075 - Life in the Spirit: Wrapped in God’s Love

Introduction

If you watch ABC Nightly News in the evenings, you may have become a fan, as I have, of two eagles, Jackie and Shadow, who have become frequent stars of ABC News.

With modern technology, a camera was placed near the nest of the two eagles, and the world watched as three eggs lay in the nest. Then, one egg began to hatch, and the next night, the news showed that we now had two little eaglets. Then, the third egg began to hatch, and we had three. However, sadly, because of a massive snowstorm in the San Bernardino Mountains, when the cameras came back on, there were only two eaglets, and we lost one.

Eagle watchers have observed Jackie and Shadow for several years, and have become symbols of strength, resilience, and devotion, amazing eagle lovers worldwide.

Jackie was the first to show up many years ago at the Big Bear nest, claiming the territory as her own.

A year or so later, Shadow shows up and awkwardly begins to court Jackie, proving himself to be a loyal and determined partner.

Together, the two eagles formed a strong bond, ready to face the challenges of the wilderness.

During the years, Jackie and Shadow have raised several young eagles under the observation of many eagle viewers via the nest cam.

Jackie, always fiercely protective, spreading her wings to shield the young ones from the snow and cold winds while Shadow soars across the lake, returning with fish and rodents to feed the young.

One event that the eagle watchers have captured was a time when a Red-Tailed Hawk dared to approach the nest. Jackie rose with a screech that echoed through the pines, talons extended. Shadow flanked from below, and together, they chased the intruder far from the nest. One observer stated that the aerial dance was not just defense – it was a display of their power, love, and determination to protect their family.

Jackie and Shadow have proven themselves over and over that they are mighty protectors of their children, and even though some have been lost, the two parents form a force of power that covers and protects their loved ones from all forces of evil.

But I want to tell you about a greater source of power this morning that covers you, as a believer in Christ Jesus, with a love greater than any love ever known to mankind.

And the love that I am talking about is the love of God.

As we study the Book of Romans, we find that Paul writes to believers he has never met personally. He writes to, not a single church in Rome, but to born again believers scattered throughout Rome which gathered daily in houses to worship the risen Lord Jesus Christ.

Throughout his letter, Paul explains the truths of the gospel and how salvation is found through faith in Christ Jesus alone.

In chapter 8, as we have seen, Paul explains the workings of the Holy Spirit, who dwells in the believer.

He has taught that there is no condemnation to believers in Christ Jesus and that we are not to walk according to the lust of the flesh but according to the Spirit. Then, he spent a section explaining what he meant by living according to the Spirit, followed by an explanation of the groanings shared by God’s creation. Groanings crying out for the day that all would be set at liberty.

Then, to conclude the chapter, we see that Paul longing and desire, for the believers in Rome to know that their salvation was secure in Christ Jesus.

Maybe the believers in Rome had the same question that we have today.

Can I know that my salvation is secure?

And if so, How can I know?

I want to tell you that the answer to the first question is YES!

Yes, you can know that your salvation is secure and can never be taken from you.

And in our text this morning, Paul is going to give you three facts explaining how you can rest assured that your salvation is secure in Christ Jesus.

And the first fact is that you are wrapped in God’s love and cannot be condemned.

Wrapped in God’s Love and Cannot Be Condemned as Unrighteous

In the last two verses of the previous section, verses 29 and 30, Paul gives a list of five stages in the process of salvation, often referred to as the “Golden Chain.”

These five links are foreknowledge, predestination, calling, justification, and glorification.

This chain begins in eternity past (foreknowledge and predestination), continues in the present time (calling and justification), and concludes in the future (glorification).

This is a continuous and unbroken process, with each stage leading to the next. The certainty of this process is emphasized to such an extent that even the future stage of glorification is spoken of in the past tense.

God knew you before He ever created you in your mother’s womb and predestined you to become as Christ Jesus by calling you out of the world, justifying you through the blood of Jesus poured out on that cross at Calvary, and is sanctifying you that you may be glorified in His presence.

Now, Paul asks a rhetorical question in verse 31

“What then shall we say to these things (these things being the five links of our salvation) if God is for us, who can be against us?

If God has known you before you were even formed and has predestined you to become like Christ Jesus.

If God has called you and justified you,

If God is in the act of sanctifying, you

Who can take this away or put a stop to the chain?

The only answer to Paul’s question is complete silence because to stop the chain, God has enacted. One would have to be more powerful than God Himself.

Paul says, “The fact is that as a believer you are wrapped in God’s Love and cannot be condemned.”

Look at what he says right here in Romans 8:33-34

Romans 8:33–34 NKJV

33 Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.

Emma Carson was 19—smart, fiery, and a little reckless behind the wheel. One rainy evening, running late for work, she flew through a red light doing 45 in a 25 zone. A patrol car clocked her and pulled her over. The ticket? $500 and a mandatory court appearance.

A few weeks later, Emma found herself standing nervously in court. She was guilty—no excuses, no defense. She hadn’t told her friends or even her mom who the judge was that day.

The Honorable Robert Carson.

Her father.

The courtroom buzzed as people realized the connection. Judge Carson’s reputation was ironclad—fair, firm, and never one to bend the law, even for family.

He looked at his daughter from the bench—his face neutral, his voice calm.

“Emma Carson, you’ve been charged with reckless driving and endangering public safety. How do you plead?”

She swallowed hard.

“Guilty, Your Honor.”

Without hesitation, he nodded.

“Then I must uphold the law. The fine is $500.”

The gavel came down with a sharp crack.

Emma’s eyes stung. She understood—this was justice. But it still hurt.

Then, to everyone’s surprise, Judge Carson stood up, took off his robe, and stepped down from the bench.

He walked over to the clerk, reached into his jacket, and pulled out his wallet. Without saying a word, he counted out five crisp $100 bills, laid them on the counter, and turned back to his daughter.

“The law says you’re guilty,” he said softly. “And justice requires a price. But love… love pays it.”

He gave her a quiet nod, turned, and walked out.

In that moment, Emma saw something she’d never fully understood:

Justice and mercy can walk hand in hand.

Her father didn’t excuse her mistake - he honored the law. But as her father, he stepped in and paid the price she couldn’t.

You have an accuser who stands before the Lord God accusing you of all the sins and wickedness that you have committed against Him.

The Bible calls him “the accuser of our brethren.”

But all the charges that he brings against you cannot stand because the One who justifies is also the One who judges.

Remember what Paul said in verse 30, “Those whom He has called, these He also justified.”

Just like Emma, you have committed a sin and that sin requires a payment, a fine.

And the fine levied against you is more than you could pay.

But God loves you in such a way that He sent his only Son to come to this earth and pay that fine for you.

That what Paul is saying right here in verse 34,

“It is Christ who died and furthermore is also risen who is even at the right hand of God who also makes intercession for us.”

The old devil makes accusations against you before God and as he does, Jesus, who has settled the fine, stands before the Father, nail scarred hands held out, and God determines, “the fine has been dealt with, though your sins are like scarlet, they have been made white as snow.”

You have been declared righteous on the basis of Christ’s atoning ministry.

And the fact is, you cannot be condemned as unrighteous.

Secondly, Paul explains that you can rest assured that your salvation is secure in Christ Jesus by the fact that you cannot be separated from the love of God.

Wrapped in God’s Love and Cannot Be Separated From the Love of God

Not only can the devil bring any further accusations against you in his feeble attempts to condemn you but there is also nothing that can remove you from the love that God has for you.

Just like Jackie covers her little eaglets under her wings protecting them from the winds, the snow storms, and all predators that would like to steal them away, God has covered you in His love and as Paul says right here in verses 35-36, there is no one nor no thing nor any other that can ever separate you from His love.

Romans 8:35–36 NKJV

35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”

The word that is translated “who” from the Greek is a word that references someone or something, and means “who or what” “shall separate us from the love of Christ?”

Paul is not saying that we cannot be separated from our love for Christ.

Let me tell you this morning that there have been many born again Believers who have fallen back into their old ways, fallen back into the ways of the world and are now more in love with the world and the lust that it overs than they are in love with the Lord Jesus who died for them.

In the second chapter of the Book of Revelation, Jesus instructed John to write these words to the church at Ephesus, a church who seemed to have it all going for them. But they had fallen out of love with Christ and Jesus said, “I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place – unless you repent” (Rev. 2:4-5).

And let me just say this, church, if we do not have that inexpressible love for Jesus Christ we have no power, we have no strength, and we are incapable of doing what Jesus has called us out to do, we are of no use to Him, and we had better get on our knees and repent of our sin and come back to Him, fall in love with Him all over again.

Sometimes in marriage counseling we run into someone who says, “well I just don’t love her like I used to.”

Well mister, you better start loving her the way you used to.

And you do that by doing the things that you did when you first fell in love with her.

Our feelings have a tendency to follow our actions.

And if are finding yourself more involved with the things of this world than you are with Christ Jesus, you need to fall back in love with Him and you do that by re-ordering your life.

Begin a daily quiet time reading and praying.

Begin finding ways to serve others

Remembering why you love Christ, He died for you

Fall in love with Jesus again, today!

It is possible for the believer to find themselves not in love with Christ as they once were, and He calls for them to come back to Him.

But there is not any troubles, sufferings, persecutions, distress, difficulties, hungers, lacking’s, dangers, or even threatening’s of death, nothing they you can go through here on this earth that will ever be able to remove you from the love that God has for you, nothing.

And Paul says, “that is a fact.”

And lastly Paul says that it is a fact that you are wrapped in God’s love and cannot be defeated.

Wrapped in God’s Love and Cannot Be Defeated

As a born again believer there is nothing that can stop you from singing:

Victory in Jesus, my Savior forever

He sought me and bought be with His redeeming blood

He loved me ‘ere I knew Him and all my love is due Him

He plunged me to victory beneath the cleansing flood,

Paul says,

Romans 8:37–39 NKJV

37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. 38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

“more than conquerors,” in Greek it is one word, ὑπερνικῶμεν, hyper conquerors, excessively excited conquerors, we are conquerors that are above and beyond the usual or normal sense of being a conqueror, we are SUPER CONQUERORS.

There is a new mini-series out called “The House of David.” And it is a story about the life of David and in the last show David, as a young shepherd boy kills the giant Goliath, who has terrified all the armies of Isreal for several days. Calling out for someone to come and do battle with him, but all feared the giant, and a sense of defeat fell over all the armies.

But then comes David, a young boy, a keeper of his father’s sheep, never having fought in a battle. He hears this giant defying the Lord of Host and he says who is this giant, I will go and fight him.

And we know the story, how with a sling and a single stone, David kills the giant, and all of a sudden, as the victory is realized all the armies of Isreal, all the ones who shied away in fear, became overwhelmed with the victory and all as one charged out against all the armies of the Philistines and defeated them.

Suddenly, they had become SUPER CONQUERORS.

Paul says that there is nothing that can defeat you, you are a conqueror and in Christ Jesus, you have overcome all the worries of life, no angelic being can overcome you, no supernatural force, nothing, not even death itself, in Christ Jesus you have overcome and are conquerors.

And church, when we understand this, when we come to the realization of the truth of what Paul is telling us here at the close of this great chapter in Romans,

When we see the giant has been slain, and the victory is ours, we will no longer be able just sit in the pew, we will grab up our sword, and we will charge all the armies that defy the Lord of Host and defeat them and bring to light the wickedness that is spreading its web of darkness over our land and over our loved ones.

And Paul says this is a fact!

It is a fact that you are wrapped in God’s love and no longer condemned as unrighteous.

It is a fact that you are wrapped in God’s love and cannot be separated from the love of God.

It is a fact that you are wrapped in God’s love and cannot be defeated.

Conclusion

That leaves you with only one question, “Are you a believer?”

You see, to be wrapped in God’s love, you must first be one of his children.

And the only way you can be a child of God, according to John 3:3, is that you must be born again.

Now that is an interesting term isn’t it?

How does one become born again?

The first thing is that you must be willing to admit that you are as sinner. And if you have ever lied to someone, taken something that was not yours, or even thought evil against someone, that makes you a sinner.

And you sins have driven a wedge between you and your creator God, and has actually made you his enemy.

But the Bible says that God shows his love for you in that even while you sin against him, Christ came and died for you, to pay your sin debt.

The fine that has been charged against you for you sins is death, eternal death.

But God sent his Son to pay that fine for you if you will accept it from Him.

It is a free gift.

And if you will simply confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, the Bible says you will be saved.

For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

And you can do that right now, as we get ready to sing our song of invitation, hymn #298 “I’ll Live for Him”

If you will just bow your head and pray this prayer from your heart.

Dear God, I know I’m a sinner, and I ask for your forgiveness. I believe Jesus Christ is Your Son. I believe that He died for my sin and that you raised Him to life. From this day forward, I want to trust Him as my Savior and follow Him as Lord. Guide my life and help me to do your will. I pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Let’s stand as we sing “I’ll Live for Him” and if you prayed that prayer with me, I want to ask you to come forward as we sing and make your profession of faith public so we can all rejoice in the victory you now have in Christ Jesus,

Let’s sing.