Series: New New
Romans 8:28 ESV
Romans 8:3-8 The Message
If I had to choose one scripture that has helped me more than any other it would probably be Roman’s 8:28.
That’s because when life has been difficult and I’ve felt like the bottom is about to drop out I remember the promise in Romans 8:28.
That’s because Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”
I’ve always been amazed that God can make all things work together for good. I’ve grown to rely on it.
But before we get a deeper look at those words, we need to look at Paul’s words in Romans 8:3-11 from the Message:
“God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn’t deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that.
The law always ended up being used as a Band-Aid on sin instead of a deep healing of it. And now what the law code asked for but we couldn’t deliver is accomplished as we, instead of redoubling our own efforts, simply embrace what the Spirit is doing in us.
Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God’s action in them find that God’s Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn’t pleased at being ignored.
But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won’t know what we’re talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God’s terms.”
When we back up to get greater context we begin to see the big picture plan God has for us. See, when God sent His own son. He sent us the best person to help us. The Prophets had tried for years to explain the law but man still wasn’t really getting it.
As the Message explains the law ended up being a band-aid. It didn’t fix the wounds. When Jesus came and modeled the wounds in person. He lived out the death to sin and the power of the resurrection, so we would know for certain how much God loves us.
Then when Jesus left earth God sent the Spirit to fill us with power and personally experience God’s presence in our lives.
When we trust God and receive the power of the Spirit we have access to grace and peace through the Spirit living in us. And with God living in us we embrace the grace of God IN us.
As the Message explains it in Romans 8:11 when the Spirit living in us we “ experience life on God’s terms.”
In other words we don’t look at life the same way anymore. People who do not have God living in them do not have the love and grace of God. They don’t have hope.
They fill their lives with keeping busy and doing what they want.
The opposite of that is a life where the Spirit is in us and constantly helps us. The Greek word for helper is Paraclet, which I’ll refer to as helper of grace, friend, advocate, comforter.
When we put our hand in God’s hand we know we can count on God/Jesus and we have a helper who always goes with us wherever we go.
It is the Spirit that keeps our connection to God always active and alive.
Romans 8:28 in the Message tells us, “That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.”
When we have trusted God and we love God all things will come together for good.
Looking through the study lens of Roman’s 8:28 made me realize that when I get frustrated because I can’t see the good or how there could possibly be good from something going on, I need to remember that I do not see what God sees.
Some would call that my impatience…they are probably right.
That reminds me of fizzies. In 1950 we didn’t have soda pop readily available but we had fizzies. It was a tablet (about the size of an alka-seltzer. Fizzies came in various colors and flavors and when you dropped a tablet in a glass of water you had something like instant strawberry soda pop. We thought fizzies were the best treat on the planet!
The point is, keep your eyes on God and watch for God’s solution. It may take time (it’s not fizzies) and it may not be what you expect but it will work out for your good.
Spiritual Practice: Look for the Good
When you are struggling with something turn to God and watch for the good to emerge.
In God, Deborah
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