Good morning everyone. >> So there's a few months in the year that have five Sundays and anytime there's a month with a fifth Sunday, our youth takes the fifth Sunday. And so this is the fifth Sunday of August. And so it's neat to see them starting to learn and grow and develop those gifts and to get that opportunity. So thank you for serving us youth. That is great. They got another banger yet to come. Just just you wait. It's one of my favorites at the very end. Take your Bibles if you will, turn with me to Romans chapter 8.
As you're turning there, let me tell you a true story. There's a little boy named Antonio living in Italy many years ago. Many years ago, late 1600s, actually. He loved music, but whenever he tried to sing, he just couldn't sing. Well, I'm sure there's some men in the room who will give an amen to that. Myself included. He tried to sing. He loved to sing, but he just couldn't sing on key.
But he loved music. And and the instrument that he loved the most was the violin. And so he just he just loved to hear that violin play. And so Antonio would take his little pocketk knife and he would whittle and he would whittle pieces of wood into little violins. Well, one day he found out that the great Nolo Amadi lived in his village. Nicolo Amadi at in that day was the greatest violin maker in the known world at the time.
And he thought, "Oh, this is marvelous. I might get the chance to meet him. So he for weeks upon weeks took his little knife and he crafted the best violin he could by whiddling and he finally got it so that it looked to his eye really good and he brought it to the home of Nicolo Amadi. He knocked on his door and Mr. Amadi opened the door and Antonio said, "I would like to one day make violins like you." And he gave him this little gift and the coloadi looked at it and he he smiled and he said this to him beautifully done.
You want to make violins and so you shall in time your violins will make the most beautiful music ever heard. Now there's dispute at this point if you look online. Some believe Antonio became the pupil of Nolo Amari. Others don't hold that to be true. I would contend based on the evidence I saw online that he was at least for a time the pupil of an Aoi. But whatever the case, Antonio took it upon himself to learn how to build violins.
And for years and years and years, he worked on his craft. He went through many failures. Violins that sounded terrible. It didn't didn't work good. And he eventually made what he thought was the best violin he could. His last name was Stratavi. And in time, the Stratavarius became the greatest violin in the world. And to this day, it's considered among the greatest violins in the known world, even to this day, hundreds of years later.
And as wonderful as that story is of and as we consider the endurance that was required to get to that point, that endurance, wonderful as it is, pales in comparison to the endurance of God's love for his people because God's love endures forever, eternally. And we're going to see that in our text this morning at the tail end of Romans 8, the last two verses of Romans 8. Here is what it reads. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 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. What a glorious text.
Wonderful. But I remember years ago, Pastor Bryce told me that his mom and dad would watch our services online and whenever we quoted from the book of Romans, they would take a drink of water or tea. They're here this morning. They have their tea in hand. Ushers, make sure one of the washroom stalls is open because we're going to be in Romans a lot. So, get ready, Mr. And Mrs. Leman. We see a lot about God's enduring love in this passage.
And one of the things we see is the certainty of God's love. Now for us to understand this, we need to understand, of course, the backdrop of this. This is considered by many to be one of, if not the greatest passage of scripture in the whole Bible. It's certainly this chapter is the crescendo I would say to Paul's treatise here to the Roman believers. For us to understand how this is the crescendo, we need to look at the book of Romans up to this point.
Paul in chapter 1 asserted his confidence in the gospel. Listen to what we read in verses 16 and 17 of Romans 1. He says this to the believers there. For I am not ashamed of the gospel. For it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith as it is written the righteous shall live by faith.
So he says it is the power of the gospel. He asserted his confidence in this gospel. But then he goes on having asserted that to show at the last half of chapter 1 and into chapter 2 the sinfulness of man. Why the gospel is needed. That man's heart is so darkened. Chasing after faulty gods, chasing after wickedness and the sin of this world, lusting after the anyone but God, replacing God with the God of self.
And so he shows this and he shows that all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God. Romans 3 23. So any then any of our works then any and all of our works if that's true that all have sinned and all have fallen short of the glory of God that means that any of our works are useless to save us. Now they're not useless in terms of honoring him and blessing God and exalting his name but in terms of our salvation our works can't do it because it's all tainted by sin. We've all sinned.
We've all fallen short of the glory of God. And as Isaiah 64 verse 6 tells us, we have all become unclean and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment, filthy rags, I believe the NIV words it cannot save us. Our works simply can't do that. So any work we do, even good work, work that's God-honoring, missions work, witnessing, tithing, church attendance, all things that are good.
And I would advocate all of those things, but they cannot save us. Why? Because we're sinners. We've all fallen short of the glory of God. Our sin cannot be atoned for by we who are wretched sinners. So then the question becomes, how then can we be saved? Well, Paul begins to answer that in chapter 4. In chapter 4:3, he says this. What does the scripture say?
Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. So Abraham, was he saved by his works? No. He was saved. He was justified by his faith. And so it is for all mankind. All mankind. The way of salvation is the same for you and I. I can I be saved by my works? No. How am I saved? By faith in the work of Christ and his work in mystead in my place as my substitute.
That is how I am saved. Just as Abraham, the righteousness was credited to him because of faith. And so it is for you and I. Let me pick up for you at the tail end of chapter 4 starting in verse 23. But the words it was counted to him, that is Abraham, were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. So, we're justified by faith in the work of Christ. We are made right with him and we have peace with God. I was at one time at enmity with God. I was an enemy of his. And now he has made me clean and righteous in his sight. Not because I am inherently righteous. No, because Christ's righteousness was credited to my account by faith.
This is the argument that Paul is telling the Roman believers about. And so then because of that once I have received Christ by faith I am dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Chapter 6 verse 9. We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin once for all. But the life he lives, he lives to God.
So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Sin is no longer my master. As one who has followed Christ, who's by faith received Christ. No, sin's no longer my master. It was, but not anymore. My master is now Christ. I'm alive to him. And you might say, "Praise God, but but I still struggle with sin." Yeah, we live in a sinstained world. We're not home yet. And Paul knew that struggle well.
At the end of chapter 7, listen to what he says, picking it up in verse 21. So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inner being. But I see in my members, that is your hands and your feet, my in my members another law, waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.
Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. So Paul understood, boy, we live in a sinful world and we can get caught up in it. Even as believers, we can struggle. Even as believers, we can wrestle with with these ugly temptations and trials and difficulties and it can lead one to struggle with the assurance of their salvation, can't it?
That's what then leads into this glorious chapter. Look at the very next words. Chapter 8, starting at verse one. There is therefore now no condemnation. Let me say it louder for those in the back. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Yes, that's woohoo worthy. You're right. For the law of the spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
For God has done what the law weakened by the flesh could not do by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin. He condemned sin in the flesh in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the spirit. Praise God. Now, if you marry chapter 7 and chapter 8 together, you recognize we're going to struggle with sin as we press on.
We seek to honor God. We seek to glorify him, but we live in a sinful world and we're wrestling with it. And yet for the one who loves the Lord Jesus, who is saved, who is seeking to honor God, even as they struggle from time to time, there's you don't need to be condemned. God doesn't condemn you. You're saved. And you need not condemn yourself. You've been set free. Praise God. This is the hope that we have, friends. Here's the reality for those who are in Christ.
This is what separates the Christianity from every cult in the world. Cults will tell you you have to do XYZ, all these things in the hopes that you might one day be saved. Maybe Christianity tells us this. I'm a wretched sinner. I can't save myself by my works. Christ has saved me by his work. And as I attain it by faith, not only will I be saved that day, I'm saved right now. I'm saved right now. I can tell you I am saved. It's not that I'm going to be saved. I am saved.
The law of the spirit of life has set me free from the law of sin and death. Present tense. I am saved. If you're in Christ, you can say that too. This is the word of God. We are adopted children of the most high God and his spirit abides within us. Chapter 8, 15 and 16 say this. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you receive the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, "Aba, Father."
The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. Awesome truth. So he's making this argument for these Romans to to help them understand the depravity of sin, the need for the for for Christ's work and his atonement, what he has done in saving us and justifying us and giving us peace with God and the shortity with which the believer can live their life in the hope of the gospel as they pursue righteousness. And chapters 12 and on will give the impetus or or will give the the means by which we pursue righteousness and holiness in this world.
But he's giving them this argument and what he does in in wonderful way in chapter 8 and he actually does it throughout Romans but we see it lots in chapter 8 he gives questions it's an apologetic he'll give a question you might say you might ask this question here's the answer you might ask this question here's the answer he g he's giving an apologetic through Romans 8 and the last question he asks is in verse 35 who shall separate us from the love of Christ. He understands that that might be a question that comes up and he answers it.
And the la the crescendo of his answer are our verses this morning. And notice how he starts it. Verse 38. For I am sure. Sure of what? Well, that at the tail end of 39, that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. I am sure. That's how the ESV renders it. The NASB renders it, I am convinced. The CSB renders it, I am persuaded, which probably is the most accurate way to word it because the Greek word here speaks to a persuasion that has won over and has prevailed.
There is an argument that Paul has built in these first eight chapters. He's seeking to persuade them of this confidence that they should live with even as he himself has been persuaded. The spirit of God has helped them understand these truths and he's desperately wanting them to understand these truths. Have you ever had that interaction with maybe a new believer or someone who's not yet a believer and you're trying to persuade them, oh wait, take a time. The church bells are ringing.
Those phones get me every time. Good job. No, no, no. Apologize. He was persuading them in the way that we would want to persuade others. You've done that, I'm sure. If you're if you're a saint, you love the Lord, and there's someone in your life that either is a new believer or not yet a believer, but they're hungry, they're interested, what do you try to do? You try to persuade them that this is the truth that what the word this the word of God the gospel is the truth and that's what he's trying to do.
Persuading them and he's come to the point of saying I'm sure I've been fully persuaded that this is true and coupled with the fact that in what we're about to look at this little list coming up at the end of of these verses Paul's experienced almost all of them himself and he has seen how God has done a work in his life and so he's all the more sure it's like bedrock beneath his feet I am sure that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. We see that throughout the the scriptures.
Peter read to us from second Timothy. Did you hear that? He also said, "I am convinced that he is able to guard that which has been entrusted to me until that day." Sure. Certain. If you are in Christ here today, you too can have this certainty. Some might say this is arrogance. Some might say this is cockiness of the believer. Some will point to the Christians who have this kind of certainty and and they will say, "Yeah, you you're a bunch of arrogant jerks.
You you think you got it all under control." No, I know I don't. But I know he does. I am not in Matt. I am in Christ. If I was in Matt, I'm dead. I am hopeless. I'm lost. But if I'm in Christ, I have life and I have it for eternity. And I can be sure of this. If you are here and you have acknowledged your sin and your utter incapability of saving yourself, you have repented, that is to say, you've turned from living a life devoted to sin, and you're now devoted to Christ, to honoring him, to living for him.
You've you've sought to you've sought him as savior and you are seeking to live for his glory even though you're limping through this life and at times you fail but you're you're the desire of your heart is to glorify God because he is your savior. Friends, you are saved and you are secure. Praise God for this. This is the hope that he is giving them here. The certainty of God's love. But wait, there's more. Not only does he give here the certainty of God's love, he gives the comprehensiveness of God's love.
Paul goes here into some detail about how sure we can be in God's love. And he gives a pretty impressive list. Starts with this. Neither death nor life can separate us from the love of God. Well, death is the final enemy, but all death does for the believer is usher them straight into the presence of God. The last year and a half, we've seen some precious saints go home to be with the Lord.
Vodie Bacham passed away, instantly home with the Lord. John MacArthur passed away, instantly home with the Lord. We're coming up to the one-year anniversary of Charlie Kirk, instantly home with the Lord. And think about all those saints in your life, people that you love. Maybe it's been your parents, your grandparents, or maybe it's a child. If they knew the Lord Jesus Christ by faith home, what does 2 Corinthians 5:8 tell us? If I'm absent from the body, I'm present with the Lord. So death is not an enemy to the Christian. It just takes him home.
But so you might wonder, okay, well, what about life? Why is life on this list? Life sounds positive. Why is life even here? Well, what happens in life in this life is where we struggle. And this life is where we can get tripped up living in a sinstained, fallen world. Listen, let me go back to Romans 7 and see if you can resonate with the Apostle Paul here. I'm going to pick it up in verse 15. Paul says, this is this is the Apostle Paul here. He's saying this, "For I do not understand my own actions.
For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law that it is good." So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good that I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.
Now, if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. I'm not going to ask for a show of hands. But I wonder how many of you can go, "Yeah, I I get that. I hear that." But even life, even in the world like that where we struggle with sin, even that cannot remove the saint from the love of God. If one is saved and they're going to they're pursuing holiness and even as they struggle and trip and sin at times, the spirit of God abiding them is going to bring conviction over that sin.
Is going to draw. It's going to point them to the Lord that he might forgive them and their the repentance will be received by the Lord and they will not be lost. No spiritual being can remove me from the love of God. Look at what we read. So neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers, no spiritual entity can remove the saint from the love of God. Who can bring a charge against God's elect? Look at verse 33. It's verbatim what it says.
Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God's who is God who justifies. Who's going to bring a charge that's going to keep the elect from getting home? Can can an angel do that? Can a demon do that? No. This is the confidence he's giving them. What about your past or your present? That's what he talks about here. Neither things present nor things to come and even in the future. My past, my present, my future, my life.
Oh man, I've made Have you ever heard someone say, "if you'd see what was in my life, you know, God can't forgive me." You know what you've just proven by saying that? That you're a legalist. That's what you're proving. The legalist is the one who adds to scripture and says, "Here's what God can and cannot do. Not by his standard, but by because of what I've said. So anyone who says God, you don't know. You may have done these things, but you don't know what I've done. Yeah, you're a legalist, you need to repent of that because God can forgive and he is more than able to do so in Christ if you would repent and believe on the gospel of Jesus Christ this day.
And so past, present, future, God is able to remove your sin as Psalm 103 says, as far as the east is from the west. Praise God for that. The hope that we have in Christ Jesus. So here we have death and life, angels, rulers, things present, things to come, nor powers. Now some there's there's different ways to understand that word powers here in the ESV. That's what's rendered here. It it may mean either this the spiritual realm and the spiritual powers or worldly governmental powers because we have already got angels and rulers ahead of that.
My my understanding of this would be governmental powers, but who knows? But make no mistake, no power, no power can stop the believer from going home or from the advance of the gospel even. Do we need a Christian government for the gospel to spread? Wrong answer. Typically, let's be honest, history has shown the more Christian a government is or or the more warm toward the gospel they are and and and and likable they are toward the gospel, the more the Christians grow ep apathetic.
It's in the nations where they're hostile to the gospel that Christianity actually flourishes every time. God is not limited by government. No power, no entity will stop the spread of the gospel and will keep and no power, no government can stop the believer from going home. Go with me to John chapter 10. John chapter 10, picking it up in verse 27. This is Jesus speaking about the sheep of his pasture.
And he says this, "My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they will never perish and no one." You know what the word no one means in Greek? No one. No one will snatch them out of my hand. My father who has given them to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of my father's hand. I and the father are one.
That that's a pretty strong promise from our Lord. In Hebrews chapter 7, listen to what we read here about our Lord Jesus. Verse 25. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him since he always lives to make intercession for them. Right now, as we speak, August 30th at 10:37, 11:37 a.m., guess what Jesus is doing?
Making intercession for you and for me. Isn't that amazing? And we're doubting our salvation. Wow. We shouldn't. Neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers. Then he says, "Nor height nor depth." Fascinating. These are both astrological terms. Did you know that? When you look at the Greek, these were terms that the original readers, by the way, if you want to understand your Bible, you have to understand what the original readers understood.
And the original readers would have understood these as astrological points of stars in the sky. The highest height and the lowest low, the the path of the star, which would seem to point, as John MacArthur pointed out, it likely refers to the beginning and the end of one's life. The start and the finish. From the very beginning to the very end, nothing can separate God's love from the the saint. There's no point along the path where all of a sudden he's going to stop loving his people from height to depth all the way along.
And then as if all of this comprehensive list wasn't enough, he says this verse 39, nor anything else in all creation. What is excluded from that? What is not created? There's only one entity, God. He's the only unccreated one. Everything in creation is included in this list. This is is as comprehensive as you can find.
And he is saying here there's absolutely nothing in all of creation in the spiritual realm, in the material realm, in the physical realm, in any realm. There is nothing that can separate God's love from his people. Period. Full stop. This is good news for you and I. There's times when we feel like failures, right? There's times when we fall short. We ache because of the sin that we wrestle with and he gets frustrated that this like whatever the sin issue is.
It's like it's hanging on like a bad smell. And I and I'm calling out on the Lord and I'm struggling with this and surely he's going to forsake me. The saint who loves the Lord Jesus, who seeking to pursue him in holiness, struggling though they may be, they can rest assured that God does not forget his people. He does not cast them aside. He does not forget them. There is no possibility of the believer losing their salvation.
So long as Christ is on the throne, your salvation is secure. That's hope, friends. One more thing we see here the connectedness of God's love. Look at the word separate at the end of verse 39. Nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. In virtually every reputable translation, that's the word that's used there, separate. What does that mean?
Well, I reached out to my my good friend, my my best lifelong best friend. His name is Dean. Lives in Manitoba. He'll probably watch this. And Dean, I'm about to butcher the illustration you gave me, but I asked. So, they have a farm and and they have a side business, another business which has become quite a large business for them. It's called Triplear Manufacturing, and they manufacture farm implements, that kind of thing. Big part of their business is welding. And so I asked him, "Tell me what makes for a good weld. Time fails me to tell you all that he told me about that.
I will show you his text later if you're interested in in welding." He sent me copious amounts of information, which is awesome. All of it was really interesting, but he said, I'll try to sum up a little bit. The best weld, if you can possibly do it, is to grind a bit of a V into two pieces of metal you bring together and have everything really clean. No dirt in there, nothing. And then you essentially put the bead of the weld in that V and fill it up. And if it's done perfectly well and it's done right, that weld is so strong, it's actually stronger than steel itself.
So try as you might and and maybe maybe some of our welders here can attest to this. Try as you might. Sometimes if you're trying to break it apart, the steel will break around it before the weld itself will break. So strong is that connection. Friends, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. It's as if we are welded to Christ. And nothing in all of creation. For the one who is saved and in Christ, nothing can separate you.
He is the bridegroom. We are the bride and he will not tear us aunder. We are with him to the end and forever. So saint, when you're doubting, remember this truth. Come back to this text. When you feel like you've failed and you are downtrodden and you're discouraged, come back to this text. When you feel like you're alone and that no one cares for you, come back to this text. The one who cares for you is the most important one.
And he always cares for his people. The youth are going to come up and lead us in a song here in a moment. But before they do, I want to read to you a few verses as we close. The first few verses and the last few verses of Psalm 136. Hear these words. Hear this truth. And be encouraged before we sing together. Here's what it says. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good for his steadfast love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods for his steadfast love endures forever.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords for his steadfast love endures forever. Than the last few verses. It is he who remembered us in our low estate, for his steadfast love endures forever. And rescued us from our foes, for his steadfast love endures forever. He who gives food to all flesh, for his steadfast love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of heaven, for his steadfast love endures forever.
Lord, we are so thankful that that is true. That your steadfast love endures forever. That your saving love never fails. That we have such hope and confidence in this gospel. That though everything else around us might fail, you never do. Your love never fails. And though we might struggle at times, we know that through repentance and faith, you will receive our our broken hearts, you will grant to us forgiveness and you will never cast us aside.
You are so good and so faithful. And may our response be to live then for your glory, to live in such a manner that pleases you as a means of saying, "Thank you, God, for what you have done." And so grant to us that heart we pray as we carry on in the love of God. We pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.
Transcribed automatically from YouTube captions, so names and words may be misheard.
