Romans 8:31-39 (NIV) – What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
“It is that love, finally, that comes back again and again, not as an afterthought but as the underlying theme of the entire section. We cast our minds back to Romans 5:5-11, where the love of God was demonstrated in the death of Jesus, and we realize that we have come full circle. John Donne, indeed, likened the love of God to a circle, seeing that it is endless. It rules victoriously over death and life alike, over powers in heaven and on earth. And since it is love’s nature to bind the beloved to itself, Paul is convinced, and after eight chapters of Romans he might expect that we would be as well, that ‘nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God in King Jesus our Lord.’”
(N.T. Wright, Paul for Everyone: Romans: Part One, page 161)
Prayer: Lord, thank you for such assurance of your love! Help me to live in the security and power of your love. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
“One Thing Remains (Your Love Never Fails)” written by Brian Johnson, Christa Black Gifford, Jeremy Riddle (Bethel Live version). Link: https://youtu.be/Ot6JKzTSby0
– EK
