What can separate us from God?
Readings: Romans 8. 26-39
We’re once again in a wonderfully rich part of Romans, if you’re familiar with the Bible and with Romans there will be quite a few bits you’ll perhaps recognise in this section. And once again there’s far too much to talk about in one sermon here, but we’re going to focus on the pinnacle of this reading, the pinnacle of not just the chapter but all of this letter ‘If God is for us, who can stand against us’.
How far would you go for someone you loved? How much would you give in order to bring them home? It’s a big question, and perhaps our minds immediately flick to family, what would you give for them? For their safety, for their return. You may be thinking rather a lot. But let me switch the question round, how much are you worth? How much do you think others would give for your safe return?
Famously Julius Caesar when he was 25 years old, and a nobleman rather than the Emperor he would become, was captured by pirates and when they announced they were ransoming him for 20 Talents scoffed at them, saying he was worth far more and demanded they raise the ransom to 50. Not the usual strategy for negotiating with pirates. But most of us aren’t like Caesar, most of us downplay our own value, our own worth. We may give the world for a loved one, but perhaps be more than willing to allow ourselves to be lost.
But God disagrees, God looks at you and sees someone worth giving everything for. Not because you’re so perfect and never get anything wrong and so it’s only right to save you. Not because you’re wonderfully talented and he needs you to do his work so he has to save you. He gives everything for you because he loves you. He gives everything because he wants to. And what does he give?
Well Paul tells us, his own Son. God gives what is most precious to him, his eternal Son whom he has loved since before the foundation of the world, he gives him up, even to death, to bring us home. And the Son goes willingly, joyfully laying down his life for our sake. Repeatedly in the Gospels we see Jesus determinedly heading for Jerusalem to die for you. And Paul tells us that if that is how far God is willing to go for you, if that is how much he loves you, if he’s willing to sacrifice everything to bring you home, if this God is for us, who can be against us.
He’s not saying that no-one will ever oppose us, he’s not saying that we’ll live a blissful life, in fact he’s just about to go into great detail of the suffering we may endure for this. What he’s saying is that if this God is so utterly for us, how could anyone or anything make a dent in that, put a stop to that. So when someone holds up our sins before us, all our failings and shame and misery. When they are thrown in our face and they tell us what we deserve, we’re to point to the cross, and to our Father in heaven who has justified us, who has paid the price and put it right so that we can stand tall despite our sins, because they have been dealt with.
When we’re condemned by others, or far more likely, when we condemn ourselves, beat ourselves up for our sins, for our turning from God, beat ourselves up for our greed or selfishness or anger or pride, when we condemn ourselves, we find that we have no grounds to do so. As Paul asks in verse 34 ‘who is he that condemns?’ Who has the right to condemn us, to pronounce judgement on us and find us guilty? Only Jesus. And what has Jesus done? Has he condemned us? Quite the opposite, he’s died for us, been raised to life for us, and is at God’s right hand, the place of power, interceding for us even now. The only one who can truly condemn us is the one who died to deal with our sin, who took our condemnation for us, and is even now speaking for us, advocating on our behalf when we do sin. He does not condemn, so how could anyone else? How could we condemn ourselves when Jesus himself refuses to. Only Jesus can truly condemn us, so how can we decide to do to ourselves what he refuses to do?
If this is how far God will go to save us, to rescue us and free us from condemnation, do we think there’s anything that can rip us from his hand now? If we have placed our faith and hope in him, is there anything that will steal us away from him or him away from us? Absolutely not. God isn’t going to go that far for you only to let you slip through his fingers at the last moment.
And yet so often we may feel that he isn’t near, that he has abandoned us, or forgotten us, or perhaps even rejected us. And so often it’s because of our circumstances. Things aren’t going well, so perhaps we’ve been separated from God. Perhaps at some point on this journey we took our eye off him somehow and wandered off. We thought he was with us, but like a child in a busy crowd suddenly we find our heavenly Father isn’t there anymore and we panic.
But Paul is emphatic. ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword’? Will these things separate us from Christ’s love for us? No, Paul says ‘in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us’. It’s not a simple no is it. And he doesn’t even say we’re victorious over those things because of Jesus, he says that we’re more than conquerors. We haven’t made it through by the skin of our teeth, God has plucked us through and we’ve barely made it. No, the language Paul is using reads more like an overwhelming victory, the enemy didn’t stand a chance. Trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, sword, they never stood a chance at ripping us away from God’s love.
And you may be thinking that’s a nice idea but it certainly doesn’t feel that way, it feels a lot more like it may be an overwhelming defeat is coming our way. But Paul isn’t being theoretical here, this isn’t a nice idea, a lovely bit of poetry he’s writing from a comfortable villa somewhere. This list is pulled entirely from Paul’s own experience of following Jesus. He’s experienced more than his share of trouble and hardship. He’s been persecuted for Jesus’ sake, he’s been hungry and naked. He’s faced all sorts of danger even threats to his life. And having experienced all of that he can confidently say that these things cannot separate us from Christ’s love. He can stand there not even on the other side of those things but in the midst of them and say that Christ’s love is still being poured out upon him, Jesus hasn’t gone anywhere, his love for Paul has not failed, and if it’s true for him, it’s true for the Christians in Rome and for us.
And just to drive it home fully, in one of the more famous parts of this passage, he goes into all the things that may try to separate us from God’s love. ‘For I am convinced’ he says ‘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’.
Once God has rescued you, he’s not going to fail you. Spiritual powers cannot separate us from God’s love, nothing angelic or demonic can get between you and God, his love will come through. Nothing in the future will separate you, we may not know what the future holds, we may be sat here thinking ‘but what if’, but God’s got it, he’s got you. Nothing happening right now, or anything you may face in the years to come is going to come between you and him. No powers or height or depth; Paul here is using the language of astrology, the powers of the heavens to dictate our lives as they believed, and some still do. The culture in Rome featured astrology, and Paul is saying that not even those forces should they conspire against us will separate us from God’s love. Not even death. Yes that was the first one but I swapped it to the end. Death is the ultimate separation, it separates us from everything we have known, all our possessions and money, separated from our loved ones, separated even from our bodies. Death separates us from everything, the great divider, but it cannot separate us from God, from his love for us. Death severs every link but one, even in death God will not let us slip away and be lost.
If you’ve placed your faith in Jesus, then this God is for you, so who could stand against you? Paul has relayed everything that the world can throw at us. He’s gone through his own experiences of the struggles this world can throw at us. He’s gone through the spiritual realities that may mass against us. And he’s assuring us that, even if everything in heaven and earth and hell conspire against you personally to separate you from God’s love, to drag you out of his loving embrace, God will not allow it, his love conquers all, and we are more than conquerors through that love. If God didn’t even withhold his only Son in his rescue of us, if he didn’t even hold back that which was most precious to him, he’s not going to let anything else get between you and him. That’s how much he loves you, that’s how much you are worth to him, he will bring you home.
I don’t know what you’ve gone through this week, and I certainly don’t know what you’ll go through in the weeks, years, and even decades ahead. But I can confidently say this, God’s love will not fail you in any of it, you will never find yourself too far from him. You’ll face struggles and pains and hardships, yes, and plenty of them, you may go through some of the most awful times you can’t even imagine. But he will not abandon you in any of them. His love will endure it all, will carry you through. He’s working even now to bring you home, so that you can look at him with your own eyes and see the one who gave everything for you all out of love for you. So do not despair, hold fast to this truth, this hope, even as he holds you fast through all things.
Amen.