A very good morning to you my precious friends
Romans 8:35 says, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?
Paul in Romans chapters 1-8 lays out God’s plan for how people become righteous. Paul’s explanation culminates in Romans 8:35 with the question, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” In Romans 1:1-3:20 Paul makes the case for the universal need for God’s righteousness as revealed in the gospel of Jesus Christ. All of humanity is unrighteous and in need of salvation. Romans 3:23 reminds us that no matter who we are, all have sinned and have fallen short of God’s glory, and the wages of that sin is death and separation from God. (Romans 6:23)
Romans 8:31-39 is one of the most encouraging and affirming passages in all of God's Word. Paul has established that God is for all of us who are in Christ, who have been saved by their faith. No charge or accusation made against us can stand, because God has justified us and the Lord Jesus is interceding for us. Paul makes two lists of all of the things in the universe that cannot separate us from God's love for us in Christ. Hard things will happen. Yet, none of them will cause our Father to stop loving us, nor are any of them signs that He has abandoned us. Our salvation is entirely, absolutely secure on account of His great love.
We notice three things in verse 35.
1. Christ is loving us now.
A wife might say of her deceased husband: Nothing will separate me from his love. She might mean that the memory of his love will be sweet and powerful all her life. But that is not what Paul means here. In Romans 8:34 it says plainly, "Christ Jesus is the One who died — more than that, who was raised — who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us." The reason Paul can say that nothing will separate us from the love of Christ is because Christ is alive and is loving us now. He is at the right hand of God and is therefore ruling for us. And He is interceding for us, which means He is seeing to it that His finished work of redemption does in fact save us hour by hour and bring us safe to eternal joy. His love is not a memory. It is a moment-by-moment action by the Omnipotent, living Son of God, to bring us to everlasting joy.
2. This love of Christ is effective in protecting us from separation, and therefore is not a universal love for all, but a particular love for His people—those who, according to Romans 8:28, love God and are called according to His purpose.
This is the love of Ephesians 5:25, "Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for her." It is Christ’s love for the church, His bride. Christ has a love for all, and He has a special, saving, preserving love for His bride. You know you are part of that bride if you trust Him. Anyone who trusts Christ can say, I am part of His bride, His church, His called and chosen ones, the ones kept and protected forever no matter what.
3. This omnipotent, effective, protecting love does not spare us from calamities in this life, but brings us safe to everlasting joy with God.
Death will happen to us, but it will not separate us. So when Paul says in verse 35 that the "sword" will not separate us from the love of Christ, he means: even if we are killed we are not separated from the love of Christ.
If anybody could write this encouraging word to us, it would be the Apostle Paul. Paul had such a revelation of grace that he was convinced that nothing could separate us from God's love. He saw it in all things and experienced it in every situation. That is why he wrote to us to tell us that God is the one who justifies us, Jesus is the one who intercedes for us, so based upon this, nothing could remove us from this position of favour and blessings with the Lord.
Circumstances in life certainly could not separate him from the love of God. Paul had the most revelation of any of the Apostles. Even over those who walked and talked with Jesus and yet he faced the most persecution and opposition because of it. He knew the power of God and the love of God and it kept him going in the face of resistance. In 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 he wrote concerning this, "I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me". Paul knew the secret to strength was resting in the Lord and in His mighty power. In vs 10 he says, "That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong"
Brothers and sisters, be fully convinced that nothing we face in life can separate us from God. Nothing man can do to us can take away what Christ has already done for us. As believers we can join with those who have gone before us fully convinced that we will forever belong to the Lord and nothing can change that. Getting this eternal perspective in life will change how we live and breathe today.
The sum of the matter in verse 35 is this: Jesus Christ is mightily loving His people with unconquerable, moment-by-moment love that does not always rescue us from calamity but preserves us for everlasting joy in His presence even through suffering and death.
Let us pray
Father God, thank You for the security You give in Your great love. Let Your love be the thing that fuels my own love for You through the challenges of life. Thank You Lord Jesus for dying so that we might live and for living that we might die. We love You Lord. Amen
Much love from Maurice and Margaret
