Longing For What is New

Romans 8:18-22 ESV

18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.

Here in the month of August, it is my desire to take you, the flock here at Bethany Cumberland Presbyterian Church, step by step through a remarkable doctrinal thesis given to us by Paul the Apostle in the book of Romans, chapter 8, verses 18 through 30. You can go ahead and skim over that particular passage in your Bibles, so you can see what we are going to be talking about this month.

As we work through this passage, some of the things that we will be looking at are the promise of a new creation, how God ensures that we as His people will all ultimately persevere and make it to His new creation, and finally, we will look at the process of how we are saved and what will inevitably be accomplished in our salvation.

But both today and next Sunday, what we are going to be looking at particularly is the promise that God gives to us as His people, that the way that things are today, won’t always be that way, as God promises to eventually create the new heavens and earth.

We see Paul begin to speak about this in first verse of our reading, where we read him saying:

Romans 8:18 ESV

18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

When we read the Bible, it is important that we always practice proper, Spirit-led exegesis. Now, essentially, what that word “exegesis” means is forming our understanding of God through the proper gleaning of the Word of God.

This means that we come to understand God through approaching the Bible with no bias whatsoever, being willing to learn more about God and Who He is, not through what we want the Bible to say, but through what it actually says.

And when we look at this first verse of our reading, the first thing that we read in this verse is the word “for”.

Now, because this verse starts with the word “for”, it clearly indicates that this verse is not a stand-alone statement, but it is summing up what was said before it.

That means that in order to properly understand this verse, we need to look at what comes before it. And if we look to what is written right before this verse, in verses 16 and 17, we will see where Paul says: “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”

So, what we see here is that we as Christians are indeed the children of God, and as the children of God, we will one day inherit what the children of God inherit, a new creation to live in for eternity. But before we receive the privilege of inheriting that new creation, we must suffer while on earth.

Now, what this suffering entails is one, living life in dying bodies in a sinful world, and two, it entails living in a sinful world as one who is different in that we follow after Jesus and not the ways of the world.

Now, if we appear different than those of the world because we follow after Jesus, then that means that those of the world are going to misunderstand us, and even persecute us in various different ways.

This is a known fact, a reality that certainly will be experienced by all those who follow Christ. But as Paul says here, whatever kind of sufferings that we may have to endure at the present moment are not even worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed to “us” the true children of God.

But what exactly is that glory that will be revealed to us? Well, the next verse in our reading, verse 19 describes that glory as the revealing of the sons of God.

Verse 19 reads:

Romans 8:19 ESV

19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.

Paul says that the creation in general, that is, everything that has been made, waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.

Now, that phrase “eager longing” essentially means having or showing a strong desire or interest. It means to desperately want, to hold out hope for, to seek desperately.

And our reading says that this eager longing is for the revealing of the sons of God to take place.

Now, what is this revealing of the sons of God? And furthermore, who are the sons of God?

Well, let me answer that last question first and tell you who the sons of God are.

Have ever heard someone say, “We are all the children of God.”? Maybe you have even said that yourself at one time. That’s a very popular thing to say, but it is a false thing to say. Not everyone is a child, or a son of God.

Certainly, God created everything and everyone, and so everything and everyone is a creation of God, but those who are the children of God are the ones whom God has adopted into His family as His very own. And who is it that God has adopted into His family? Believers in the Lord Jesus, those who have been saved by the grace of God.

Therefore, the children of God are we who have been saved by God, truly born-again Christians.

So, when Paul speaks of the revealing of the sons of God, he is speaking of the time in which God will make plain who are His and who are not His, when He separates the sheep from the goats.

And when will this take place? Well, Jesus Himself tells us when this will take place in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 15, verses 31 and 32 when He says:

Matthew 15:31-32 ESV

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

So, Jesus tells us right away when this will occur: “When the Son of Man comes in His glory…” Obviously, the Son of Man is Jesus Himself, but He speaks of the time in which He will come in His glory.

Now, when Jesus first visited us, He came as the Lamb of God, the One Who would die and take away the sins of His people. But Jesus is coming again, and when He comes again, He will come as the Lion of the tribe of Judah, as it will be known to all Who He really is, as the Lamb turned Lion will be revealed to all as God Himself.

And when He comes, it is written that He will sit upon His glorious throne as the rightful Ruler and King of heaven and earth. When this happens, He will divide those who are His children and those who are not as He establishes the new heavens and earth, the new creation, what the book of Revelation calls, the New Jerusalem.

Now, that is certainly a blessed hope that we as the people of God, the children of God have to hold to and look forward to. But it’s not just us who look forward to it, as our reading says, the creation waits for this with eager longing. All of creation looks and waits for this.

Paul explains this in the remainder of our reading, verses 20-22 when he says:

Romans 8:20-22 ESV

20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.

Paul says that the creation, that is, everything that we see, the moon, the sun, the sky, the trees, every animal that exists was subjected to futility.

Now, what that word “futility” means is: pointless or useless. Now, when we look at the present order of things, we see that for us, it all starts when we are born and receive physical life, but this proves to be almost pointless in that the moment we are born, we begin to die in that every second that we live, every breath that we breathe is one second, one breath closer to the moment that we will die.

So, this means that not only we as humans, but all of creation is subjected to this. Trees grow and when they do, they grow branches and sprout leaves, but one day the leaves, then the branches, and eventually the entire tree will fall. Stars form and create beautiful light for us to observe in the evening, but one day even they will all burn out.

All of creation was subjected to this futility when man first sinned against God in the Garden of Eden. But it is written here that they were subjected in hope.

Now, a faithful Christian friend of mine once described hope as a lead pipe cinch. This means that hope is something that has not happened yet, but it will indeed happen, it is guaranteed to happen.

And the hope that creation looks to is the same hope that we as Christians look to, the revealing of the sons of God, the time in which God will make everything new. The time in which God describes in Isaiah, chapter 11, verses 6-8 when He says:

Isaiah 11:6-8 ESV

6 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. 7 The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8 The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den.

It will be a time in which the creation is so removed from sin that animals which we now know as predators will no longer seek prey but will live at perfect peace with them. It will be a time in which the saved children of God will live at perfect peace with one another, enjoying the presence of God to the full.

No more dying, no more sickness, no more aches and pains, no more futility, it will be a perfect creation, with our perfect God ruling and maintaining that which He has made anew.

Beloved, we do indeed live in a world today that has been subjected to futility. We realize that every day when we wake up and we realize and face the challenges of the day ahead. But in the new creation, in the New Jerusalem, there will be no challenges whatsoever.

This is our hope, this is the certainty that we have to look forward to, this is the very promise of God.

Therefore, live your life today in recognition of the fact that the way things are today won’t always be this way.

Amen?