In Christ There Is No Separation

Introduction

29,032 feet… or nearly 5.5 miles above sea level… lies the peak of Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain on the planet. It is estimated that just under 1,000 people attempt to climb this treacherous mountain each year. Along the way up to the summit there are lots of dangers - frigid temperatures, hurricane level wind speeds, avalanches, altitude sickness, and crevasses that are, at times, hundreds of feet deep. A person like you or I might say that the risks don’t outweigh the rewards, and we’d much rather stay home than travel to Nepal and attempt to climb this monster. Yet, some people, many seeking adrenaline or fame, make this trip and are led by guides called Sherpas up the mountain. Not only do these Sherpas keep climbers safe as they go up the mountain, they also help the climbers see the beauty of the mountain and the surrounding area as you can see for over 200 miles from the summit of Everest - which would be like you being here in Springfield and being able to see St. Louis or Kansas City in the distance! That’s a crazy view.

Sometimes, we’d love to have that type of view in our own lives to be able to see what was really going on here? Why did this happen over there? What does the future have in store? We have all of these questions and there are times we’d love to know the “why” behind them… We know that we’re not always promised an answer to the “why” - but we have something better - we know the “Who” behind it all. We might not know why something is happening, but we do know that God promises to work all things for our good. Romans 8 reminds us of God’s goodness in every aspect of our lives - from before we were even born, to eternity that is waiting us in the future. This morning as we conclude Romans 8, we’re in Romans 8:31-39, and we see how this Oasis of hope begins with no condemnation and ends with no separation.

Christian, whatever you’re facing. Wherever you’ve been. However you feel. There is hope for you in God’s Word today as we see the 200 mile birds eye view that God truly holds us and has a good plan for us.

Romans 8:31–39 CSB

31 What, then, are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? 32 He did not even spare his own Son but gave him up for us all. How will he not also with him grant us everything? 33 Who can bring an accusation against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies. 34 Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is the one who died, but even more, has been raised; he also is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us. 35 Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can affliction or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written: Because of you we are being put to death all day long; we are counted as sheep to be slaughtered. 37 No, 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 rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Nothing can separate us from the love of God - Romans 8 is like climbing up a mountain and the views get better and better the further you go. God promises to not only be for us, but to be with us each step of the way. Let’s thank Him for this truth, let’s pray.

People Can’t Separate Us from God (31-34)

Being separated from someone you love isn’t fun. Many of us can think of a time whenever we were little kids and we were with our parents somewhere, whether it be the mall, a park, a sporting event, or even church, and we get separated from our parents and we feel hopeless and lost. Since becoming a parent, nothing makes your heart drop quicker than turning around and not seeing your child that just a few seconds earlier was standing right there. We know that living in a fallen, broken world that there are many things that can cause separation between people. Whenever I’m at the park with Gabriel, I know that a dog can cause separation between us because if my son sees a dog at the park, his first instinct is to run toward it and ask if he can pet it! We know that situations can cause separation between people - whenever you graduate and move out of the house for the first time, that creates separation. In a relationship, a couple can be fine one minute and be separated the next for a number of reasons.

Have you discovered that in this life some people enjoy causing separation. Division. Discord. Confusion. In a world that loves to debate, there can be a temptation to want to get God to be on our side rather than make sure that we are on His side. What a blessing it is to read in verse 31 that “If God is for us, who is against us?” In other words, if you’re following God, no one can separate you from Him! He will take care of you. He will sustain you. He will encourage you. He will keep you safe. We saw last week that God is actively working all things for our good as believers!

Does this mean that we will not face opposition? No! Christ faced opposition, we will certainly face opposition, however we know that nothing can stand in the way of whoever God is for. Have you ever heard of an unstoppable force and an immovable object? God is an unstoppable force AND an immovable object. If He is for you, there is nothing that can stop you or harm you (spiritually speaking). If He is not for you (if you do not have a personal relationship with Christ) then He is an immovable object and nothing you do will move Him. No amount of good works will cause God to move aside and allow you to enter heaven. No amount of tithing or Bible knowledge will get you in. What will get you in? Having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ by repenting of your sins and trusting in Christ for salvation.

Last week we celebrated the fact that our God did not spare His own Son. He sent His Son to die the death that we should have died. He bore the wrath of God and took our place. That God delivered His Son over to death so that we might have a way when there previously was no way. Our God is a relentless God. Some will say that he is reckless however, there is nothing in God’s nature that is reckless. It might not make sense to our finite selves, but God has a plan and a purpose. He holds all things together and He makes all things work together for our good (being conformed into the image of Jesus Christ).

So, if God is for you, if the One who gave His Son to die in your place and delivered Him from death to secure your salvation, if this God is for you, then how will He not freely give us all things?

(What are these all things?)

A billion dollars? A new car? No! Our inheritance as Believers. That is the “we” in verse 31.

Going back to Romans 1, we see that believers are loved by God… but throughout Romans 3-7, we see a whole lot of negative truths. We have sinned. We have a sinful nature. We have a war being waged in our bodies, even as Christians. We fall short of God’s standard. We wonder how on earth we can have hope and be saved? Enter the Gospel. What are these things that we hold on to? We are justified. We have peace with God. We have the Holy Spirit. We are not condemned. We are adopted. We are glorified. We are called by God. All things work for our good as believers! What do we say about all of these things? Verse 31

Romans 8:31 CSB

31 What, then, are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

If you’re a believer, hear this: God is FOR YOU! Many will oppose you. Friends will let you down. People will abandon you. People who used to have your back won’t have your back… But God is for you. God is not like other people. He doesn’t leave whenever times are hard. He doesn’t stab you in the back when you’re vulnerable. He doesn’t save you and then leave you… no, He saves and then He sustains. He is FOR His people - this doesn’t mean that you become sinless, but it does mean that you have a perfect and powerful advocate.

Someone will remind you of your past… and they’re exactly right. There was a time in your life where you were marked by sin. You walked in darkness. You were a child under wrath. You were not righteous. You were sinful. You dropped the ball.

Spurgeon once shared it like this, “If any man thinks ill of you, don’t be angry. For you are far worse than he thinks you to be.” OUCH! RUDE! Convicting… isn’t it? We have many charges against us because of our sin. But, friend, God knew those charges against you before He adopted you. He knew the sin. He knew the brokenness. He knew the path you had walked.

V. 33 - Romans 8:1 told us that there is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. Romans 8:33 reiterates this reality. In American politics, we know that we elect officials to represent us. We choose them. These words, elect and choose, appear in the Bible not as words to fear, but words to celebrate. In the Old Testament, who were God’s chosen people? The Israelites. Going deeper, though, we know that Scripture explicitly tells us that God chose to use people like Abraham, Moses, and Jeremiah for His purposes. Those men faithfully obeyed and did what God called them to do, but God set them apart for a task. In the New Testament, as we saw last week with the words call and predestine, we see this same picture. God has chosen or elected people. Some have a hard time with that, but it’s the picture of the New Testament. Remember last week in Romans 8:28-30, we saw those Golden Chains of Redemption as God predestined, called, justified, and glorified Christians. We don’t see that work in eternity past or eternity future. We don’t know God’s mind. We can’t understand everything that He is doing or what He has already done. But the word justified is significant because it’s the legal word of salvation. We hear the Gospel, we hear of our sin, we hear of God’s grace in sending Christ, what is the responsibility of anyone who hears the Gospel? Mark 1:15 gives us the answer

Mark 1:15 CSB

15 “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”

Repent and Believe. Some hesitate to believe in words that the Bible says like predestine, elect, choose, they’re not mean words. They’re not meant to be divisive words. Ask yourself this question: Have I repented of my sin and believed in the Gospel? That’s your responsibility today! If your answer is yes, then realize, friend, that this was God’s plan. He made you. He loved you. We see in the Bible words like this and we can honestly say that He chose you and this isn’t reason to complain, it’s reason to celebrate. And, at the same time it is true to say that you placed your faith in Him. We don’t have to pit one against the other and say that it’s either God chose me and I’m a robot, or God is desperately waiting to know what I’m going to decide. Neither of those pictures are faithful to Scripture.

What Paul is saying is that for every believer, every single one, the charges against us are dropped the minute that God’s gavel comes down. The accuser will try to convince us that we’ve dropped the ball too much. That we could never be loved by God. That we’re too far gone. Yet, God knew it all whenever He sent His Son to Calvary to save your soul and, as JI Packer said, “No new evidence of your depravity can change God’s mind.” God is the One who justifies! The charges against you, though they are true, have been dropped because of the finished work of Jesus Christ. People will try to separate you from God, but they will all fail. God is the one who saves us. He is the one who justifies us. He is also the one who condemns. In Matthew 5-7, Jesus preaches a sermon that has come to be known as the Sermon on the Mount and He talks about individuals who will one day stand before Him and they will say that they did lots of things for God, they did miracles, they spoke of God’s goodness, but then Jesus Himself says this

Matthew 7:23 CSB

23 Then I will announce to them, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, you lawbreakers!’

Understand this, friend. Whenever we sin, we wrong Jesus. We sin against Him. We break His commands. Therefore, Jesus is the one who seals our fate. If you are against Christ, He will condemn you. But if you are for Christ, if you are in Christ, the good news of Romans 8 is that God is now for you and the only way for you to be condemned once you’re in Christ is for Christ to fail and it’s impossible for Christ to fail. We might be afraid of another person in this life, we might be afraid of the devil, we might even be afraid of ourselves - what if I don’t do enough? Christian, no one can separate you from the love of God.

God promises to grant us everything. Likely not everything that we want - toys, cars, boats, fancy jobs, luxurious houses… but He promises to grant us everything needed to glorify Him and fulfill the task He has for us. There are so many passages that share this with us - that God will provide. There are so many passages that remind us to not worry, to not be anxious about the future. Jesus says this. Peter says this. Paul says this. The Psalms tell us this. Jesus says that worrying doesn’t add a day to our lives, but you know what it does do? It robs us of today because we’re so concerned about tomorrow. Paul says to not be worried about anything - well that’s really helpful, isn’t it? Whenever I was a few months old, my biological parents gave me up for adoption. Do you know the trauma that does to your brain as you get older? When you were at your most vulnerable, as a baby, you were abandoned. Separated. People left. Guess what happens as you get older? People leave. As a pastor? People leave. If you’re used to people leaving, hear this: God won’t. God promises to provide for the birds and the grass… how much more will He provide for His adopted children who are made in His image? He will give you your daily bread. When people oppose you or try to separate you from God, remember God’s work of salvation in your life! He started this work. He will complete it. You can trust fully in your God!

Problems Can’t Separate Us from God (35-39)

If you’ve ever been to Colorado and gone up into the mountains, you know that those slops are steep and if you take a little snowball and begin to roll it down the hill, it will not only get faster and faster, but bigger and bigger. In fact, by the time it reaches the bottom of the slope, that once tiny snowball is a dangerous problem for people below. Just one tiny thing can cause massive problems. Just one tiny spark can light an entire forrest on fire. Big problems typically don’t start out very big. Early on, Christians were asked to stop talking about Jesus. Stop sharing the Gospel. Stop telling other people about the Resurrection. Just stop it! In Acts 5, we see Peter’s response - “We can’t to this… we must obey God.” Time goes on, and we see that Christians begin to experience severe opposition. The Roman Emperor Nero had a beautiful garden in Rome and he lit Christians on fire to light up the garden pathway at night. Christians were imprisoned. Killed. Stoned. They faced persecution and famine and distress and affliction - they faced many problems, that at first didn’t seem like big problems. It was a simple request: Stop sharing this message about Jesus.

What would you do in this situation?

These earliest followers saw the resurrected Jesus. They knew that He defeated death. They had confidence in Christ. They knew that God was with them. Because of this, they didn’t fear the future. They didn’t fear persecution. They welcomed it! That’s not to say that they enjoyed affliction, distress, and persecution, but they endured them. Christian, because of God’s love for you, you might not enjoy difficult things, but you can endure all things! The cost of faithfulness has always been high and will always be high. Those who say that following Jesus doesn’t cost you, or that serving Jesus is easy are selling a false bill of goods. Jesus promised His followers in John 16 that in this world we will have trouble, in Luke 9:23 we see the cost of following Christ

Luke 9:23 CSB

23 Then he said to them all, “If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me.

Deny self, take up your cross daily, and follow Christ. This is a summons to die to self. This means to have a reoriented view of life - our life is no longer just about ourselves, we are created to live for eternity and to glorify our good God! We don’t need to be afraid or upset whenever these problems strike our lives, they don’t need to snowball and create doubt and dread and despair, because nothing can separate us from the love of God.

How do we persevere in these difficult times? When suffering strikes. When betrayal begins. When promises are broken. How do you get through them? I’m reminded of Charles Simeon - Simeon was born in 1759 and attended Cambridge for college and while he was there, he was saved and felt a call to be a pastor and at the age of 23 he was called to pastor at Trinity Church and he stayed there for over 50 years! We never hear of pastors being at a church for 50 years today, so maybe you think that this means that his tenure at Trinity Church was without problems, but this is far from the case. Whenever Simeon arrived, there was a group that didn’t want him to be their pastor. This group refused to come on Sunday night for service, even though the church was rapidly growing. Because of this, some members locked the doors to the church on Sunday afternoons to prevent people from coming to Sunday night service. After this debacle, many members refused to attend service saying that Simeon was too much of a Bible preacher (!) not only did they stop coming, but they locked their pews meaning that if they weren’t there, no one could sit in the pew! Because of this, visitors were forced to stand and even sit in the aisles of the sanctuary for 10 years! Can you imagine this? Locking the door and locking their pews so that people couldn’t hear the Gospel? This affliction wasn’t even from outside the church, this was friendly fire! We know what this feels like - don’t we? When brothers and sisters you love are those who break your heart?

Simeon, at the end of his pastoral ministry, said this, “My dear brother, we must not mind a little suffering for Christ’s sake.” There are times when you will suffer in this life for the sake of following, trusting, obeying, and praising the name of Jesus… and friend, that suffering is worth it and the reason we know this is because pain, misery, and suffering cannot separate you from the love of God! This is the reminder we see throughout Scripture and we might wonder, why do we see this story again and again? Because we’re prone to wander and tempted to forget.

We so often look at our problems instead of our Provider. Romans 8:37 reminds us that in all these things, in all these areas where we face problems, in all the difficulties, in all the suffering, in all the heartbreak, in all the pain - not only can we not be defeated… we actually win. We are more than conquerors. We are “hyper-conquerors” as the Greek reads. We have absolute victory over all people and problems that seek to destroy us… again, this promise rings true from Romans 8:28

Romans 8:28 CSB

28 We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.

The good things, and the bad things, God has a purpose for them. He loves us and He uses all things to make us more like Jesus.

Tim Keller put it like this, “What determines whether you enjoy life is not a particular set of circumstances, but ultimately it is how your heart responds to them.” Suffering will strike. Heartbreak will happen. But there is peace for today and joy for tomorrow because of this promise in Romans 8 - that God is for us, even when we might not feel it, and that nothing will separate us from His love! God’s got you!

Aren’t you thankful here that your salvation and victory is not the result of your perfection? We aren’t conquerors because of our goodness and works. Our hope is “in Him.” In Christ. As you run this race called life, there will be good days and bad days. There will be days where you experience victory over sin and there will be days where it seems like temptation is stronger than ever. There will be days when you don’t know what to do, and there will be days when the Spirit calmly leads you through the most difficult of paths. Without Christ, we would have no hope… but with Christ, we are more than conquerors because He is our Champion and nothing can separate us from Him. How can we know this? We look to the cross. We look to the empty tomb. We look at His Word. We look at this Golden Chain of Redemption and remember that God promises to finish the work that He began! Paul is convinced of this truth that He has been liberated. Transformed. Adopted. Saved. He is convinced that God is working all things for His good - which is to be more like Jesus! He is convinced that He is untouchable until God says otherwise. Nothing - neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height or depth, nor any other created thing can separate us from the love of God - absolutely nothing. It’s not possible!

Today, do you have this hope? Do you have this assurance? If you do, today, then you have full confidence at all times, not in yourself, but in your Savior.

Hebrews 13:6 CSB

6 Therefore, we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?

But maybe you’re here this morning and you’re desperate for this assurance. The idea of having someone who will never leave you, who is for you, who sustains you, who loves you - does that sound too good to be true? This is the remarkable news of the Gospel. This is the message of hope that Romans 8 shares! There is a good God who sent His Son into this world to seek and save sinners just like you and me. Jesus Christ lived a perfect life and died in our place on the cross and rose 3 days later. Today, His call is simply this: Repent and Believe. Turn away from the idea that you can do enough to make yourself savable. Turn away from wells that this world says to run to. Turn to God’s Word. Trust in the finished work of Jesus. Believe that Jesus’ death is sufficient for salvation.

(Remember God’s Love For You!)

Look at the truths we see in Romans 8:

There is no condemnation - you’re in Christ

There is no alienation - you’re adopted into God’s family

There is no miscommunication - God hears and see’s it all

There is no humiliation - all things work for your good

There is no separation - God has you in His hand

This is why Romans 8 is remarkable. It starts with no condemnation and ends with no separation, which means that because of Jesus, this life is marked by celebration. Not because life always goes our way, but because we know how the story ends. We are in Christ. God is for us. Nothing will separate us from Him. The Bible tells us that God is the Alpha and the Omega. Those words mean first and last. He is before all things. He is after all things.

Colossians 1:17 CSB

17 He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.

Today, God is holding your life together. Maybe it feels like you’re hanging on just by a thread - y’all, I’ve been there too. In fact, my week has had moments like that too. Today, God woke you up. Today, He brought you here. Today, He is sustaining your body. Today, He is providing for your needs. Why? Not because we deserve it, but because of His grace.

Grace isn’t a license to live in sin. Grace isn’t a license to take it easy. We are saved by grace and we are kept by grace, and because are saved to get to work. Because there is no separation for those in Christ, we boldly and faithfully share the Good News of the Gospel with others. Because there is no separation for those in Christ, we commit to serve alongside one another because we realize that we are stronger together than we could ever be apart and we desperately need Christian community. South Gate, the enemy can’t steal your salvation - nothing can separate you from God’s love, but the enemy would love to keep you silent and get you distracted. To get you focused on something other than the Gospel. To get you focused on your problems first, not your Provider. This has been his tactic for thousands of years, and it will continue to be as well. What must our response be? Not today! South Gate, God is with us. God is for us. We do things His way, right away, every day. That starts with us acknowledging that we desperately need His help. If you haven’t done that yet, today, realize that you and I both have dropped the ball and sinned against this Holy God. But rejoice in the good news that this God sent His Son to save us from our sins. Respond to this message by turning away from sin and trusting alone in Jesus. We’ll pray and then we’ll respond - maybe that means that you need to talk with someone about trusting in Jesus, or maybe there’s a situation that has caused separation in your life and you need Jesus’ help to make that situation right. Whatever the Lord is calling you to do, let’s pray and let’s respond faithfully.