Romans 8:18-39
"The Sweeping Victory"
A woman, who was terribly sick in the hospital tells the following story:
"I sat in the bathroom. It was the middle of the night.
No people, no 'miracle' medicine, no strength left.
I was too tired to fight.
I sat there—four walls surrounding me.
And a bleak, monotonous 'bleep' from my battery-operated IV filled the silence. I couldn't stop the sound of that miserable machine, anymore than I could control my own miserable life.
So I sat there—dull, miserable, in pain, with no hope.
It was while I was there that I finally did hear something else.
I didn't hear it with my ears—but I did in my spirit.
I heard someone crying.
And I immediately knew that it was Jesus crying for me.
I was shocked—totally surprised.
I didn't think he would do that for me.
This experience did not leave me emotionally elated.
Nor did I feel a physical touch.
Life was the same, except I now knew I really was not in this battle alone.
Jesus cared in a way my wildest imagination would never have hoped for or expected.
Slowly I got up and shuffled back to bed, my IV still 'bleeping' in my ears.
Life was the same but different entirely.
I believe that Jesus at that time made intercession to the Father for me.
When there was absolutely no one else that would help me, he cried for me."
(pause)
Another woman shares this story:
Her mother was dying of esophageal cancer, and she was making the weekly drive to Atlanta in order to help her sister take care of her.
She was feeling terribly overwhelmed and uncertain about the future.
She wondered, "How long will our family have to keep up this schedule?
How long will my mother have to endure this illness?
How long can I balance the demands of work and family?"
She continues, "I don't remember
forming any words as I drove, but I remember sighing a lot.
I don't remember that I was intentionally praying, but I do remember sensing that I was crying out to God in my heart.
Many minutes of silence passed, and then, as the sun rose in the distance, these words came to me: 'My grace is sufficient for you.'
It was an answer to a prayer I didn't even know that I had offered but desperately needed.
I was assured that God was with me.
It was a promise that I carried with me in the days, weeks, and months to follow.
It was an assurance I held on to through my mother's illness and following her death."
Have you ever felt as if you were carrying such a heavy burden, you didn't know if you could continue?
Have you ever come to the end of your rope, to the edge of the cliff, so to speak?
At times, I think we are all too aware of the brokenness of our world, and we experience incredible suffering in our daily lives.
We might experience physical illness or loss.
We deal with the pain of broken relationships.
We see stories on the news of violence, and injustice.
We see so many children and adults in our community who live in dire economic need and hopelessness.
And so, as we look around us it can be very easy to become discouraged, overwhelmed, and afraid.
There are moments in life when we are literally speechless as we face a world of suffering and pain.
When we are groping in the darkness and shocked by the brokenness of our world, when we are struggling with our own suffering and pain, as well...
...it can be hard to know what to say or what to pray for.
Have any of you ever stood speechless in the presence of great evil?
Those of us who watched the World Trade Center Towers crash to the ground on that horrible September 11th day can probably give a big affirmation to that question.
I remember that I was watching it happen on ABC News, and at the time, Peter Jennings was the Anchor.
As the first Tower collapsed, and the full weight of what he was seeing unfolded before his eyes, the sound from the ABC News studio when silent.
Jennings couldn't say a thing.
Suddenly this great wordsmith was speechless.
And then, in the background, you could finally hear someone say, "Peter? Peter?"
If you Google it on YOUTUBE--if you can handle it--you can watch it again.
What I'm trying to get at is that there are times in our lives when we are so struck with the enormity of what we are facing that we don't even know what to pray for or how to pray.
Have you ever experienced this?
Paul says that "the Spirit comes to help our weakness.
We don't know what we should pray, but the Spirit himself pleads our case with unexpressed groans...
...he pleads for [us], consistent with God's will."
What an amazing gift God has given us, that even when our words fail, God's Spirit is with us in ways that are beyond our human understanding!!!
Even when we can't pray in our own strength, the Holy Spirit prays for us.
And it is often in these times of great struggle, that we are reminded or given the assurance of God's love, mercy and presence.
Therefore Paul says, "What are we going to say about these things?
If God is for us, who is against us?"
"Who is against us?"
Most of us can probably make a long list in response to that question.
We might start with the government, or our neighbor.
We might write down the way things seem to work against us...
...the refrigerator that stops working just after you put all that food you just bought in it...
...the computer that crashes swallowing whatever you have been working on for hours or days...
...the car that won't start when you are already late for work.
"Who is against us?"
There are people in our lives who seem to take some great delight in making us look and sound foolish.
Even when things are going well, there often seems to be someone who enjoys calling attention to our shortcomings.
"Who is against us?"
If the truth be told, entirely too often, we are against us.
Even when we know what we should be doing, we don't do it.
Even when we know what we should say, we keep quite.
"Who is against us?"
Well, my goodness, 1 Peter Chapter 5 tells us plainly that our "accuser, the devil, is on the prowl like a roaring lion" seeking to devour us!!!
But you know what?
Jesus Christ has defeated the devil!!!
Through Christ's suffering on the Cross, and glorious Resurrection from the dead--Jesus Christ has bound up Satan--and has brought victory over death.
And through faith in what Christ has done for us, we win the victory, as well, and are infused with new life, hope and possibility!!!!
Terrible stories come from wars, terrorist action and other violent events.
I recently read that the hostages in Lebanon in the 1980's were, on more than one occasion, led off, blindfolded, and told they were going to die.
A gun would be pressed against their heads, held there for an agonizing moment, and then, with a laugh or a kick, they were sent back to their cells.
The sense of relief, along with the knowledge that it might happen for real the next day, is almost too hard to imagine.
Finally, when the hostages were released, it took them months, if not years, before they could wake up in the morning and know that their enemies had gone, that nobody was going to threaten them anymore.
And there are lots of other stories of surprising release.
When Jesus confronts the self-righteous folks who were about to stone a woman to death in John Chapter 8, she had been kneeling or lying on the ground, waiting in terror for the first rock to smash into her, maiming her, hurting her--long before her eventual release of death.
But when all the people had gone, shamed by Jesus' challenge of "If anyone of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her," Jesus asks her, "Woman, where are they? Is there no one to condemn you?"
Something of that air of surprised relief pervades Romans Chapter 8.
"Who is against us?"
We look around and see who has condemned us, and we discover that they have all gone or been defeated by Christ.
Four times the question is asked, and four times the answer is resounding!!!
"If God is for us, who is against us?"
"Who will bring a charge against God's...people?"
"Who is going to convict them?"
"Who will separate us from Christ's love?"
No one!!!
"God didn't spare his own Son but gave him up freely for us all.
Won't he also freely give us all things with him?"
"It is God who acquits...
...It is Christ Jesus who died, even more, was raised, and who also is at God's right side.
It is Christ who also pleads our case for us."
"Will we be separated [from Christ's love] by trouble, or distress, or harassment, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?"
No way!!!!
Are you kidding????!!!!
"in all these things we win a sweeping victory through the one who loved us."
There are many who will try to separate us, but the victory has been won!!!
"nothing can separate us from God's love in Christ Jesus our Lord: not death or life, not angels or rulers, not present things or future things, not powers or height or depth, or any other thing that is created."
This is a list of all the things we humans fear the most.
But the knowledge and experience of God's love in Christ Jesus our Lord--whether it comes through the Holy Spirit praying for us when we cannot pray for ourselves or whether it comes through the long process of maturing in our faith through persevering, even in the face of suffering, God's love brings us peace.
Because God's love will always have the last word!!!
And nothing can ever take this hope away.
Look what God has done.
Look what Jesus has done, and is still doing even as we worship here this morning.
Look around and see the many things that threaten to separate you from the powerful love that reaches out through the Cross and the Resurrection of Christ--and learn that they are all beaten foes!!!!!
Learn to dance for joy and celebrate the sweeping victory of God!!!
Amen.
