Romans Chapter 8 cont'd.
Who can now bring an accusation against those whom God has chosen to be his? He has already declared them "not guilty, but righteous". Who can now condemn them? Jesus Christ died and rose again for their sake- he is their advocate before God, and God has agreed with him up front! What can separate us from the reality of the love of Jesus? Can pressure or troubles, persecution or rejection? Can natural disasters or loss of possessions? How about dangers or even physical death? No, these are the very kinds of experiences that scripture teaches children of God to expect in this fallen world- "For your sake we are constantly handed over to death, we are like sheep headed for the slaughter house." Indeed, these are the kinds of evil events we encounter, but prevail over, because of our confidence in the goodness and love of God toward us- no matter what things look like. I am convinced that neither death nor life; angels, authorities, nor demons; the present or the future; life's peaks or valleys; nor any created being, can isolate us from God's love which flows down richly to us through Christ Jesus our Lord.
Comments:
The answers to the question, though meant to be rhetorical, about who can accuse or condemn us are...1. the devil and 2. ourselves and 3. the fallen authorities of our earthly cultures. But, then again, who really are any of these beings compared to Jesus and our heavenly Father? All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus by the Father...and he is the true Judge of all. And, it just so happens that the Judge...is in love with us! The Judge took upon himself our sin and guilt and shame and resolved it forever through his death, resurrection and ascension. Case closed.
And what then can separate us from the love of Jesus? Nothing actually now...which is the apostle's point. But our doubt about his love for us...with the crap, and its stench, of living in this fallen age in our faces...can definitely do a number on our enjoyment of it. Our doubts and fears can cloud our sense of our Father's love. Paul is jealous for us to overcome this doubt and fear.
When things do not go well in this life for me, I am tempted to immediately imagine that God has changed his attitude toward me and has now decided to punish me for my failures after all. As though the gospel was some kind of a "bait and switch" political deal. This is because I know that God is all-powerful and that he intervenes, even miraculously, in this world to bless his children, answer our prayers and accomplish his will. So...when (not if!) something "bad" happens to me or mine...God must surely now be upset or angry with me. When I first came to faith, I sub-consciously imagined (and hoped) that "accepting Jesus" meant that nothing "bad" would or could happen to me.
However, these imaginations are overly-simplistic equations of spirituality and life that I worked out in my own head. And life's violation of these equations is at the root of my doubts about the goodness and love of God toward me. I crave a iron-clad code to live by as a basis for my spiritual security. I secretly and silently demand that God follow this code that I have scripted for him. (This is the subterranean fountainhead of all legalism--it is a "control issue".) A part of me does not like the fact that he is a "living" God...and that a personal relationship with him is at the heart of the faith that Jesus Christ has come to bring to the world...not a predictable and static religion. I do not like living in the tension of having a relationship with an all-powerful and loving God who does indeed care for me, hear my prayers...and who does, at times, even miraculously intervene to undo evil situations...but who also continues to allow evil events to happen all around me. I tend to equate "God" and "God's love for me" with "life in a fallen age". I do not like the basic paradox of my faith.
It is this temptation to doubt the goodness and love of God that Paul indirectly addresses in this grand passage above. I believe that overcoming the doubt of our Father's love for us...in the midst of a life in which not everything is going well and nothing is going perfectly...is the essence of "the good fight of faith". We are called to take a bold, and sometimes lonely, stand...with the adverse winds of this age blowing in our faces...and lean into it while we declare to the whole cosmos our unyielding belief in...the truth of the last paragraph of Romans 8..."God is good. God is good. God is good. God is good. Life can be hard...but God is good. And...absolutely nothing can separate me from his love for me through Jesus Christ my Lord!"
No comments:
Post a Comment