General Session 12: The Triumph of Divine Love - John MacArthur
00:00:00.000 | A lot of things on my mind and my heart as we come to this conclusion.
00:00:09.540 | The Lord always has a way of directing us so that He puts the pieces together, I think,
00:00:18.740 | in a sovereign, supernatural way. The message by Steve about the triumphant return of Christ
00:00:30.780 | with all of its violence and judgment, severity, followed by His kind invitation even to a
00:00:42.940 | group of pastors to be sure you're in Christ was so important, because we can be tempted
00:00:54.520 | in a lot of ways. And one of the ways that we can be tempted is to even doubt our own
00:01:01.440 | condition. We can be tempted to doubt that the Lord really has His hands on us permanently
00:01:15.360 | and forever. And if there is any doubt in your mind about your eternal destiny, or moments
00:01:27.120 | of doubt, or you wonder if something could change with God or with you that could obviate
00:01:37.440 | His promise, then you of all people would be the most terrified, because you know what
00:01:47.560 | the Scripture says is coming. And you know it's coming. The critics said in Peter's day,
00:01:58.600 | "No, no, no. All things continue as they were since the beginning." And Peter said, "Did
00:02:03.720 | you forget the universal flood?" No, it's happened before, and there's evidence of it
00:02:07.760 | all over the earth. It's coming. So we, in order to enjoy the prospects and the promises
00:02:19.400 | of our eternal salvation, need to understand what Romans 8 provides for us, and that is
00:02:29.240 | the triumph of our Savior's love. The opening message was obedience, the triumph of the
00:02:37.880 | saints' love. The closing message is security, the triumph of the Savior's love.
00:02:46.360 | And you can go back to Romans chapter 8. I was reading an article from some psychoanalysts
00:02:56.400 | who were trying to talk about what people want, and the article suggested that the first
00:03:01.640 | thing they want is food, and I get that; and the second is water; and the third is shelter;
00:03:07.400 | and the fourth is love. People need to be loved. Created in God's image, we were created
00:03:15.920 | for affection. We were created for love. They long for loving relationships. Hard to generate
00:03:25.960 | in this isolated culture where people spend all their time looking at media, and very
00:03:36.000 | little time cultivating face-to-face relationships. People long for a loving relationship that
00:03:43.200 | lasts. They are crushed when love fails. Human beings long for a love that will never fail,
00:03:52.360 | and not even wane, certainly not die and not disappoint. That love is really very rare
00:04:03.840 | in human society. But there is such a love that endures in its fullness and gives lasting
00:04:14.760 | satisfaction and lasting joy. And when I say lasting, I mean everlasting. To be loved by
00:04:26.280 | the God of the universe, to be loved with such a lavish love that what that love promises
00:04:35.860 | to us is even incomprehensible. We can't grasp the height and depth and length and
00:04:41.740 | breadth of it. It's an amazing love.
00:04:49.740 | Before we go to Romans 8, turn back for a moment to the 13th chapter of John. Familiar
00:04:58.880 | scene in the upper room. And Jesus is with His disciples, and there's a statement made
00:05:11.120 | in the first verse that has long penetrated my own heart. "Before the feast of the Passover,
00:05:19.800 | Jesus, knowing that His hour had come, that He would depart out of this world to the Father,
00:05:27.840 | having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end." This is the hardest
00:05:37.720 | night of His life. This is the eve of His crucifixion. This is the night of His betrayal.
00:05:50.160 | And this is when His disciples had been unable even to watch for a few hours and uphold Him
00:05:58.840 | in prayer in the midst of His incomprehensible agony. They fell asleep, and they were seen
00:06:11.360 | in their weakness. When the Lord needed them to stand with Him in intercession, they were
00:06:19.000 | useless. They were really at their ugliest. They had been squabbling about which of them
00:06:27.600 | would be the greatest in the kingdom. And in that moment when they were self-centered
00:06:35.760 | and indifferent to the reality that was told to them and was looming in a few hours, they
00:06:45.120 | couldn't find it in their hearts to fix their attention on Him. It is in that moment that
00:06:52.120 | He loved them to the end.
00:06:58.440 | Ice tell us to the max, to the end every way you can define the end. He loved them to the
00:07:09.600 | end without limits, completely, fully. To the extent of His capacity to love, God loved
00:07:22.720 | them. He couldn't love them more. He couldn't love them less. A love that surpassed all
00:07:31.680 | other loves could not be increased, could not be decreased, but a love reserved for
00:07:41.880 | His own. He loved His own who were in the world. He loved them even though in the world
00:07:50.280 | they were miserable failures. Peter was the most disappointing believer
00:07:58.640 | of the disciples. But in the hour of betrayal, in the hour of betrayal on the part of the
00:08:08.120 | disciples, even Peter, and the scattering of all the rest of them in fear in our Lord's
00:08:15.200 | most severe trial, He loved them to the end because that's the only way He can love
00:08:26.960 | His own to the max, to the full. And what do you mean to that? By that, the fullness
00:08:34.520 | of His capacity to love. However much love God can generate is exactly what He gives
00:08:43.080 | to His own. And Romans 5:8 says, "God demonstrated His love for His own, in that while we were
00:08:55.200 | yet sinners, Christ died for us." He loved His own when they were yet sinners. He loved
00:09:08.000 | them so much it would be impossible to love them more, because it would be impossible
00:09:15.040 | to do more than give His Son as a sacrifice. He loves His own with an everlasting, immeasurable
00:09:28.880 | love. This is the greatest gift a human being can be given. No matter how many other loves
00:09:35.200 | fail, this one never does. And it sounds too good, really. And some people who call themselves
00:09:44.000 | Christians think it is too good to assume that this love is that complete and permanent.
00:09:54.360 | Can we be sure? Can we really be sure that we are loved like this all the way to the
00:10:01.560 | end, even in the ugliest moments of our lives? Well, the answer to that question is back
00:10:10.320 | in Romans 8, so let's go there. This, I think, is the most precious of all promises, that
00:10:22.720 | the Lord's love never fails, because if I wasn't sure of that, I couldn't enjoy any
00:10:26.640 | of the benefits. So go down to verse 31, "What then shall we say to these things?" What
00:10:41.040 | things are you talking about? Well, we're talking about everything from the beginning
00:10:44.920 | of the book of Romans, the gospel. "I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power
00:10:52.520 | of God unto salvation to everyone who believes." And then Paul unfolds the bad news, and then
00:10:59.000 | the good news. And we see justification by faith in chapter 3. And then the glories of
00:11:05.040 | the gospel unfold from chapter 3, verse 20, all the way to chapter 8, verse 30. And in
00:11:12.440 | verses 28 to 30, which we read earlier, you have a summation of the glories of our salvation.
00:11:23.600 | It's a secure salvation, because verse 28 says, "We know that God causes all things
00:11:29.180 | to work together for good." If all things work together for good, then nothing can work
00:11:33.720 | together for bad. He causes all things to work together for good to those who love God,
00:11:43.280 | to those who are called according to His purpose. His purpose and His call determine that everything's
00:11:53.360 | going to work together for good. Then Paul looks at those wonderfully familiar terms
00:12:02.680 | in verse 29, "For those whom He foreknew, those whom He predetermined to set His love
00:12:08.880 | upon, He predestined." Predestined to what? To become conformed to the image of His Son.
00:12:15.880 | He predestined them to glorification, to conformity to Christ. This is His purpose, so that He,
00:12:29.080 | Christ, would be the prototokos , the premier one among many brethren. And then Paul says
00:12:36.440 | it another way, "These whom He predestined, He also called." And that is a life-giving,
00:12:46.440 | regenerating, irresistible, divine call. "And those whom He called, He justified." No one
00:12:55.000 | is called and not justified. "And He also justified those who were called, so that they
00:13:02.600 | could be glorified." That's the purpose of God, to glorify those whom He called by conforming
00:13:16.640 | them to the image of His Son. So what should we say to this? This is breathtaking. Everything
00:13:28.080 | in our lives is working toward the purpose of God, which is our eternal glorification
00:13:33.240 | and conformity to Christlikeness. Everything. Nothing works against that. Everything works
00:13:39.000 | for that, because that is what God purposed. That is determined by His predetermination
00:13:47.280 | to love us, predestine us, justify us. It all brings us to eternal glory.
00:14:00.220 | Can this be true? Can such grace be a reality? Going back to the first verse in chapter 8,
00:14:09.560 | "Is it really possible that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, that we
00:14:18.120 | will never be condemned?" Is this really true? It introduces two hypothetical questions.
00:14:33.160 | Number one, can God reject us? Can God become so weary of us that He changes His mind? Can
00:14:48.800 | God say, "I've had about all I can take out of you. You're such a disappointment. You
00:14:56.440 | fall short so often. You bring reproach on My name. You are an embarrassment. You're
00:15:03.680 | a problem to My church. You don't honor My Word as you should. You stumble and fall into
00:15:12.080 | the same sinful patterns that you were stumbling and falling into years ago. I'm worn out picking
00:15:21.400 | you up and dusting you off. I'm weary of the mixed messages you send to the people who
00:15:28.680 | know you, because sometimes you act like a Christian and sometimes you don't." Could
00:15:37.880 | God just say, "I really can't take it anymore. I'm canceling your eternal life"?
00:15:48.080 | Or the second question would be this, the hypothetical possibility is that we reject
00:15:53.560 | God, that we say, "Look, I've been hanging in there as a Christian doing my part, and
00:16:00.800 | I don't really get the answers to my prayers that I would like. Does marriage have to be
00:16:07.640 | so difficult? Does my husband have to be such a jerk? Do I have to struggle at work? Do
00:16:17.660 | I have to fight the people close to me that should love me but make life difficult? And
00:16:24.680 | why all the illnesses and the diseases? And I've prayed for a long time, and I'm weary,
00:16:35.920 | God, of Your failure to step in and make my life what I think it should be if You really
00:16:46.280 | loved me." So those are the two hypothetical possibilities that God gets tired of us and
00:16:52.520 | rejects us, or we get tired of Him and reject Him.
00:17:00.760 | God rejecting us has a theological category, doesn't it? Those who deny the security and
00:17:09.160 | perseverance of the believer. And now there's a new theological category of people who reject
00:17:17.680 | God. It's called deconstruction, or exvangelicals, hashtag. Can either of these things happen?
00:17:31.180 | Can He stop loving us? Can we stop loving Him? Well, the answers are in this section
00:17:41.660 | starting in verse 31, and that's why the question is posed. What then shall we say to these
00:17:46.780 | things? How do we respond to the absolute character of salvation as summed up in verses
00:17:53.580 | 28 to 30? How do we respond to that, that God had a purpose, and the purpose was to
00:18:04.420 | conform us to His Son in eternal glory, and He takes every step in the process to make
00:18:11.580 | sure that it comes to pass? What shall we say to these things?
00:18:18.980 | And 1 Paul poses the question, "Can God reject us?" Back to verse 31. It's assumed. If God
00:18:33.140 | is for us, who is against us? Can God find reason to take away our salvation? Well, certainly
00:18:47.740 | not based on verses 28 to 30, because whom He foreknew He predestines, He calls, He justifies,
00:18:59.600 | and He glorifies. Look at that first part of the second half of verse 31, "God is for
00:19:08.620 | us." The assumption here is that God is for us. There are some people in some forms of
00:19:17.740 | evangelicalism who think God is against us. But listen to what Scripture says, Psalm 27,
00:19:29.300 | verse 1 to 3, "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is
00:19:39.220 | the defense of my life; whom shall I dread? When evildoers came upon me to devour my flesh,
00:19:48.300 | my adversaries and my enemies, they stumbled and fell. Though a host encamp against me,
00:19:54.660 | my heart will not fear; though war arise against me, in spite of this I shall be confident."
00:20:03.420 | Why? The Lord is my salvation. Listen to Psalm 46, "God is our refuge and strength, a very
00:20:14.940 | present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change,
00:20:22.500 | and though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam,
00:20:29.340 | though the mountains quake at its swelling pride." If everything starts to fall apart,
00:20:40.860 | God is going to be our refuge and our help. I love this in Psalm 46, 7, "The Lord of
00:20:48.020 | hosts is with us." Verse 11, "The Lord of hosts is with us."
00:20:56.900 | Psalm 56, 4, "In God whose word I praise, in God I have put my trust; I shall not be
00:21:04.500 | afraid what man can do to me." Or Psalm 56, 11, "In God I have put my trust, and I shall
00:21:15.060 | not be afraid what can man do to me." Or Psalm 84, 11 and 12, "For the Lord God is a sun and
00:21:23.420 | shield; the Lord gives grace and glory. No good thing does He withhold from those who
00:21:29.580 | walk uprightly, O Lord of hosts. How blessed is the man who trusts in You."
00:21:38.300 | Psalm 118, verse 6, "The Lord is for me." Isaiah 50, verses 7 to 9, "For the Lord God
00:21:49.660 | helps me; therefore, I'm not disgraced; therefore, I've set my face like flint. And I know that
00:21:57.060 | I'll not be ashamed; He who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me? Let us
00:22:03.700 | stand up to each other. Who has a case against me? Let Him draw near to me. Behold, the Lord
00:22:10.820 | God helps me. Who is He who condemns me? The Lord is for us, all of this is saying."
00:22:21.580 | To the degree that Isaiah 54, 17 familiarly says, "No weapon that is formed against you
00:22:27.540 | will prosper." No weapon. "And every tongue that accuses you in judgment, you will condemn.
00:22:37.360 | This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their vindication is from me, declares
00:22:43.100 | the Lord." In the wonderful language of John 10, verses 28 to 30, "I give eternal life
00:22:51.680 | to my sheep; they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father
00:22:58.580 | who has given them to me is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the
00:23:03.300 | Father's hand. I and the Father are one." Summed up, God is for us. He knows how weak
00:23:19.580 | we are. He knows how sinful we are. But He is for us. And Paul's about to prove that.
00:23:32.320 | How do we know that? Look at verse 32. "He," meaning God, "who did not spare His own Son,
00:23:42.120 | but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?"
00:23:50.880 | Amazing statement. The greatest proof of God's promise to keep us is what He sacrificed to
00:24:01.520 | give us. This is an argument from the greater to the lesser. His love is so strong that
00:24:17.200 | He gave His Son for us. Will He not do what is less than that to keep us? You can't do
00:24:24.440 | more than to give your Son to save us. We would assume You would do less than to keep
00:24:34.040 | us. He gave us the most, the best, and He has no capacity to hold back the least. That's
00:24:47.280 | why the Scripture says, "You're blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies
00:24:55.920 | in Christ." He gave you Christ; that was the big sacrifice. The rest follows.
00:25:04.480 | Back in the 5th chapter of Romans, just by way of reminder, wonderful familiar text,
00:25:13.680 | Romans 5, 6, "For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly."
00:25:21.480 | We were helpless, we were ungodly. Verse 8 adds that we were sinners, Christ died for
00:25:31.520 | us. "If when we were helpless, and ungodly, and sinful, Christ died for us," then verse
00:25:41.480 | 9, "much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be being saved from
00:25:49.000 | the wrath of God through Him. For while we were enemies, we were reconciled. And if that
00:25:56.040 | is true, that God reconciled us to Himself through the death of His Son, much more, having
00:26:02.080 | been reconciled, we shall be being saved by His life." "Much more" in verse 9, "much more"
00:26:11.440 | in verse 10, "much more" in verse 15, "much more" in verse 17, "all the more" in verse
00:26:18.120 | 20. And all of that language there is to say that if He gave you the greatest of all gifts,
00:26:24.000 | He would follow that up with the lesser gifts.
00:26:36.320 | This language draws me back to Genesis 22 where it talks about a sacrifice. Let me just
00:26:51.580 | draw you back for a minute. Genesis 22, a very familiar story. We don't need to go through
00:27:03.440 | the whole story. But verse 12, if I can get there. Abraham, Abraham, verse 11, ready to
00:27:18.240 | offer Isaac, took a knife to kill his son in verse 10. And in verse 12, "And the Lord
00:27:26.960 | says to him, 'Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him. For
00:27:33.380 | now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from
00:27:42.240 | Me.'" In verses 15 and 16, "Then the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time
00:27:49.520 | from heaven and said, 'By Myself I have sworn,' declares the Lord, 'because you have done
00:27:55.140 | this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son. Indeed, I will greatly bless
00:28:03.300 | you.'" The story of Jesus was different. Abraham
00:28:11.900 | had only one son, one that was a true child of the promise. In Him all the covenant promises
00:28:18.360 | would be fulfilled. In Him the nations would be blessed. Through Him salvation would come,
00:28:22.740 | and the Messiah would come, and He was willing to offer Him in death. Isaac was spared by
00:28:28.060 | God by divine intervention; Jesus was not. So the picture is really contrast. The willingness
00:28:38.420 | of Abraham to offer up Isaac provides only a faint analogy of the Father's ultimate self-sacrifice
00:28:44.900 | in refusing to spare His Son. Abraham was willing, didn't have to do it. God was willing
00:28:51.140 | and did it. Would He have spared His Son if in the end
00:29:02.940 | He would accomplish nothing for those for whom it was said that He died? Would He have
00:29:12.180 | given His Son if He did not have the power to hold on to the ones for whom His Son died
00:29:18.460 | and whose sins His Son bared? Isaiah 53 10, "It pleased the Lord to bruise
00:29:29.380 | Him; He put Him to grief." So the first question is, would God become
00:29:39.020 | weary of us? Would He let go of us? Would He cancel our salvation? And Paul's answer
00:29:51.900 | from the greater to the lesser is, verse 32, "He gave His greatest gift; He will give
00:29:57.280 | the lesser gifts to sustain what the death of His Son purchased." He made Him to be
00:30:06.300 | sin for us. He put the curse on Him, Galatians 3. Delivered His Son to damnation and abandonment.
00:30:18.340 | Who delivered Jesus to die? Not Judas for money, and not Pilate for fear, and not the
00:30:25.500 | Jews for envy, but the Father for love, the Father for love.
00:30:33.740 | John Murray wrote, "It is only as the ordeal of Gethsemane and Calvary is viewed in the
00:30:39.460 | perspective of damnation vicariously born, damnation executed with the sanctions of unrelenting
00:30:46.180 | justice, and damnation endured when the hosts of darkness were released to wreak the utmost
00:30:52.540 | of their vengeance, that we shall be able to apprehend the wonder and taste the sweetness
00:30:58.860 | of love that passes knowledge, love eternally to be explored, but eternally inexhaustible."
00:31:10.220 | He put damnation on His Son to make us His own when we were ungodly sinners. And that's
00:31:18.820 | the point, isn't it? Verse 32, "Delivered Him for us all." Not just for our benefit,
00:31:28.420 | but in our place. The us is the us of verse 31. Who is against us? The us of verse 31
00:31:38.060 | is the us of verse 29 and 30, "Those who were foreknown and predestined and justified and
00:31:48.180 | would be glorified." And that goes back to verse 28, "The us are those who have been
00:31:55.060 | called according to His purpose." So would God reject us? No. Paul says, "How, on the
00:32:09.420 | other hand, shall He not also with Him freely give us all things?" That fits His eternal
00:32:17.380 | saving decree. The point is that if the Father didn't spare the Son, but gave Him up to the
00:32:22.980 | shame and horror of damnation and sin bearing on the cross to bring about an eternal goal,
00:32:32.380 | that is the greatest sacrifice. Anything else that sustains us is a lesser act on His part.
00:32:43.380 | To deny security is to misunderstand the work of God in His Son.
00:32:51.860 | Well, if there's nothing we can do to cause God to reject us, can someone else come along,
00:33:03.980 | let's say, and convince Him that we are an embarrassment, that His reputation would be
00:33:11.460 | protected if He didn't have to identify with us? If He just cut us off, we wouldn't bring
00:33:20.060 | a blight on His lovely name. Could someone come to God and say, "God, You're really,
00:33:31.100 | You're really giving up Your credibility by holding on to John MacArthur. He's an embarrassment.
00:33:47.660 | You'd be better off to disconnect with him." Could somebody else come and do that?
00:33:58.860 | Turn to Isaiah 50, verse 7, "For the Lord God helps me; therefore, I'm not disgraced.
00:34:08.380 | Therefore, I have set my face like flint, and I know that I will not be ashamed. He
00:34:13.820 | who vindicates me is near. Who will contend with me? Let us stand up to each other. Who
00:34:19.380 | has a case against me? Let him draw near to me. Behold, the Lord God helps me."
00:34:26.820 | You want to make a case against me, you're going to have to get through Him. Who will
00:34:35.660 | bring a charge against God's elect? Well, who would want to do that? Satan in the case
00:34:43.740 | of Job; Satan in the case of Joshua, the high priest of Zechariah 3; Satan in Revelation
00:34:50.900 | 12, 10, the accuser of the brethren who is before God. What does it say? "Night and day."
00:35:03.300 | Relentlessly indicting us, relentlessly bringing the case against us to God. Same kind of case
00:35:14.740 | he brought with regard to Job. Will God hear that charge? Can somebody successfully, verse
00:35:25.700 | 33, bring a charge against God's elect? Answer, "God is the one who justifies." Literally,
00:35:36.860 | "God the one justifying." No, He cannot condemn and justify at the same time. The case against
00:35:49.300 | believers and against their justification may be fought by Satan, but to no avail, because
00:36:03.460 | we are covered with the righteousness of Christ who bore our sin. That's why John Wesley
00:36:10.260 | wrote, "Bold shall I stand in that great day, for who ought to my charge shall lay fully
00:36:18.500 | through thee. Absolved I am from sin and fear, from guilt and shame." God's elect. Satan
00:36:33.060 | can bring all the accusations he wants. God will never condemn those whose condemnation
00:36:40.100 | was paid in full by His Son. Say, "Well, wait a minute. We haven't heard from the Son.
00:36:48.860 | What's He got to say about this?" Verse 34, "Who is He who condemns? Christ Jesus? What
00:36:57.220 | if He says, 'I'm fed up. I'm embarrassed by these vacillating Christians who bear My
00:37:08.260 | name?'" Could our Lord Jesus turn against us? The answer comes, "Christ Jesus is He
00:37:25.660 | who died." Point one, He paid the full price for our sin. He died. He can't condemn us;
00:37:40.380 | He was condemned for us. He was delivered over to death on account of our transgressions
00:37:48.820 | back in chapter 4, verse 25. Not only that, who was raised, which means the Father was
00:38:01.460 | fully propitiated, fully satisfied that Christ paid the full and complete price for the sins
00:38:09.880 | of the elect, and raised Him from the dead for our justification, signifying that His
00:38:20.860 | death accomplished our eternal salvation. Would Christ turn on us? No, He died in our
00:38:31.300 | place. Would He turn on us? No, He was raised by the Father, validating the efficacy of
00:38:38.220 | His death. Thirdly, He is at the right hand of God. He is at the right hand of God. He's
00:38:46.620 | been exalted to heaven to the Father's right hand, as Psalm 110, verse 1 says, "The Lord
00:38:53.900 | said to My Lord, 'Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool.'" Christ
00:39:02.420 | died a substitutionary death that pleased God. God raised Him from the dead. God exalted
00:39:09.940 | Him to His right hand, which validates the efficacy of His work on the cross. That's
00:39:18.940 | not all. There's a fourth feature. He is now at the right hand of God interceding for us.
00:39:31.220 | Christ won't turn against us. He intercedes for us as a merciful and faithful high priest.
00:39:39.860 | In John 11:42 He said, "I know, Father, that You always hear Me." I can't resist reading
00:39:48.420 | a few verses out of John 17 that take us right into His intercession. Verse 13, John 17.
00:39:59.760 | This is Christ's intercession. "Now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world
00:40:05.620 | so that they may have My joy made full in themselves. I have given them Your Word."
00:40:10.900 | This is Christ in His intercessory work. "I've given them Your Word, and the world has hated
00:40:16.820 | them because they're not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I do not ask You
00:40:20.940 | to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. They're not of the
00:40:26.380 | world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; Your Word is truth. As
00:40:31.440 | You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. For their sakes I sanctify
00:40:37.380 | Myself that they themselves also may be sanctified. I do not ask on behalf of those alone, but
00:40:44.960 | for those also who believe in Me through their word, those who come in generations after
00:40:50.420 | the apostles, that they may all be one, even as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that
00:40:56.020 | they also may be in Us, and the world may believe that You sent Me. The glory which
00:41:02.780 | You have given Me, I've given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one. I in
00:41:10.020 | them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that
00:41:15.180 | You sent Me and loved them, even as You have loved Me. Father, love them the way You love
00:41:24.860 | Me. Christ isn't going to turn on us. He died
00:41:29.300 | in our place. He was raised by the Father for having accomplished our eternal redemption.
00:41:37.340 | He was exalted to the right hand of God, triumphant in His death, and He now ever lives to intercede
00:41:46.980 | for us. God will not turn on us. Satan cannot affect a change in God's commitment. Christ
00:42:01.860 | would never, ever turn on us, because He accomplished everything to secure our everlasting salvation.
00:42:14.340 | Okay, what about the other hypothetical? Could a believer reject God? Can you really deconstruct?
00:42:26.940 | Can you really say, "I'm done with Christianity? I'm worn out with it"? You hear this so often.
00:42:33.140 | You know, I was raised in some kind of rigid Bible environment, and I didn't get my questions
00:42:40.780 | answered, and I don't like the direction that that life was taking me, and I don't want
00:42:47.420 | anything to do with that. I grew up maybe in a Christian family, at some point affirmed
00:42:54.780 | my faith in Christ, but I've changed my mind. So the question is, starting in verse 35,
00:43:03.020 | could a believer reject God? The question comes, "Who will separate us, or what will
00:43:11.940 | separate us from the love of Christ?" Now it's our turn. Would we walk away? Can life
00:43:18.900 | become so difficult, so disappointing, so tragic, so defective, so unfulfilling, so
00:43:26.980 | troublesome that we say, "Look, I've had enough"? Is that possible? Well, Paul says,
00:43:39.180 | "Let's check a few things." Could tribulation do that? That's the Greek word philipsis,
00:43:48.340 | which basically means pressure, pressure, affliction, outward difficulty, accusation,
00:43:57.140 | rejection, bodily harm. Philipsis, in Latin it's like flailing, like wood and leather
00:44:11.340 | whips, lashing, a very common word. It even appears in the agrarian environment when speaking
00:44:22.860 | about separating chaff from wheat, beating the grain. Can life just be so difficult that
00:44:34.820 | we reject Christ? Outward difficulty. Or maybe distress, second word, inward difficulty.
00:44:47.540 | Sennachoria, it means narrow, narrow space, hemmed in, no way out. Can I become in my
00:45:00.460 | own mind so unfulfilled and so desperate that I don't see any way out, and I can't find
00:45:08.420 | fulfillment that I would turn away from Christ? Or maybe let's be more direct. Persecution,
00:45:19.700 | abuse. Literally the word means abuse, physical, mental abuse at the hands of Christ-haters.
00:45:30.740 | Would that do it? Or famine, starving to death, perhaps because of that, persecution, deprivation,
00:45:41.060 | nakedness also associated with persecution. And then just a general word, peril, danger,
00:45:49.300 | being exposed to treachery, being in a culture where your life is threatened because of hostility.
00:45:59.700 | Or even a sword, mecharia, meaning death. Could any of these things cause me to turn
00:46:08.940 | my back on my Savior? And, oh, by the way, that list of seven were very personal to Paul
00:46:17.340 | because they were all part of his biography. Paul had all of that in, honestly, mega doses.
00:46:36.620 | He chronicles that, all his suffering, beaten with rods and whips and shipwrecked, and all
00:46:47.620 | the things he told the Corinthians. Was that enough to turn him against the Lord? It was
00:47:00.100 | to be expected. Quoting Psalm 44, 36, he adds, "Just as it is written, 'For your sake we
00:47:08.780 | are being put to death all day long. We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.'"
00:47:13.700 | Now that's where you see the personal touch. I lived through all this. This is not hypothetical.
00:47:18.580 | This is my own experience, and I'm here to tell you I've been through it all. I've felt
00:47:24.980 | the powers of the pressure, and the distress, and the persecution, and the hunger, and the
00:47:34.420 | nakedness, and the cold, and the danger, and the sword which eventually flashed in the
00:47:42.540 | sun and severed his head from his body. And it's to be expected, and all of it, all of
00:47:54.580 | it, "For your sake," verse 36. So it's all happening to me because I'm connected to you.
00:48:07.740 | This wouldn't be happening to me, Paul is saying, if I didn't represent you. I was willing
00:48:17.760 | to take up my cross and follow. I'm not sure I understood what it was going to mean.
00:48:27.220 | This is a lot to bear. Could this do it? No. Verse 37, "But in all these things we overwhelmingly
00:48:40.580 | conquer, not in our own strength, but through Him who loved us." We are hupernickemen , super
00:48:52.480 | conquerors, winners of a sweeping victory, not just a bare escape. Love triumphs. But
00:49:04.780 | it's not so much our love as if it could triumph independently. It's His love that holds onto
00:49:12.540 | us. What does it mean to be a super conqueror? I think it means two things. You not only
00:49:21.780 | do not find yourself separated from Christ, but you find that, first of all, trials work
00:49:30.380 | to your greater good. Anytime you survive a trial and your faith is intact, that is
00:49:38.780 | a testimony to the validity of your true saving faith. But also, you find yourself strengthened.
00:49:47.020 | The trials that you have have a strengthening work. They allow you to strengthen others,
00:49:54.820 | as our Lord told Peter. They increase your hatred of sin. They drive you to God. They
00:50:04.300 | help you recognize your weaknesses. That's why the Bible says trials perfect you. Trials
00:50:13.420 | work to your greater good, and secondly, they work to your greater glory. The benefits of
00:50:23.300 | those trials are going to show up in heaven.
00:50:27.540 | Listen to 2 Corinthians. I know you know this; it's very familiar. "For momentary light affliction
00:50:42.460 | is producing for us an eternal weight of glory." So the weight of our glory is connected
00:50:49.940 | to the affliction here. Our momentary light affliction, relatively speaking, is producing
00:50:57.400 | for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison. So in what way are you a super
00:51:05.180 | conqueror? You not only conquer by sustained love to the Lord because He sustains His love
00:51:11.860 | for you, but the trial works to your greater good, which instead of weakening you, makes
00:51:18.660 | you stronger, and it increases your eternal glory.
00:51:30.120 | Now the Corinthians weren't particular models of virtue or obedience. They had their issues,
00:51:44.400 | didn't they? But whatever victory they had over these kinds of assaults increased their
00:51:52.960 | strength and added to the eternal weight waiting for them in heaven.
00:52:05.040 | Just an Old Testament passage comes to mind as we kind of wrap up, Isaiah 41. I have a
00:52:13.440 | lot more that I've been editing in my mind on the fly here tonight. But Isaiah 41.10,
00:52:23.360 | "Do not fear, for I am with you. Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God. I will
00:52:34.640 | strengthen you; surely I will help you. Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right
00:52:39.960 | hand. Behold, all those who are angered at you will be shamed and dishonored. Those who
00:52:47.560 | contend with you will be as nothing and will perish. You will seek those who quarrel with
00:52:54.800 | you, but will not find them; they'll disappear. Those who war with you will be as nothing
00:53:01.560 | and non-existent. For I am the Lord your God, who upholds your right hand, who says to you,
00:53:09.520 | 'Do not fear; I will help you. Do not fear, you worm, Jacob, you men of Israel. I will
00:53:16.680 | help you,' declares the Lord, 'and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.'" Back to Romans
00:53:27.520 | 8. So there's no possibility that God is going to stop loving us, and there's no possibility
00:53:36.240 | that we're going to stop loving Him. As enduring as His love for us is, that's how enduring
00:53:43.160 | our love for Him is, because the love that we give to Him is that love which comes from
00:53:48.760 | Him shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. So the sum of it all. I'm convinced,
00:53:57.920 | are you, that neither death, the greatest enemy, the gates of Hades, nor life - that
00:54:10.640 | covers it all with all its dangers and difficulties - nor angels, probably thinking of hypothetically
00:54:20.480 | good angels - no good angel can alter anyone's salvation or would want to do that - nor principalities,
00:54:27.760 | perhaps He had in mind evil angels who would want to do that, but can't. And just in general,
00:54:38.560 | neither life nor death, nor good angels, nor evil angels - and that takes care of the spiritual
00:54:45.080 | realm - nor things present here and now, nor things to come in the future. No dimension
00:54:55.860 | of time can ever sever us from Christ, nor powers - plural in the New Testament - refers
00:55:05.000 | to miracles, supernatural, mighty works. There is no supernatural act that can sever us from
00:55:14.760 | Christ, no mighty power. And stretching even further, nor height - that's an astrological
00:55:25.520 | term - hupsoma, it referred to a star at its zenith; or bathos, depth, when the star was
00:55:34.680 | at its lowest point, the height and depth of the universe. Nothing anyplace in life
00:55:43.160 | or death or the spiritual realm, or in time or the future, or in space from top to bottom,
00:55:54.960 | or any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which
00:56:05.280 | is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
00:56:10.960 | George Matheson wrote back in 1882, when he went blind and he was engaged, and his fiancée
00:56:18.000 | finding out he was blind, decided to call off the marriage. That's when he wrote that
00:56:21.880 | wonderful song, "O Love That Will Not Let Me Go." And the sentiment behind that song
00:56:31.640 | was Jeremiah 31:3, "I have loved you with an everlasting love." Is that good news?
00:56:44.640 | He will not let us go, and we will not let Him go. You say, "Whoa, wait a minute. I
00:56:54.120 | know a guy who believed and walked away." 1 John tells us, "They went out from us because
00:57:02.460 | they were not of us." Father, we are so undeserving of such a love,
00:57:19.600 | so grateful for it. We should be literally in a spiritual euphoria every day of our lives
00:57:32.500 | to think that You love us like this. All the petty things of life should fade away compared
00:57:41.480 | to this eternal reality that You have for us, reserved for us in heaven, an eternal
00:57:50.940 | inheritance, undefiled, unchanging, unfading, reserved for us with our name on it. You have
00:58:02.240 | loved us to the max. Help us to love You, and show it in our obedience. In Christ's
00:58:15.640 | name, amen.
00:58:16.640 | Amen.
00:58:17.640 | Amen.
00:58:18.640 | Amen.
00:58:18.640 | Amen.
00:58:19.640 | Amen.
00:58:20.640 | Amen.
00:58:21.640 | Amen.
00:58:22.640 | Amen.
00:58:23.640 | Amen.
00:58:24.640 | Amen.