Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Romans 8:31-39 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? . . . It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? . . . Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
CONQUERORS THROUGH CHRIST
As people who live in a world infected with sin and evil, each of us face difficulties of various types and varying degrees. Some will face many trials in life, while others may face few by comparison. These troubles span the whole range of human existence, and are often incomparable to what others have gone through, since each individual situation is different. At times we may feel that what we are going through is so unique or unusual that no one can understand, and that nothing can help us. We may give up all hope, thinking that all is lost.
Paul offers us words of comfort, reminding us that, as believers in Christ, we have something that cannot be taken away from us -- no matter what we face in this life. No matter how many troubles afflict us -- no matter how great those troubles are -- we still have hope and confidence in the future! "If God is for us, who can be against us?"
Through the trials we face, we become conquerors! "Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us." There is nothing we can face in this life which can take away our hope and our confidence in God's love for us. A love that was so great, He sent His only-begotten Son to be our Savior!
In tribulation, distress, famine, peril, and even death itself, we are more than conquerors, through Jesus!
