Rest for the Weary

Introduction

If you have been with us lately you know that we are studying the book of Romans. Our passage today is Romans 8:26-30.

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Last Sunday we saw that living in this world is difficult because this world is broken. And for the believer this world is not our home—but as long as we are still in this world—until Jesus comes back or we die—we must live in this world as ambassadors of King Jesus.

But oftentimes we need hope. And we saw last weak that our hope lies in what God has promised us.

Another thing we often need in this world is rest.

And I’m not just talking about physical rest—although our bodies do need that—I’m talking about rest for our hearts, for our souls. We need the rest that comes with knowing that we are not alone and that God is in control over our lives. His sovereign, good will is taking place in our good and bad circumstances. We need rest that we are in good hands. And I’m not talking about Allstate.

Let’s read the passage. Romans 8:26-30

Romans 8:26–30 ESV

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

This morning we will see that he weary believer can rest in I. The Holy Spirit’s Intercession (26-27), II. God’s Sovereign Plan (28), III. Our Sure Salvation (29-30)

And this morning there is a phrase that I’m going to ask you to repeat to me every so often throughout the sermon.

“I will rest in God’s promises”

Okay, good, lets jump in.

I. We Can Rest in the Holy Spirit’s Intercession (26-27)

Romans 8:26a “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness...

Friends, our passage starts this morning by reminding us of something we really try to forget.

Paul says, “Likewise” just like there is hope for the weary and it is sure because it is based on God’s word. There is rest for the weary. Paul is letting us know that what follows in these next five verses is just as much a rock solid promise to the believer as what came before. Like what God said earlier, now He’s saygin this too.

But what else does he say? He says, “that God the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness.”

Did you know that you and I are weak? It’s not something we like to acknowledge. It is hard wired into our sinful flesh that we want to be independent and need nothing from anybody.

Weakness is akin to a cuss word. You won’t normally call someone weak and then get a “thank you” in return.

But the reality, friends, is that you and I are weak. And it’s not something to be ashamed of—or to run away from. But we try.

Let me point out 3 areas of weakness that we have.

We are spiritually weak. The task that we have been called to—the battle that we are fighting in—we are not strong enough to be victorious—our strength comes not from our flesh, but from our God. Jesus says you can do nothing without me, so abide in me. We are in great need of help to fight this spiritual battle that you and I are in. This is why God graciously gives us spiritual armor to fight with. The helmet of salvation, the sword of the Spirit which is the Word, and the shield of faith.

We are providentially weak. Everything that we have has been given to us. And a person might say, “What do you mean? I work for what I have!”

This can be a great source of pride for us. “I earned this! I built this life!” But where did your talents come from? Where did your health come from? Where did the opportunities that led to these blessings come from? Where do the blessings come from?

James 1:17 “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights...”

You and I don’t have anything we weren’t given. God gave you everything from start to finish.

We cannot provide for ourselves.

We are strategically weak.

You and I are severely lacking in knowledge. I don’t mean book smarts. I don’t mean trivia.

I mean that we are not omniscient, we are not omnipresent, if we had great strength and power we would not know where to apply it.

We don’t know the perfect will of God—we only know our own broken will.

And so even if we had the means to wield great power over our lives and the lives of others we would do so in ignorance of the perfect plan of God.

God’s strategy for every person in all of history is perfect because he sees all and knows all.

And we could go on and on and on in pointing out the different ways that you and I are weak—but I think you get the point.

And it is really important that we understand this because the world certainly, and even popular Christian culture really tries to do away with the idea of the “weak Christian”. Weakness doesn’t sell.

But it is when we embrace our weakness that we can be wielded with true strength.

The apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 12:9 “But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

Paul was asking God to take away his weaknesses, but God says it is your weakness that perfectly displays my power. And we see God demonstrate this over and over again in the Bible.

David and Goliath. How does a “ruddy youth”, a teenager defeat a man of war 4x his size? Not becausee he was strong. God used the weakness of David’s flesh and the strength of his faith to show the perfect power of God.

Elijah and the prophets of Baal. How does Elijah ignite soaking wet wood on fire without touching it? Certainly not because he was strong. God used the weakness of Elijah’s flesh and the strength of his faith to show the perfect power of God.

You must grasp this truth that you are weak. Because When you know the reality of your situation then you can operate in it to your maximum effectiveness. If David thought he could fight Goliath without the help of God we’d read a different story. If Elijah thought that he could light the wood of the sacrifice without the power of God then he would have been just like the prophets of Baal.

We our strongest when we embrace our weakness and rely on God’s strength.

Transition: And know that you can rest despite your weaknesses because God has not left you alone. Let’s keep reading.

Romans 8:26 “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.”

Paul says, “we don’t know what to pray for as we ought”.

And you and I experience this all the time. We pray—but we don’t know exactly what we “should” pray for. Because we don’t know the perfect will of God.

And let me encourage you here to have God’s sovereignty in mind as you pray. God is not sitting in heaven hoping you say the right combination of words to “unleash his power”. He’s not saying, “Oh man, I really want to bless Jacob, but he just won’t ask for the right thing. Or he didn’t ask enough times.”

God accomplishes all that he wants to do in our lives. Prayer is not primarily a plea to get something but it is a conversation between a child and their father.

Your good father has a plan for you but you and I in our weakness don’t know what that is. We want—or should want—the perfect plan of God and if we knew what that was we'd pray it.

For instance, you go to a job interview and you think that this new job is probably good and so you pray that God would give it to you, but in reality maybe this job isn’t right. We don’t know.

But our passage tells us that where we don’t know God the Holy Spirit does know.

Romans 8:27 “And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

The Spirit himself intercedes for us…He steps in. When all we can do is groan we can rest that our prayers are guided by the Spirit and that the Spirit of God intercedes in the lives of God’s people according to the perfect will of God.

This should be an immense source of rest for the child of God.

Because the will of God is not based on my weakness but on His strength. It’s not dependent on my ability to see all and know all and then pray the right thing. When all we can do is groan the Spirit knows how to interceded for us.

This is where true rest and peace come from. Even when we don’t know what we need our Good Father does...

This leads us to the next truth we can rest in...

II. We Can Rest in God’s Sovereign Plan (28)

Romans 8:28 “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”

Verse 28 of our passage has been an anchor for the people of God throughout history. John Stott has called this a “pillow upon which to rest our weary heads”. Because the truth of verse 28 encompasses all of life.

Verses 26-27 give us rest because we are not alone. When we don’t even know what to say to God the Holy Spirit intercedes for us. And verse 28 tells us that God intercedes for us based on his sovereign plan. Listen, God isn’t just trying something out with you. He’s moving according to his perfect plan.

But his perfect plan doesn’t always mean that you and I will be perfectly happy.

I do want to draw your attention to a wrong teaching on this verse. Some, especially those who believe that salvation is a path to earthly prosperity, they twist this verse into something that causes anxiety instead of comfort.

They ignore the context of the verse and say “for those who love God” means for those who do a good job of loving God.

For those who “believe hard enough and act holy enough”.

For those who have enough faith God will do good things for those people. The saints that live in victory are the saints that “sow the seed money”. For these special people God pours out blessing.

The teaching goes even further though—and says that if you are experiencing hardship, if you are not receiving the blessings of your neighbor it is because you have not had enough faith—you have not prayed enough—you have not trusted in God enough.

These teaching takes the rest of Romans 8:28 and turns it into a fiery dart of the enemy that causes doubt and fear.

Friends, if a pastor tells you to “name it and claim it” you stop sitting under that teaching. It sounds good. We like things that rhyme and our flesh loves the idea that there is a storehouse of blessing that WE can unlock when WE are good enough and WE are faithful enough.

But this is not the message of the Bible. We are not saved by grace and then sustained by our own works and our own strenght of belief.

When Jesus died on the cross he accomplished full salvation for all of those who are called according to His purpose.

The work was finished completely! There is nothing for you to name and claim because God has already given you every spiritual blessing in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 1:3 “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places,”

You’ve already got everything you need. Remember your hope in Christ is sure. You will be glorified, you have a glorious inheritance.

When Romans 8:28 says For those who love God—it is signifying who is receiving the action of thiis sentence.

The action is “all things work together for good”.

And twice in our sentence we are told who these people are. They are “those who love God, they are those who are called according to His purpose.”

The message is clear for all those who belong to Jesus, for the saints, God is working good in all things. He works good in all things for His children.

Friends, in your blessing—on the mountain when the air is clear and you can see the face of God shining upon you. When you are catching glimpses of Eden and heaven to come-- God is working these things for good.

But the glory of verse 28 is that when we are in the valley, when the shadow of death chills us, when we are like Job covered in sores with our lives falling down around us—the truth is that here, here too, here in this painful place GOD IS WORKING THIS FOR GOOD!!

There is no place, no circumstance, no suffering, no pain that the goodness of God won for you on the cross of Jesus Christ can’t reach you!!! There is no evil that God’s goodness can’t transform!! There is no past that he can’t redeem!

The most seemingly cursed saint on earth will wear a crown of glory in heaven!!!!!

And friends, sometimes our suffering confuses us—and we may be confused at how God is working this thing for good but we can be confident that He is. And we can cry out to Him to help us believe it and we can implore Him to use what was intended as evil against us for good.

Joseph didn’t feel good when he was thrown into the pit. When he was sold into slavery he wasn’t rejoicing. But later God allowed Him to see the “good he was working in his pain—in his suffering”.

Genesis 50:20 “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.”

Joseph believed Romans 8:28 before Paul ever pennned it.

Hebrews 12:1 “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,”

There is a great crowd of witnesses that have gone before us in Christ that are cheering us on as we run in the race of life—as we run with endurance as those who follow Jesus.

And just like us they lived lives of mountains and valleys—for some the mountains were more plentiful and for some it seemed as if they lived in the valley—but all of them now have what we are promised --and from this place—where they can see how God worked all things in their life for good—they cheer us on to keep going, to never stop trusting in the sovereign goodness of our Father.

Friends, you can rest in God’s sovereign, good plan. You can know that in all things the goodness of God has not left you.

And if you want an example of the good that comes from suffering look no further than the cross.

For there, a sinless man, an innocent man died for our sins, for our rebellion. He was broken for our transgressions for our sins he was punished. His blood ran for you and me. The Romans meant evil for him, the Jewish rulers meant evil for him…BUT GOD MEANT IT FOR GOOD so that many sons and daughters would be brought to glory!! Hallelujah and amen!

Friends, you can rest in God’s intercession for you and you can rest in God’s sovereignty, and also...

III. We Can Rest in Our Salvation (29-30)

Next Sunday we are going to dive deep into these two verses but I want us to see the rest that comes from the plain reading of these two verses.

Romans 8:29-30 has been referred to as the “golden chain of salvation”. It’s referred to as a chain because Paul links one doctrine to another. Let’s read.

Romans 8:29-30 “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.”

Next Sunday I’m going to make the case to you that this verse teaches us that God is completely sovereign in salvation. That he chose those who would trust Christ and it is those people that come to believe in Jesus.

But this morning I want us to simply rest in the surety of salvation.

Notice that every action word of verses 29 and 30 are in the past tense. Those he foreknew. He predestined. He conformed. He called. He justified. He glorified.

For the believer your glorification is so sure that God speaks about it in the past tense.

When a person is saved in Jesus the chain of salvation will always end with the believer being glorified.

“Well what if a person loses their salvation?” Friends, the Bible doesn’t teach that a person can lose their salvation.

Sometimes there are people that seemed as though they were of us, but do you know what God’s Word says about that?

1 John 2:19 “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.”

Paul says that when a believer loses their salvation what we are really seeing is that they were never saved in the first place.

The Bible doesn’t tell us that God is holding onto us as long as we hold onto Him. If you let go of God then he’ll let go of you!

John 10:28 “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.”

John 6:37 “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.”

Here’s the glorious truth! You aren’t holding on to God, He’s holding onto you and he’ll never let you go even when you let go of Him. Even when you are down in the pit of depression as David often is in the Psalms and you cry out, “My God where are you!”

Even when you act in anger toward God because you can’t understand the suffering in your life and you are not believing what He has told you and you are rebelling against Him—if Jesus paid for your sins and you are a child of God then you cannot lose your salvation—God will never disown one of his children. And the fate of your eternity isn’t decided by the strength of your faith, but by the strength of Christ’s death on the cross and when Jesus cried out, “It is finished.” He meant it. The matter was settled.

Friends, no matter what happens in this world we can rest in the surety of our salvation.

When you are walking with Christ step by step and focusing on the Word and believing it and obeying it—You are saved.

And when you are trying to forge your own path and are trying to lead Christ instead of being led by Christ—when you are not in the Word and you aren’t believing it and your obedience is faltering—YOU ARE SAVED.

And as a child of God you won’t stay there. The prodigal returned! And so will you.

Your salvation is sure. It is finished. In Christ it is complete.

Bottom Line

As followers of Jesus we have much to hope in and our text today has shown us that we can rest in this world as we believe the promises that God has given his children.

You can rest in God’s intercession for you. You are not alone.

You can rest in God’s sovereignty. His perfect will for you is sure to take place.

You can rest in the surenesss of your salvation. It is already considered finished by God.

We can try to find our rest in other places, but we’ll find that every other source, but God, offers us counterfeit rest that doesn’t last.

Only in Jesus Christ will you find lasting rest for your weary soul. If you’ve never trusted Christ for salvation Jesus calls you to come today for the forgiveness of your sins.

And if you have trusted Christ rest in your secure position because your God has got you in his hand and he will not let you go.

Let’s pray.