is that they do not stop us. Nothing can stop us, nothing can change our direction of travel. We are superheroes through him who loved us.
v.38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, v.39 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.
We are the inseparably loved people of God. The steadfast love of the Lord is set upon us.
Which is an extraordinary thing to say.
Throughout the Old Testament, the steadfast love of the Lord, the covenant love of the Lord, khesed, was set only on one family—the family of Abraham.
And yet here we are this morning, this motley crew, and we are saying that because we have believed the gospel, the steadfast love of the Lord is set upon us. And not just temporarily—inseparably!
Who are we? We are the irrevocably justified people of God;
Who are we? We are the inseparably loved people of God.
It’s an extraordinary thing!
Which brings us to his opening question:
What then shall we say to these things?
It is hard not to feel emboldened by Romans 8:31-39.
During Covid, I listened to a sermon on these verses where the pastor said he had been speaking to the oldest member of his congregation about how he was holding up. And this member told him that he had committed Romans 8:31-39 to memory, so that whenever he felt afraid, wherever he was, he could just recite them to himself.
If you read Christian biographies and things like that, there is no shortage of Christians throughout the centuries who have boldly faced persecution, martyrdom, suffering, and disease, holding on to these verses.
It’s hard not to feel emboldened by these verses.
But you know what? I think Paul has a bigger vision in Romans 8.
He is, as I said, sitting at his desk at a pivotal moment in his missionary career. He is about to sign off on his ministry in the Eastern Mediterranean and is setting his gaze on a new assignment—Spain.
And Paul wants to get to Spain with the church in Rome by his side. And so this is his pitch. He is trying to get them to commit to supporting his ministry of proclaiming the gospel to those who have not heard it.
So imagine there is the apostle Paul, and he is standing before the dragon’s den. And the dragons are the Roman church. And he is trying to persuade them that they should invest in his ministry.
And he gets to the end of his pitch, and they say to him, “Paul, summarize it for us—what exactly do you intend to achieve by proclaiming the gospel?”
And that’s a question you could ask Grant as he returns from Sabbatical next week—a pivotal moment in his career: “Grant, what exactly do you intend to achieve in the next ten years of your ministry here so that we can support you?”
Or it’s a question I hope you would ask me again at a pivotal moment in my career.
And what Paul would say, and what I hope Grant and I would say, is that what I really hope is that as I proclaim the gospel, wherever that is—Spain, Amersfoort, Rotterdam—some people might believe it.
And you might say, “But that doesn’t sound very impressive, Paul.” And perhaps you look around here, and perhaps you don’t think it looks very impressive either. It doesn’t warrant your investment.
And Paul wants to say, “You need to realize how extraordinary it is when people believe the gospel.” Because those who have believed in the gospel, we, are the irrevocably justified and inseparably loved people of God.
We are the people against whom the Lord will never count any transgression;
we are those who have the law written on our hearts;
we are the friends of the living God;
we are the heirs of the world to come;
we are those who have received the promised Holy Spirit;
we are those with two divine intercessors—Christ in the court of heaven, the Holy Spirit in the theatre of our own hearts;
we are those on the journey home, and nothing can turn us back—
we are predestined, we are chosen, we are justified, we will be glorified;
we have Abba Father in our hearts; we are those on whom the steadfast love of the Lord rests, and it can never be taken away.
I think Paul believes that if the church in Rome understands that—if we at All Saints understand that—then they will realize that gospel proclamation is something to get behind.
What has the last eight years of evangelical gospel proclamation at this church accomplished? Well, by God’s grace, amazingly, some people have believed the gospel.
What will the next ten years or fifty years of solid, undiluted evangelical gospel witness in this church achieve? By God’s amazing grace, some people might believe the gospel. And that is an extraordinary thing.