What can separate us? NOTHING!

Romans 8:31-End

This section is Paul’s conclusion to not only to this small section, but to the entire first 8 chapters. The overall theme of the first half of the letter is salvation. He’s getting ready to change gears and start talking about Israel’s rejection of Jesus and their place as God’s people. But for the first 8 chapters the theme has been “the salvation available to all men.” Chapters 1-3 discuss our sinfulness and need for a savior. 4-5 discuss how grace is superior to the law, the benefits of this covenant above the last. 6-7 discuss the death of the law’s power over us even though we still struggle with the sinful nature. 8 is all about the confidence we can have in this salvation.
Paul has been using a didactic where he asks questions he knows his opponents would ask (devils advocate) then answers his own questions. The last question he asks in the section is more broad and further reaching than the others, “What shall we say about these things?”. “These things” can refer not only to the previous statements about God calling and justifying, but to the entire book so far. Here’s what can be said: Everything Paul has said points to the immense love of God, to the fact that in spite of our rebellion and wickedness God loves humanity, and to the fact that those who have been brought from law/death to grace/life God has promised to be faithful and to use everything to bring us good. It points to the fact that God is for us, and if that is the case, what can possibly be against us?

V32
The most supreme evidence of God being for us: Jesus on the cross. (1 Cor 11:1.)

The rest of this chapter is the pinnacle of Paul’s teaching on salvation; the climax! If Romans had a soundtrack this would be the part where the orchestra is blaring and the cymbals are crashing. This is the part of the movie where the bad guy has killed the good guy and has the damsel cornered and right before he kills her the good guy does a backflip off a moving train while shooting ninjas and dropkicks the villain, then says “I wasn’t dead, I had to let him think I was to lure him out.” This is the climactic point of Paul’s argument on salvation!!! The theme of Paul’s climactic ending to this is that absolutely nothing can spoil this, nothing can pull you away, nothing can void your salvation, nothing will change God’s mind about you. Paul breaks this down into 2 smaller sections.

V33-34
In this first part Paul uses legal terminology and paints the image of a courtroom. Who can bring charges against us? Can anyone or anything bring legal charges that would change what Paul has said? Can anyone enter new evidence that would void God’s forgiveness? Apart from Jesus there are 3 sources of condemnation that can separate us from God; the law, our guilty consciences, and Satan.
Can the law (our breaking of the law) keep us from justification? No! Romans 6 is all about how we are not under law but under grace. Can our guilty conscience keep us from justification? No. Paul just said in 8:16 that God’s Spirit bears witness with our spirit confirming inwardly that we are His. Can Satan, the accuser of the brothers (& sisters), accuse us of anything that will force God to revoke our salvation? No! God is the one who justifies. The one we’ve offended is the one who has pardoned us, therefore there are no accusations that can me made against us. Every accusation, even the true ones, will be met with “I know. But I love and have forgiven .”
Who can condemn? Everything that would have been used as evidence against us has been burned up in the cross of Jesus. Jesus, about whom the Bible says God has given all things to judge, died our death and was resurrected. If that weren’t enough, now He’s sitting right beside the Father continually interceding for us! So the obvious answer is nobody. Nobody can bring a case against God’s people because the sovereign God of the universe has justified us and Jesus now sits pleading our case every day to the Father.

Vs 35-39
So, there’s nothing that can cause God to change His mind. If there’s nothing that can cause God to push us away, is there anything that can pull us away? Obviously, Paul’s answer is going to be no, but he says much more than a simple no.
Vs 35-7 should be read together. Is Paul saying we will not be like sheep led the slaughter? That doesn’t make sense of the wording. V36 starts with “as.” As means to the same degree, extent or quantity; equally so. “As it is written” means just like it is written, because of You we ARE being put to death like sheep.” Paul’s no is in response to his own question, can that pull us away from the love of Christ? No! Because even if we are dragged away to like helpless sheep we are still, in spite of that, more than conquerors. This isn’t reality we face like many others, but that’s what Paul means here. Not even this can cut the bond of love that is between Jesus and his people. Whatever persecutors may take, they cannot take the love of Jesus away from us. Whatever famine and anguish and affliction rob us of, they cannot rob us of the love of Jesus.
Matthew Henry: “A true Christian loves Christ never the less though he suffer for him, thinks never the worse of Christ though he lose all for him.”

What does it mean to be more than a conqueror? Some would say being a conqueror or having victory in a situation means your faith changes the situation to be prosperous and beneficial to you. Paul doesn’t say “out of these things” but “in all these things…” There’s something about continuing to love Jesus in spite of suffering that is conquering and victorious. This is what Paul is alluding to. Jesus conquered every dark and evil thing with the cross. He waged war by suffering and dying, this is the way of Jesus and His upside-down kingdom. It’s been said the church was built on the blood of martyrs. Many enemies of Christianity over the ages have expressed shock at the unshakable courage of Jesus followers, and their preference to dying rather than denying Him. Revelation 12:11 says Satan, the accuser of the brothers, was overcome (conquered) by the fact that believers did not love their own lives in the face of death. How does this work? (Sometimes I’ll be bothering Merry in some way, then she’ll finally say “Fine, do it. I don’t care.” It totally deflates me and she just beat me because now I don’t even want to do it, its not fun unless it bothers her.) When the only thing that can never be taken away from you is the only thing you need and the thing you supremely cherish above all else, you’ve just conquered everything. It doesn’t mean you “speak by faith” and make a new Rolls Royce appear out of nowhere. It means that which you love more than anything cannot be taken from you, so you have conquered.

Therefore, nothing, life nor death nor…can separate us from Jesus.

So now, let me ask, what is our response to these things? We should rejoice in the fact that Jesus loves us to this degree.


Small article by John Piper:
Believers in Jesus are precious to God (we're his bride!). And he loves us so much that he will not allow our preciousness to become our god.
God does indeed make much of us (adoption!), but he does so in a way that draws us out of ourselves to enjoy his greatness.
Test yourself. If Jesus came to spend the day with you, sat down beside you on the couch, and said, “I really love you,” what would you focus on the rest of the day that you spend together?
It seems to me that too many songs and sermons leave us with the wrong answer. They leave the impression that the heights of our joy would be in the recurrent feeling of being loved. “He loves me!” “He loves me!” This is joy indeed. But not the heights and not the focus.
What are we saying with the words “I am loved”? What do we mean? What is this “being loved”?
Would not the greatest, most Christ-exalting joy be found in watching Jesus all day and bursting with, “You’re amazing!” “You are amazing!”
• He answers the hardest question, and his wisdom is amazing.
• He touches a filthy, oozing sore, and his compassion is amazing.
• He raises a dead lady at the medical examiner’s office, and his power is amazing.
• He predicts the afternoon’s events, and his foreknowledge is amazing.
• He sleeps during an earthquake, and his fearlessness is amazing.
• He says, “Before Abraham was, I AM,” and his words are amazing.
We walk around with him utterly amazed at what we are seeing.
Is not his love for us his eagerness to do for us all he must do (including die) so that we can marvel at him and not be incinerated by him? Redemption, propitiation, forgiveness, justification, reconciliation — all these have to happen. They are the act of love. But the goal of love that makes those acts loving is that we be with him and see his jaw-dropping glory and be astounded. In those moments we forget ourselves and see and feel him.
So I am urging pastors and teachers: Push people through the acts of Christ’s love to the goal of his love. If redemption and propitiation and forgiveness and justification and reconciliation are not taking us to the enjoyment of Jesus himself, they are not love.