Those Who Love God

All things have a way of working themselves out in the end one way or another. That statement is a rip off of Romans 828. It is the secular twist on god's truth. It is a false hope when things go bad. It is a false hope even when things are going good.

And the sad part is that many Christians have helped spread this lie. This is due to ignorance on their part as many Christians believe they are sharing Romans 828. The world does have its false hope. It is this idea that the universe will provide for them in some way or in some form.

And that no matter what happens , in the end, everything will be OK. It is strange to me that a person can deny the true and living God as revealed in the holy scriptures, that a person can claim that believing in a divine being is nonsense, and also claim that the universe is divine in some way and that the universe will provide good for all in one form or another.

Romans 828 does not teach this it is a verse that must be cherished by every Christian. And at the same time if anyone is taking it into consideration, and it's full truth, Romans 828 should be despised by those who are perishing. We have to address also, that this text does not apply to those who are misled.

There are many professing to be believers who are misled in their faith. I have no doubt that they think they are saved but are misled because they believe in a false God. We can't apply any text concerning Salvation and results of Salvation to anyone who is misled.

You may say but they think they are saved. That may be true but we're talking about those who are actually saved and there is a difference. If we meet someone who is misled it is our job to lead them the right way. I will say though, that the hardest person to talk to is not an atheist, is not a satanist, it is not the Muslim.

The hardest person to give the gospel 2 is to someone who believes that they are already saved by a false gospel. When you come in with the true gospel , they think it is you that is wrong .

nonetheless it is our Christian duty to proclaim the gospel to everyone who is perishing. I am just reminding us that this section of scripture only applies to those who are actually saved. And you will see why by the end of this sermon.

Let's unpack our text for today.

Romans 8:28 NASB95

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

The last few weeks have been building up to this point. As a reminder, I opened up this chapter with the statement there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

That is the theme of this entire chapter. That there is this security that we have as those who are truly redeemed, as those who are truly in Jesus. And over the last few weeks we have been looking at suffering. There is this temporal suffering that Christians go through.

Because you are a Christian does not mean you avoid all suffering. As a matter of fact, your suffering may be the very sign of your Christian faith. The evidence of our Christian faith is not that we have all the things we've ever wanted.

That is prosperity gospel would have us believe. The Paul has been discussing this temporal suffering. Explains that not only do we suffer but that all of creation suffers with us.

And not only that, when we do not have the words to pray, the Holy Spirit groans within us. It is within that context that Paul lays down this verse.

Paul announces this statement with the deceleration “And we know”. This is a solid fact and Paul is using apostolic authority to state that, not just he, but we know. How did Paul know? How can we know? To answer this question we must look to the scriptures and the character of God.

John 1:1–5 NASB95

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

We can know based on John’s introduction in his gospel. In these five verses alone we see the omnipotent and omniscient God. This is written by an eye witness of Jesus who is opening with what most preachers would close with; God is all knowing, all powerful and everlasting.

He is “the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” (). Paul, without a doubt, knew that God is omnipotent and omniscient. Being a learned Pharisee we can trust that Paul seen these characteristics in and Israel’s exodus from Egypt.

Beyond his education, his experience was enough for him to know that God was in fact all powerful and all knowing. In Saul was heading to Damascus when a bright light from heaven blinded him (V3); omnipotent.

After Saul fell to the ground he heard a voice that he instantly recognized as Lord, call him by his name (V 4, 5); omniscient. Paul’s confidence in the knowledge is also displayed in when Paul states that our citizenship is already in heaven.

I quoted and reflecting on that, we have to ask ourselves the elementary question, who created God? The answer is no one; God is self-sufficient. This is what it means to call God infinite and everlasting. Paul also would have known

Psalm 90:2 NASB95

Before the mountains were born Or You gave birth to the earth and the world, Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.

God is more than just all knowing and all powerful, God is holy; this means he is set apart and pure. When we look to the scripture we can see Gods holy character.

Paul knew God is holy based on scripture; and again in 20:26 God told Israel that He was Holy. But We can know We can know based on the New Testament as well; we can turn to where Peter affirms Gods holiness and our need to be holy by quoting .

There is so much more to God than what I just covered and I want to cover one more, know before I do that this is not all of Gods attributes, just a few to make the point on how we can know, as paul proclaims in .

God is faithful. David asks God to answer him by His faithfulness and this is just one example from David; there’re dozens more. What is so fascinating is that we can see Gods faithfulness, along with His other characteristics I have named, throughout history; specifically fulfilled in Jesus.

Psalm22, and are all prophecies about Jesus written hundreds of years before the Holy Conception.

Moses pointed to Jesus in and Jesus affirmed this in . God’s faithfulness is solid and as redeemed creatures we have absolutely no reason to assume we can’t know God is faithful.

It is Gods proven track record of faithfulness that increases my faith and the best part is that because it is Gods proven track record it is not blind faith. Think about it this way; two of your friends want to borrow your car. One friend always returns stuff when he says he will and it’s always in the same condition from when you loaned it.

The other friend is never on time and it’s a guarantee that he will break something because he is always breaking stuff. Which one do you loan your car to? The first one because he has a proven track record and due to that track record you now have faith that the first friend will bring your car back in the same condition.

That’s not blind faith; it’s proven faithfulness and God has proved His faithfulness even though he does not have too. Praise and glory to God for His Grace and faithfulness.

We can know and we do know. Which is why Paul has no problem saying and we know. Now the translation that I am reading from states that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God.

Another reliable translation states that for those who love God all things work together for good. Both are accurate translation. Because both are stated in manuscripts. Some menu script stated the way my translation that I read from states it other manuscripts stated the other way.

The question becomes do all things work together or does God cause all things to work together. Regardless of which translation you are reading from The Greek context is clear God is the one working.

At first glance this text can make some people ask, “What about all the bad that happens?” One writer states, “During World War II a prominent preacher designated as "the hardest verse in the Bible to believe.

" Adding to the evil we face, there is that debate of the interpretation of the text; specifically “panta sunergei” and that has led to many questions. Is it God who is active in working things together? Perhaps it’s the Holy Spirit because Paul was just talking about life in the spirit earlier in the chapter?

Maybe it’s the stoic view that the universe will ultimately cause bad things to work for good? Going into all of these views is another sermon altogether.

Not only does God causes good for those who love Him, he is working in what we would view as bad to lead us to His gospel and transform us into His image. the murder of Abel was premature to us. We never got to know able, we do not know much about him.

The Only thing we know is that he was the child of adam and eve and that he brought an offering to God that honored God. Even though we know very little about the man, his righteous faith and silent lips speak louder today than they ever did while alive

Now this verse is kind of odd To preach. There are multiple subjects going on in one verse. And before we move on to the next subject that is contained within this one verse I have to point out this great comfort that we should take in this truth.

This was a reminder to the Christians were being persecuted that's a very acts of persecution itself will be worked out for good. But it is not just restricted 2 persecutions. It involves all the consequences of sin and the fall of man.

This means your illness, anxiety, depression , physical pain, stress, and all things that you may be going through will be worked together for good. This may be hard for those Who think superficially. I recall a story from a young Christian man talking about his friend who died at the age of 27.

He had some kind of terminal illness. The friend was devastated to watch his buddy go through such a terrible sickness. The 27 year old used his last remaining days to proclaim the gospel and the goodness of Christ.

And the man who reflected on his friend years after he died, The amount of people Brought to Salvation bye a dying young adult, he was seeing the abundant goodness that came from the death of his friend. This revelation that the death of his friend but much good is a revelation that can only be received by faith.

A secularist will never find the good in that situation. During hard times you may struggle to find the good, to see the good. And some of us may go our entire lives without seeing that goodness. And it is during those times when we cannot see the good in the situation that we must look to god's attributes.

Because we may not have the answers for the trials that we go through or the misery we feel. But we know who God is. And we know that he is faithful. And if we know who he is and that he is faithful then we have no reason to doubt verse 28. But this only applies to a certain group of people.

“For those who are called according to His Purpose.” “The Scripture does not say that all things work together for good to everyone, but only to a certain class of people who are described in two ways: those "that love God" and those "who are the called according to his purpose."

"To them that love God" describes the persons in question from the human side. "To them who are the called" describes the persons in question from the divine side.” And; “God called them "out of darkness into His marvelous light" ().”

Throughout this study I have been emphasisizing that salvation is not by your works. I have never said that works are not involved. I declared that your works are not involved. But salvation was achevived by works, the works of Jesus.

Our great salvation is secure because it was Jesus who performed on the cross, it is God who calls His church and it’s His church that is sealed in the Holy Spirit. Based on casual conversations with other Christians, many assume “called” is something you physically do for God after one is saved.

For example; I feel called to lead bible study or I don’t feel called to lead bible study. But in the epistles, “called” or “calling” is referred to the sovereign, regenerating work of God.

To sum this might be a bold statement. We have to take this word seriously, the word called. This brings us 2 a conversation that has been historically controversial. This conversation is still controversial today.

It is a subject that I find difficult to teach because there are so many misunderstandings. The misunderstandings take place because people already have their mind made up before they give it a serious study. We are looking at the Calvinism versus arminianism debate.

The rest of this chapter in Chapter 9 may be difficult for some of you. And it may not be difficult for some of you. I wanna handle this subject with care and respect. And the best way to do that is to clear up some misconceptions over the next coming weeks.

We are going to be looking at this historically, theologically and Biblically. We will not make these words mean what we want them to mean but rather we will look at these words as Paul is trying to teach them.

Now before we can move on and look at this debate I have to clear up a lot of misconceptions. Are explanation of Calvinism today is not the same explanation of Calvinism of say the 17th century.

Today we understand Calvinism as predestination only. This is not true. Calvinism is the teaching of the absolute sovereignty of God and predestination is just a subplot within that topic. Calvinism comes from the reformer John Calvin. The controversy of this debate focuses on the predestination side which in my opinion is not strictly fair to John Calvin.

John Calvin was not the reformer who spoke the most on predestination. Martin Luther had way more to say about the subject. Why history name that after John Calvin? I don't know. What I do know is that Calvin had such a high view of God that when he read Romans 828 he said God works all things. That there is not one thing out of god's control.

This is what I mean by he taught absolute sovereignty. His focus was on a God who is in control. Down to every little thing. If it was evil acting, it was because God allowed that to happen. And this is what we see with job. But the way John calvin's mind worked was that you did not even receive a mosquito bite outside of the will of God.

I know some of you may be in agreement with Calvin on this. There is not one thing that moves outside of the will and knowledge of God. For Calvin this included Salvation. But there were some who questioned that and their greatest concern was what about my freedom? And how can a loving God allow evil.

These are the things that we are going to cover in the weeks to come. My goal in this is to first proclaim the glory of God. Second be faithful to the word of God. Third present these men from history as men.

John Calvin and Jacob arminius were real people. Who felt real pain and are capable of committing real errors. I think because the word Calvinism and arminianism is used we stop looking at them as human beings. Both these men loved Jesus.

That is a historical fact. It is OK to disagree with with these men but it is not our spot to bash these men. Agree or disagree, both these men belong to the Kingdom of God and are your brothers who went before you.

And even though we will be looking at these men and not just him there are others as well, we're just looking at them as a reference. Because the teachings were named after them. But our focus will be on the work of God. We will look at the works of the father , the works of the son and the works of the Holy Spirit.

There is no avoiding what is called Calvinism when we look at the word called. And verse 29 makes it even more difficult. I want you all to know that this subject is so controversial that there are many pastors will go their entire preaching careers of avoiding this section chapter 8 and all of Chapter 9.

I am not one of those preachers and we will not be a church that avoids god's word. We keep going on through whether we like it or not. And we have to discuss that word called. The word called has 2 meanings in scripture. There is the outward call. That is a preacher calling sinners to repent at the proclamation of the gospel.

But there is an inward call as well. And that is the call of the Holy Spirit. Preaching the gospel does not mean that the Holy Spirit must move in the heart of those who are hearing the gospel. Rather the Holy Spirit will move in whom he decides to move. These are things we see work together. A man makes the outward call and the Holy Spirit is working within the heart of man for the inward call.

Theologians have called this the effectual call. It is called that because the call is effective. God summons the whole world to Christ through the preaching of the gospel” and the effectual call is where the “Spirit illumines the heart and gives people faith through the gospel.”

Effectual calling has been highly debated and controversial among Christians. The debate is over what comes first; regeneration or faith? Some would say one must have faith before they can be regenerated; you find these mostly in dispensational circles. Zane Hodges argues that faith is required for regeneration to happen.

This means that according to Hodges, the unregenerate can have faith. R.C. Sproul argues that while regeneration and faith are simultaneous, that is that there is no long length of time in between regeneration and faith, regeneration precedes faith.

That is a conversation that will take place next week. we just do not have the time to cover that today.

Today I want to leave you with the reminder about salvation. As we can not look at these controversal subjects without a proper understanding of how one is saved.

Being called according to Gods purposes means we don’t perform for God but are transformed by God and afterword’s we bear the fruit of salvation. We express love for our brethren, love for God, love for prayer, love for righteousness and hatred for sin. It is so comforting how active the love of God is for us.

I would be a liar if I said bad events did not lead me into the arms of love, into the arms of my Lord and Savior. It’s something I do not talk about often because I know it hurts my family.

The death of my sister lead me to another city that I never had anything to do with which then lead me to my wife and her family which then lead me to Christ. My sister and I, as teenagers, both worked at Taco Bell and when she passed away it was hard for me to be there.

I eventually asked to be transferred out of there and they only opening at the time was a restaurant located off 64th and Ward road in Arvada; about a 40 minute drive from where I lived. At minimum wage the drive alone was not worth it.

A few weeks after I started working there my wife started and over the years, well, I am now here writing this paper with the expectation that anyone, if not everyone, will be reading this. Bad events can lead to amazing things but remember, for those who love God all things work together for good ; instead of asking why God? Ask what’s next God?

[2] Ibid

[2] Pack, Frank. Source: Restoration Quarterly, 22 no 1-2 1979, p 44-53. Publication Type: Article, Database: ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials

[3] Osburn, Carroll D.. Source: Westminster Theological Journal, 44 no 1 Spr 1982, p 99-109. Publication Type: Article, Database: ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials