Power in the Blood
This is one of my favorite passages in the Bible. The words in verses 31-39, especially make such a powerful statement about God’s love in Jesus. These verses are used quite often at funerals because they seem to be what people need to hear when a loved one dies: "Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress,….” Did you notice that Paul asks a lot of questions in these verses? You may have asked them a time or two yourselves. You see, when we grieve we often have questions. “Why did my child die?” or “What will I do now that my spouse of 35 years is gone?”
That is where our faith comes in, in verse 28 where we read that, “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God.” A statement we have trouble with after losing a child or a spouse or any other tragedy you want to think of. Those are questions that we don’t have answers to. Only God has those answers. Those are “why” questions and Paul wants us to focus on the “who” questions he’s asking. Paul asks these questions to challenge us to focus upon God and believe that He loves us and is always in control, even at times when it seems that death has won.
The first question I would like us to examine is: “Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.” God is the Judge and He has already acquitted us. And since “It is God who justifies.” our justification can never be overthrown. 2 Cor. 5:21 tells us, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." You might remember a few weeks ago when I told you that being “justified” means that it is “just if I’d” never sinned. We are secure from all charges against us; if we have been declared "not guilty" by the highest Judge in the land, who can bring additional charges against us?
Paul then asks, "Who is to condemn?” You’ve heard the words of condemnation just like I have. "There’s no way God could love you, you’re a sinner!” Where do those words of condemnation come from? Well, they don’t come from God. Those words come from one who doesn’t want us in the arms of our father. Revelation 12:10 tells us that there is one who stands before God day and night accusing Christians of sin. He is the one whose name means "accuser." We call him Satan.
So can’t you just picture it? Here’s God the Judge sitting behind this huge bench and we’re brought before Him, Satan starts ranting about our sins, all the terrible things we done in our lives. But we have the greatest defense attorney in the world! “It is Christ Jesus…who indeed intercedes for us.” Jesus sits there patiently while Satan jumps around, yelling about how bad we are and that we don’t deserve to go to Heaven. Finally, exhausted, Satan slumps in a chair, a smile on his face because he knows what a lousy sinner we are and he’s confident he’s won his case. God asks Jesus what his defense for you is. Jesus rises and approaches the bench and wordlessly hold out his hands. God says “case dismissed” and Satan storms out, defeated again.
With that in mind, we come to my favorite verse in this passage, Paul’s question of, “If God is for us, who is against us?”
Now, Paul could have asked simply, "Who is against us?" and there would have been many answers. Every person who lives has some form of opposition. We all face disease, disappointment, or difficult circumstances at different times in our lives. But that’s not the question Paul asked. His question is, "If God is for us, who can be against us?" And that’s a whole other question.
Now note that the one who wrote these words knew very well who was against him. The Jews were against him. The Romans were against him. The false teachers were against him. The magicians in Ephesus were against him. Satan and all his followers were against him. For he’s the one who also wrote, "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."
Based upon the premise that God is “for us,” Paul wants us to think about the implications. “If God is for us [as He most certainly is], who is against us?” Paul’s not saying that we have no opposition. His question is intended to point out the insignificance of any opponent in light of the fact that God is for us.
My favorite movie, “The Bear,” has a scene where a little grizzly cub is being chased by a mountain lion. The life of the little cub seems to be soon over as the mountain lion moves in for the kill. Suddenly, the cub stands up on its hind legs letting out the fiercest growl it can muster. Amazingly, the mountain lion shrinks back! The camera then slowly draws back to reveal just behind the cub the massive grizzly who adopted him, reared on his hind legs, delivering a fierce warning to the mountain lion. The cub’s enemy was great. But in the protective shadow of the giant grizzly, that mountain lion was nothing. With the giant grizzly as its protection, who was this mere mountain lion? With God on our side, who could possibly be an opponent who would cause us to shrink back in fear? The sovereignty of a God who is “for us” provides a new perspective on anyone or anything that threatens to oppose or destroy us.
So tell me, with that in mind, who can be against you? When you face opponents, how do they stack up? Not how do they stack up to you! How do they stack up to God? It says in verse 31, “What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us?” What Paul is implying is, “Since God is for us, what difference does it make who is against us?” We might be intimidated, but we shouldn’t be because we have God on our side—the God who loves us, the God who died for us, the God who is for us. He’s on our side.
Now let’s back up a bit and look at the phrase “God is for us”. In this context, the “us” means those of us who are Christians. God is “for” His children. God is “for us” in the sense that He has chosen us, predestined us to be conformed to the image of His Son, Jesus Christ, and He has called and justified us. How much is God for us? He is for us so much He gave up His most priceless possession, Jesus—His only begotten Son. He did not spare His own Son; He gave Him up freely for us. Therein lies our strength. There is power in the blood Jesus shed on the cross for us. That is how much God is for us. If he gave his Son to die for us, it is impossible that he should refuse us anything that will help or bless us.
ILLUS. Mad Magazine picture of man in tug of war.
But Paul was not on Dragnet. Besides the facts, he wants a correct interpretation of those facts. His position is that all the opposition against him is insignificant and inconsequential when compared to the fact that God is for him. It’s all in how you look at it. Twelve men were sent to spy out the land of Canaan. All twelve saw the same facts. Ten came back with a report about giants and grasshoppers. Two brought a minority report that basically said, "No problem. God is for us."
2 Kings 6:17 And Elisha prayed, "O LORD, open his eyes so he may see." Then the LORD opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. As the enemy came down toward him, Elisha prayed to the LORD, "Strike these people with blindness." So he struck them with blindness, as Elisha had asked.”
Lev. 26:6-8, says `I will grant peace in the land, and you will lie down and no one will make you afraid. I will remove savage beasts from the land, and the sword will not pass through your country. You will pursue your enemies, and they will fall by the sword before you. Five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand, and your enemies will fall by the sword before you.”
God is for us, and nothing can separate us from that love. READ VSS. 38-39 That is it. That pretty much sums up the entire Christian gospel. God is for us and nothing can separate us from that love. There’s not much left to say, except for the questions and the pain. If God is for us, why is life so hard at times? If God is for us, why is there so much suffering in the world? If God is for us, why is there so much evil in the world?
Where was God’s love when a young man, 2 wks. graduated from high school, drowns in Lake Michigan? Where was God’s love when a teenager gets cancer? Where was God’s love when the twin towers came crashing down? Where was God’s love when a young brother and sister die in a house fire? If God loves us so much, where is God then? Where is God now in our pain? Almost everyone has wanted to know the answer to that question at one time or another. Almost everyone has known a time when they felt separated from God’s presence and God’s love-when they felt terribly alone, when they wondered how anyone could say that God is for us.
Yet, there it is. God is for us, and nothing can separate us from that love.
But what does that mean? God’s love is not a magic potion that can protect us from the hurts of life. Just because we are children of God, we will not be shielded from suffering, illness, sadness, death. And just because we are not shielded we can’t blame God when we do go through tough times.
In his book When Bad things Happen to Good People Kushner writes: "God does not cause our misfortune. Some are caused by bad luck, some are caused by bad people, and some are simply an inevitable consequence of our being human and being mortal, living in a world of inflexible natural laws. The painful things that happen to us are not punishments for our misbehavior, nor are they in any way part of some grand design on God’s part. Because the tragedy is not God’s will, we need not feel hurt or betrayed by God when tragedy strikes. We can turn to him for help in overcoming it, precisely because we can tell ourselves that God is as outraged by it as we are."
And God is outraged by our tragedy-outraged by the pain and the evil that touches our lives.
God loves us and that is comforting. When we suffer, He suffers with us. When we grieve, He grieves with us. When we cry, He cries with us, his arm around our shoulders, supporting us, holding us up. Paul affirms the security of these things in this passage. He asks 4 questions: “Who is against us?”, “Who will bring any charge against God’s elect?”, “Who is to condemn?”, and “Who will separate us from the love of Christ?”. These are rhetorical questions with the answer of “no one”. God loves us and nothing and no one can separate us from that love.
