ROMANS 8:28-39 TEXT: v28 ALL THINGS WORK TOGETHER ETC.,
And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
We need a great promise [as we begin another year]
If we know not what a day shall bring forth…what of 365 such days? How will the winter finish its course for us?
What will the spring bring? Summer? Autumn? What guarantees do we have for the incoming year?
What can the Government guarantee us? We have a relatively stable government
With all its problems, we still have a reasonably good police force
Don't appear to be on the brink of a war (civil or otherwise) or any such calamity
There is no Hitler like monster rising in Europe as there was 70 years go
Yet no human source can look us straight in the eye to guarantee us anything for the new year
At best, human agencies can but plan and do all in their might, but they cannot give us cast iron 100% assurances
Always small print in every promise
But we turn away from the earthbound to the divine
We close the uncertain books/men and we turn in faith to the Book/God
Although we cannot foretell the future, yet we know this: text will never be outdone in any circumstance
There is a steady Hand on the tiller, no matter how rough the sea.
4 thoughts:
1) PARTICULAR PEOPLE WHO ARE ADDRESSED:
A/ Book is full of promises to different kinds/people
Promises for some which are not applicable to others
No group/people are totally left out and have nothing, but we do
need/careful that we don't lay hold on a promise/not intended for us
If I open another man's mail or turn up at the reading/another family's will, I cannot rightly claim any promises made therein
A mistake has been made
I raised my hopes - and perhaps a lot more - only to have them dashed at last
I can blame no-one but myself
We do need to be careful and rightly divide the word/truth (2 Timothy 2:15)
The faithful/wise servant dispenses the meat to the family in due season (Matthew 24:45)
B/ Promises in this Book for those still unsaved
Not yet the Lord's in that saving sense i.e. no submission to His claims
Still lost and another [new year] finds them headed for blackness/darkness for ever
But here is a great promise for you today: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. (Acts 16:31)
You can start [this new year] on a right footing with God: Saved/Pardoned/Cleansed etc.,
You have not been left out
Without any obligation on His part, yet God has gracious promises for you
C/ But our text, if you are not saved, does not have as yet your name on it
Unwise for you to bank upon it
If the earthly cheque does not have your name upon, don't bother the bank clerk trying to get it cashed
Likewise our text: It is a particular text/particular people
D/ Addressed to those who love God.
This definition is clearly defined/Bible
Not vague/sentimental
A man does not have to be an out-out militant atheist or a cynical agnostic to disqualify here
[i] To love God is to know who He is as revealed/Bible
Many folk profess: "I love God" but cannot sustain any length/conversation about Him
Never talk to Him in serious prayer
Never read His word or make Him the centre of their conversation when talking to others
Their profession/love is very shallow and unreal
Text is addressed to those who can at least say: I know Him experimentally
God to me is not an abstract matter…but I have a real, living union with Him
[ii] To love God is to forsake evil in repentance and embrace Him in faith
Cannot have both: Love not the world,
neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world,
the love of the Father is not in him. (1 John 2:15)
Another practical text: Do we love the world? Not saying: Do we never fall in temptation? Who then could be saved?
Ones/text addressed are those who mourn their sins: who say: For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. (Romans 7:19)
If we can, at the very least, use this language, then we are in the text
[iii] Those who love God are those who make Him Lord of their lives.
Peter was a saved man, and yet the Lord Jesus challenged him: "Lovest thou me more than these?" (John 21:15) If more than the fishing or other disciples is irrelevant
Is Christ everything to us? Can we really say: For me to live is Christ? (Philippians 1:21)
E/ These ones who love God (and for whom our text is
addressed) are further described as those who are the called according
to His purpose
God has an elect people
People become Christians because God purposed from a past eternity it
would be so: Sovereign electing purposes/God, whereby out of His own
pleasure, for reasons founded entirely within Himself, He has chosen a
people for His name
Who? Those who love God
A distinct promise for a distinct people
2) INCLUSIVE SCENARIOS WHICH ARE ENVISAGED:
All things will work together for good to those who are so love God
A/ You and I will face many different and often difficult situations
Hardly get a completely trouble free year
This world…not our home
We will know anxiety
Could be faced with difficult decisions
Might forgo many creature comforts
Our little worlds might collapse around us
What a year Job had! Little did he on January 1st think of what lay ahead
What of those carried away captive (Psalm 137)
Are we really so foolish to think that worry/stress etc., happen to
other people? Will never happen to us? Be prepared to be shocked
B/ No matter what the scenario is…text says that it will be for our good if we love God
Although we might not sustain our creature comforts, yet spiritually we will come out enriched
David had an experience like that: It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes. (119:71)
Hebrew word for good is translated so many different ways: better/best/merry/precious/wealth/beautiful etc., I profited
At the time it was hard. I lost sleep
I watched material comforts leave me like snow/ditch…yet I cannot deny that I am the better for it
C/ Such profiting is not dependent on mere chance
All men can profit to some extent from their experiences
Men can learn the basic virtues of being more considerate etc., through their own experiences
Some who made the greater losses became the more generous
Our text goes beyond this
D/ Our text teaches us that all things work together for our good
Not merely share a common goal, but actually work together
We have seen precision engineering at work
Men measure in fractions of millimetres. We have seen 1,000 piece jigsaw, at first glance just a heap on a table, fit together
Did so according to the picture on the box
And so God has a plan for His people. Right down to the very last detail
And day/day, moment/moment it is carefully/precisely being worked out
Nothing happens by chance
No flies to spoil the ointment in God's plan
No “if’s” in the providence/God
E/ As we say: There may be bitter ingredients in the recipe.
More than sugar goes into a cake
But the overall result is to our profit
F/ QUESTION: Are the ways/wicked not so controlled by God?
Does anything happen to them by chance and if not how do they differ
Nothing happens by chance anywhere in the world
And yet for the wicked, there is no guarantee that the things which happen (pleasant or otherwise) are for their good
Suppose a man dares to pray to God that he will win the lottery and sure enough, £5-6,000,000 comes his way
Is he any the better?
Marriages have foundered on such occasions...faster cars brought horrendous injuries
An unsaved man - a vessel/wrath - cannot guarantee that the Lord is not working for their destruction
Warning: But they that will be rich
fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful
lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. (1 Timothy 6:9)
That's the big difference
As we say: there are promises for the unsaved, but they are limited/the kind: encourage immediate repentance/faith
3) GREAT COMFORT WHICH IS ASSURED:
A/ Text: These things may be known
Indeed: Are known: We know
[i] Paul knew by blessed experience
Paul was an old warrior
Often seen the hand/God intervene on his behalf
Been through some pretty rough spots…and yet could say: We
would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us
in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch
that we despaired even of life: But we had the sentence of death in
ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which
raiseth the dead: Who delivered us from so great a death, and doth
deliver: in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us (2 Corinthians
1:8-11)
Why did these things happen? Because: text
Even when Paul came to be martyred, it was all working together for his good
Reflected in his swan song (2 Timothy 4) I
am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure/hand. I have
fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:
Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the
Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me
only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.
Paul knew it from experience
[ii] Paul knew it from the Bible
Read it in the experiences/others: Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them all. (Psalm 34:19)
Read Hebrews 11 – a biography of those for whom all things,
bitter, sweet and otherwise, all worked together for their good
All in Hebrews 11 would take Rutherford’s words: “I’ll
bless the hand that guided. I’ll bless the heart that planned,
Even throned where glory dwelleth. In Immanuel’s land.”
Paul knew it to be doctrinally true
Bible teaches the Sovereignty of God in every last matter
All things work together according to
the purpose of him who worketh all things, not only together, but after
the counsel of His own will (Ephesians 1:11)
B/ Paul bases the argument of v31-32 on the Cross
Argues from greater to the lesser: Would God give His own Son and then scrimp somewhere else?
To do anything less would become a practical insult to His Son
Another subject to explore all that we have in Jesus Christ! Blessed with all spiritual blessings (Ephesians 1:3)
4) EXCITING APPLICATIONS WHICH ARE ENCOURAGED:
Some short applications of this great truth:
A/ Let it comfort you if you are a Christian
Cure for all ills
Learn to rest upon this truth
Make it a hammock in which to rest your soul
Whatever happens…conclude that it is God making your way perfect
Your comfort does not rest upon your ability to explain these things
Poor comfort if it were
Rests on the ability of Almighty God to take every last incident in
your life, known and unknown, and make it contribute to your overall
good That’s where the comfort lies
B/ Let it steel you for the battles/Christian life
Invincible weapon if rightly handled: Don't be foolish, but use it to advance far with God
C/ Unsaved: See what you miss by not being converted
Get saved today.
THE END