Suffering and the Goodness of God :: What does “good” mean in Romans 8:28?
Preached 01/02/2011 @ Christ Community Church
Happy New Year! Welcome 2011. Please open your Bibles to Romans 8:28-39. Typically, a “new year’s sermon” consist of making resolutions, looking up to new horizons, and desiring to change. Read the Bible in a year. Pray more. Go on more date nights with your spouse. All are good if done by the grace of God. I want to go a very different way. A dose of reality living in a Genesis 3 fallen world. CJ Mahney, a pastor, says, “If you are not suffering know, you will soon – preparation is so important”. Life is made up of light and shadows, day and night, joy and sorrow, shalom and suffering. Because I love you, I want to help in that preparation so that when the storm comes rock, not sand will be your footing.
Romans 8:28-39 28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. 31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? 33 Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? 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. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered." 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
INTRODUCTION
Beep. Beep. Beep. The alarm goes off at 5:30 a.m. It’s a Saturday. The sky is a cobalt black filled with glimmering stars. The temperature outside is 24 degrees without the wind chill factor. Inside, the covers are warm and the pillow is soft. “I got to get up. I got to get up.” I roll out of bed. In the dark, I find my pile of clothes I laid out the night before. As I get dress, I think to myself, “people think I’m crazy, but it is not that cold if you put the right amount of layers and facial protection on.” So, I open the door. Its is dry and cold. Really cold. I start my car and slowing drive over to Scott’s house. He is waiting outside pacing back and forth. We begin the 5-mile loop we do almost every Saturday. After we chat about running, we move to life. I listen week in and week out. Pain. Severe pain. Headaches. No sleep. Can’t eat. Feet and toes swollen, blistered. Can’t walk. As many of you know, these are the severe conditions of Scott’s wife, Heidi. Scott discloses another hard week about Heidi’s health. Where is God? Angry. Does He hear? Where is hope? What is “good”? How can we “know that for those who love God all things work together for good”?
In the beginning of my running with Scott, I might share a story of a saint who struggle, John Bunyan’s imprisonment for preaching the gospel, Charles Spurgeon’s deep depression, or Calvin’s struggle with serve headaches or his lost of his first child after two weeks in which he wrote “The Lord has certainly inflicted a severe and bitter wound in the death of our baby son. But He is Himself a Father and knows best what is good for his children.” How does a believer write that? What is good?
I have come to find out that the Internet is a dangerous place. Not for the reason you are thinking of but it is dangerous because we see and know so much more. Across the top of the screen, a big red line appears. Earthquakes around the world, shooting at a school, sin, fallen, brokenness are our breaking news. This is the world we live in. Is their hope and redemption? Yes. In God. In His Word. In His Voice.
We go back to the text. God’s word. He speaks hope, truth, unswerving promises to his children. In this passage, I want to focus our intention on one verse, actually one word with one question, “What does “good” mean in verse 28?” Before we move to answering that question, let us look at three observations from Romans 8:28 which will shape our answer.
FIRST THREE OBSERVATIONS FROM ROMANS 8:28:
1) “For those who love God”
Exclusive. This promise is exclusive. Paul is speaking to Christians, to those who love God. For those in this room who love God, this promise is for you. God is for you in this promise. The “good” whatever that might be is ON BEHALF of believers.
2) “All things”
Paul here is inclusive. All things: All fender bender, birthdays parties, times of peace, times of war, in plentiful and in want, all joys and sorrows, all evils and any good, all life and death. He says it this way in Ephesians 1:11, “In him [that is Christ] we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.” So, the answer is “Yes” to the question, “what about this [fill in the blank] that happen in my life?” Yes God has a purpose and a part in everything. Not in the same way, but all things are orchestrated by His hand of providence.
3) “God works together all things… his purpose”
The best illustration that I have heard on how God works together all things including sin and suffering is that of God, as an artist, he is taking all things/all events and weaving together so that on the one side of the picture, our side that we see, it is mess. To our eyes, it looks like knots, tangled, random events, chaos. But, on the other side, God’s side, he is weaving together a prefect picture of His glory. And that picture of His glory is His main purpose in the universal which is to magnify Christ crucified. I say this because in the book of Revelation, we read about a book: the Book of life of the Lamb that was slain. And when was this book written? It was written before the foundation of the world (Rev. 13:8). Which I take to mean, that at the apex of the eternal plan of God was a crucified Savior. So, when the day is done and eternity dawns, beginning the forever day in glory, on His throne when He turns the picture around so that all creation can see, it will be Christ with His wounds from the cross.
So now, we get to the question that I am after, “What is the meaning of “good” in Romans 8:28-39?”
WHAT “GOOD” DOES NOT MEAN?
In a healthy and wealthy nation, we filter the word “good”, “all things work together for good” as
- Better, big, brighter house… we think good is always increase your wealth and possession.
- A clean bill of health… if you have cancer, we would think “good” equals cured. [Is that what it means?]
- You lose your job… “good” means you are going to get a better job than you had before.
- If you struggle with a particular sin… “good” means in one, five, ten years (that might be to much), no more fight, no more struggle with this particular sin
- Ultimately, “good” for you is your life will be safe, security, healthy, wealthy, happy, and retired.
So, when we hear and read the words, “all things work together for good”, we are thinking that all things will work for my safety, my security, my health, my wealth, and I will eventually end up retired, fat and happy. And as Christians we take it a step further and say, struggle, demand to God, you must give this to me. You say, no I don’t…
Heart Check. When do you get angry with God? Is it when your definition of good doesn’t come your way? Is it over something like “He didn’t give me this possession?” or “I don’t feel safe?” or “Why do I have this illness?”… “I thought you’d said “I do” forever, now this?” Yeah. We define “good” in these terms and it reveals our hearts. But, God doesn’t define “good” this way.
WHY “GOOD” DOES NOT MEAN THAT?
God tells us in His word. In this text, in this passage, it shows it is the exact opposite. It shows it as the exact opposite of a safe, security, healthy, wealthy, happy, and retired definition of “good”. It shows it in two ways. First, we see it in the life of Paul and the early Christians. Let’s read it:
Romans 8:35-36, “35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."
The life of the early Christians and Paul was a life of suffering. If Paul is our test case for a moment, he explains the list in more detail in 2 Corinthians:
2 Corinthians 11:24-28 Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; 26 on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; 27 in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. 28 And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.
Paul goes on in 2 Cor. 12 about a personal struggle and the sin of pride in which the Lord would not take away. Paul’s list is filled with physical suffering, emotional and mental suffering, suffering from the sins of others, and personal sin. I didn’t see in the list anything about safety or security or healthy in this life.
In v36, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long”. So, day after day after day, Christians were and are being killed for their faith or dying because of famines/plagues. Why does Paul go there? Go with me. Paul is taking you there. He goes there because he wants to take you there, mentally, emotionally, spiritually [think/feel - “My child just died, I buried them today, where is your faith, where is your God?... I just found out that I have cancer, it is terminal meaning it will kill me in such and such a date, how is this good for me or my family?], with the full weight of all this life’s suffering, and gives you, the one who loves God, a place to stand and be victorious in the suffering that will come.
So, Paul didn’t think good meant relief from suffering or an easily life. The second reason that we see why “good” can’t mean an easily life is the life and death of Jesus, our Lord, Savior and King.
Romans 8:32 “He who did not spare his own Son” and 8:34 “Christ Jesus is the one who died”
Jesus was a poor, Galilean pleasant who came from a small rural town, think Emerson (do you know where Emerson is? It has been called the arm pit of Cartersville). Nobody came from Nazareth (John 1). These people were simple, blue-collared, illiterate, dirt poor people. Jesus stayed this way throughout his life and ministry. On one occasion, he did not even have enough money to pay His temple tax outside of a miracle in a fish which He performed (Matt. 17:24-27).
The death of Jesus was anything but easy or safe. He was flogged with a cat-o-nine-tails which entered into His skin and then was yanked out pulling skin, muscle, and tendons. He wore a crown of thorns crushed into His head and blood flowed down His face. He was betrayed by one of His closet followers, Judas. He was rejected by His only people who led the false trials and continued to mock and insult Him. He was crucified, nailed to a cross. He experience nakedness, shame, and embarrassment on the cross. Crucifixion was a hideous grotesque scene. Ultimately, the worse pain of all was when His Father forsake Him, “O God, O God, why have you forsaken me?”, when He becoming sin for the glory of God and the salvation of us, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”, and when He being crushed by His Father, “Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for sin” (Isaiah 53:10)
And you know it to be true because you are beneficences of His suffering on a cross: Salvation to you! Sin cancelled! Death overcome! New Life Awakened! Enjoyment forever in God!
For us, if we are being conformed to the image of His Son as v29 states, and in the image of His Son there is great suffering, then we must not think we that we are above suffering (1 Cor. 4) but will be faced with it most necessarily. Paul clearly says in Romans 8:17 that we are “heirs of God and fellows heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”
So, if suffering is necessary to enter into glory, then we should not be surprise by it when it comes to the point of losing our faith. So then, if God is good and all things work together for good, what does “good” mean especially in the midst of suffering?
WHAT DOES “GOOD” MEAN?
“All things work for good” and the good means “on behalf of believers that they would know and be known by God’s never-stopping, never-giving up, unbreakable, always and forever love”. The good is to be love intimately and deeply by God forever. Your deepest longing in all of life is to be loved by God and to love Him. The Psalmist David said, “the steadfast love of the Lord is better than life” (Ps. 63:3). Augustine wrote in the Confessions, “The single desire that dominated my search for delight was simply to love and to be loved“. The good is that every event whether in the moment or in hindsight awakes a deeper love for God and expands your understanding of how much God loves you for His glory. This is the promise. And this is the promise as it is grounded in God’s saving acts:
THE GOLDEN CHAIN IN GOD’S LOVE (Romans 8:29-30)
Foreknown = He has loved us with an everlasting, eternity love.
Predestined = God lovingly planned beforehand to conforming us to His Son so that we can know His love. The more you are conformed to Christ, which will include suffering, the more you know His love.
Called = This is God’s sovereign, effectual call to dead, unloving hearts. He has pursued us in love and awakened us in love
Justification = Christ died for us in love. At the cost of His life, Christ took our sins upon Himself so that God could love us (Romans 5:7-8). God does not love you outside of Christ. He can’t, you’re a sinner. Condemnation is due. But in Christ, by faith alone, God is totally for you! “If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? 33 Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? 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. ”
Glorification = He will love us forever as He is our God and we are His people.
Because of all these saving acts of God to His people, Paul answering the question “Who shall separate from the love of Christ?” Answers: No one and nothing. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” God has loved us by giving us what we need most: Him. His ever-presents. His constant love. This walks us through life and its ways.
I have been thinking about this sermon for two years now. And this fall, I decided to preach it the next time I had an opportunity to preach. Little did I know, how much I need it personally. As some of you know, in December, Mandy and I miscarried our baby of eight weeks. We walked through the valley of the shadow of death, where the shadow was coming from our child in the womb of eight weeks… who had no heartbeat. And now we are on the path of suffering and in the process of grieving. So, this theology is not theatrical, but immensely real and needed and life-sustaining.
APPLICATION
As I move into application, I want to speak to those who are in the midst of the darkness and it seems it will not lift. Or maybe you know a friend or love one who is experience suffering. How does one go through it? God + Grace + Time is a great healer.
God.
When Mandy and I did lose the baby, it was the hardest day of my life. And now we are in the path of grieving with hope in God's almighty hand of love. But, where can I turn? There is only one place: the Scriptures. I am so thankful for the Scriptures and what God has revealed in them. They have been a light in a dark time, a rock in a hurricane-like storm, and ringing bell sounding out in the middle of black night (See Job 1-3, Psalm 50, 2 Cor. 1, 2 Sam. 12). When I read the Psalms or Paul’s life or look at Christ, I see horrific, profound suffering, sin, and waiting yet so much hope, joy, and redemption. I see God answering prayers from His people comforting my heart (2 Cor. 1:16-17). I see His promises that “he will never leave me nor forsake me”, that nothing can separate me for the love of God in Christ Jesus my Lord. Jesus will meet you there in the dark hour by His Spirit through the Scriptures. The Scriptures are your life if you are suffering like oxygen is who has been suffocating. Because they are God’s voice.
God + Grace
Grace does teach us that we don't deserve anything, but it also points us to the cross. Look to the Cross. Gaze at the Cross. The Cross of Christ is the sweet fount of sustaining grace. It is the streams of healing rejuvenating the soul. And when you are ready to receive it, it is, if the picture at the end of the universe is the Lamb that was slain then, it is the only answer for suffering and evil. Would you receive Christ on the cross?
God + Grace + Time
When a tragedy happens, give yourself, give others time. Release yourself from this “always positive, never pain” fake life. The Scriptures given you permission. When you are wounded (physically), it can take days even months to heal. When suffering happens, you are wounded spiritually and it can also take days, months, even years to heal. During this lose of my child, I feel like something has been amputated from me. When my child died, a human being was amputated from my soul. Now, amputations heal, but not quickly. It might take one, two years. But there will be a time where it won’t be tender anymore. But what won’t change is there will always be a numb on my soul which if rubbed will remind me something is missing. But, through God, grace, and time, it will heal and you and I will love God more as the saint in the past have. Let’s pray.
For those who do not love God, How do you love God? Because you want this promise… that all things work together for good. First, you recognize/confess that you don’t or haven’t love God, but have different love affairs with everything including yourself. You’re supposed to love Him and you don’t love Him. This is bad, sinful, wrong. Then, you see that God has loved you first (1 John 4:11). He showed His love for us in that while we were still not loving Him, His Son died for us and our sin (Romans 5:8). Last, you receive the love in His Son on your behalf which gives you love for Him.
Augustine. Confessions. (Oxford.: Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 24
Home with Mommy. There is never a dull moment. Lydia is taking a voyage in the laundry basket.
"This is where I hang out all day, playing with my toys."
Lydia is opening presents with Violet's help. "This is nice wrapping paper."
