No Condemnation in Christ, Part 4: Conquerors With God

Throw on some armor and saddle up!

Here we are, in the final piece on Romans 8; we've been exploring the ways this chapter speaks mercy and grace to sinners.  In the last post, we looked at the fact that not only are we Christians forgiven in Christ, we actually have a glorious destiny.  Now we're going to look more into this amazing reality.  

"We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose.  For those He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, so that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers.  And those He predestined He also called; and those He called He also justified; and those He justified He also glorified."

Romans 8: 28-30

Those who serve God are chosen.  God, Who lives outside of time, was able to determine, even "before" the beginning of time (He "foreknew"), those who would choose to love Him, and from His eternal vantage point He made it their destiny to be glorified.  This doesn't mean that we must be perfect and sinless in order to be counted in that number.  If we love God, which to be sure does include a desire to please and serve Him, then even though we stumble and fall, He justifies us.  

Our enemy, the devil, will continue to oppose us throughout all of our Earthly lives.  He and his minions will tempt us to do that which displeases God, and will always try to tear us away from our glorious destiny.  We can't give up the fight, for we know from other scriptures that only "those who endure until the end" shall be saved.  So we can't take our destiny as being "secure no matter what," because certainly God's foreknowledge, by which He has destined us, was a foreknowledge not of those who would love Him only for a time, but for those who would love Him through to the end.  However, we can rest assured that, so long as we do love God, and keep holding on, Satan cannot win:

"What then shall we say to this?  If God is for us, who can be against us?  He Who did not spare His own Son but handed Him over for us all, how will He not also give us everything else along with Him?  Who will bring a charge against God's chosen ones?  It is God who acquits us.  Who will condemn?  It is Christ Jesus Who died, rather, was raised, Who also is at the right hand of God, Who indeed intercedes for us.  What will separate us from the love of Christ?  Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?  As it is written:

'For Your sake we are being slain all the day; we are looked upon as sheep to be slaughtered.'

No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through Him Who loved us." 

Romans 8: 31-37

No matter what sort of weapons the enemy uses against us, so long as we cling to our Lord, the evil one can't stand against us.  He may win battles, and we may find ourselves cast down into the pit.  But we will always rise again, our rising modeled on the rising of Christ, the Firstborn.  If we are "looked upon as sheep to be slaughtered," then we will also rise again just like the Lamb Who was slaughtered.  This doesn't only apply to our physical rising after our bodily deaths--many of which have indeed come at the hands of enemies of the Faith--but also to our spiritual rising whenever our souls have died, temporarily, through sin.

Satan cannot keep us down, the grave of sin cannot contain us when we trust in God, Who will raise us from the dead.  We rise, time and again, to glory, by the Grace of God whenever we repent and avail ourselves of His forgiving power through repentance and confession.  No power in the universe could stand in the way:

"For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." 

Romans 8: 38-39

That is the beautiful truth, and the reason that even Satan himself, despite his deviousness and his power, can't deprive us of our rights as children of God.  For God is infinitely more powerful than even the most magnificent or potent of creatures, including the prince of darkness.  This same God, Whose power knows no bounds, loves us, and it is His unfailing will that we should be with Him forever, that we should reign with Him, if we simply love Him.  That's the consolation and the hope we have.  That's why, no matter how bleak things look, no matter how often we fall into the snare of the enemy and find ourselves discouraged, we have the guarantee that, so long as we are willing to keep up the good fight, we will prevail.  God never fails.

And that is truly good news for a sinner such as I.