SPEAKER_00: This podcast is the Ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_00: For more information in our church, please visit grandparkway.org.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: If you've got a Bible, I invite you to take it and open it up to Romans chapter 8.
SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 8.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't have a Bible, there should be one on your row.
SPEAKER_00: I'm on page 944, and we will finish one of the greatest chapters in the Bible this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to talk to you this morning about how to think about God.
SPEAKER_00: How to think about God.
SPEAKER_00: And while you're finding me in Romans chapter 8, let me just begin with some confession of my own.
SPEAKER_00: I have a bad habit.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't realize this until I started working closely with people here at the church and my family.
SPEAKER_00: I have a bad habit.
SPEAKER_00: Here's my bad habit.
SPEAKER_00: I ask rhetorical questions to make a point.
SPEAKER_00: And it drives some people I work with crazy.
SPEAKER_00: It drives my 15-year-old daughter crazy because I'll ask her questions and she's like, Why don't you just come out and tell me?
SPEAKER_00: Because I'm smarter than you and I'm inviting you to kind of step your game up.
SPEAKER_00: And she's like, And I'm like, if you think you're the first woman who's made that noise in response to something I've said, you've lost your mind.
SPEAKER_00: And then she marches through the house to her mom and goes, Mother, and I'm like, My work here is finished.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: My daughter is so frustrated she doesn't have words.
SPEAKER_00: And my wife just rolls her eyes and says, Just don't give in to it.
SPEAKER_00: Don't let it have power over you.
SPEAKER_00: And then my 15-year-old starts announcing to my wife, who I've been married to for 20 years and have been dating for 22 years.
SPEAKER_00: And by the way, when you get married, you don't stop dating men.
SPEAKER_00: That's free.
SPEAKER_00: Bam on Mother's Day.
SPEAKER_00: Just bam, right there, ladies.
SPEAKER_00: Got your back.
SPEAKER_00: And then she's like, How do you put up with this?
SPEAKER_00: This is so frustrating.
SPEAKER_00: What's frustrating?
SPEAKER_00: That I'm smarter than you.
SPEAKER_00: You can't think on my level.
SPEAKER_00: Ah! And now I have proof in the Bible that this is the right way to relate to people.
SPEAKER_00: So this will be, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00: I won't say anything, but some lady on this side of the room just went, Oh, really?
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
SPEAKER_00: Read with me, and you'll see what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 8, verse 31, Paul says, Then what then shall we say to these things?
SPEAKER_00: If God is for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all, how we not also with him graciously give us all things?
SPEAKER_00: Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: It is God who justifies.
SPEAKER_00: Who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: Christ Jesus is the one who died.
SPEAKER_00: More than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.
SPEAKER_00: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword, as it is written, for your sake we are being killed all the day long.
SPEAKER_00: We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.
SPEAKER_00: No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us, for I am sure, I am convinced, I am persuaded it is not lost on me.
SPEAKER_00: 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 in case I left something out.
SPEAKER_00: Anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Paul finishes Romans 8 with this annoying habit of asking four questions to which there is no answer.
SPEAKER_00: And I can't wait.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go home and reopen my wife's Mother's Day card and write this in there.
SPEAKER_00: By the way, happy Mother's Day.
SPEAKER_00: I got this from the Apostle Paul, so I'm gonna keep asking questions to make a point.
SPEAKER_00: Bam! He asks four questions that there's no response to.
SPEAKER_00: But the reason he asks these questions is to make this point.
SPEAKER_00: And if we're not careful, we're gonna miss it because to grasp kind of the significance of these questions, we got to grasp why they can't be answered.
SPEAKER_00: See, there's this truth that's contained in the question or in the if clause that's connected to the question.
SPEAKER_00: So let's just look this morning at these four questions.
SPEAKER_00: And and by the way, what he's the point he's trying to make is I want hey, this is how you think about God.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, this is how I want you to think about God, or this is what I want you to never, ever, ever forget about God and yourself.
SPEAKER_00: The first question is simply this if God is for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: Now, before we get to that, we've got to stumble over that first sentence in verse 31 where he says, What then shall we say to these things?
SPEAKER_00: In other words, what is your response going to be to these things being?
SPEAKER_00: What we talked about last week, how God begins a process that he sustains and he brings the culmination to fruition to fruition, to consummation.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't start something, run out of energy and ideas to see it through.
SPEAKER_00: No, he who began a good work in you will continue it to the day of Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He who, as he finishes up there, those whom he foreknew, he's gonna bring you all the way to glory.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says to sit there and remain indifferent to that is to miss the point.
SPEAKER_00: That's why he says, What then shall we say to these things?
SPEAKER_00: Hello.
SPEAKER_00: And then he gets to the question.
SPEAKER_00: And the first question is right there in verse 31.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, if God is for us, and it's not, hey, we don't know if God is for us, it's really uh so overstated.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, because God is for us, because God is on the record, is going first.
SPEAKER_00: If God is for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: And then, as if to drive the point home, he says in verse 32, he who did not spare his own son, in case you're wondering if God is for you or not, or if God kind of knows what he's doing, he didn't spare his own son, but he gave him up for us all.
SPEAKER_00: How will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
SPEAKER_00: He says, now, if God is for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: The cross is both indictment and also indication.
SPEAKER_00: And his indictment.
SPEAKER_00: Now, why does Christ have to die?
SPEAKER_00: Because I, by nature, am a sinful person who is separated from God.
SPEAKER_00: I am not born a child of God.
SPEAKER_00: I can't say, I can't appeal to the universal fatherhood of God and say, well, God's my father, you know, we're all God's children.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: If we could all be God's children just by nature, then we don't need the cross.
SPEAKER_00: It is indictment, but it's also indication.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Paul is getting at.
SPEAKER_00: He says, if God be for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: You're like, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_00: Let me just list all these people that are against us.
SPEAKER_00: And what Paul says in a biblical way is listen, when you ponder this, it's kind of like riding the seesaw with a fat kid.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna get the better end of the deal.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna get the perpetual better view, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Because God is for you.
SPEAKER_00: So it's not, hey, who's against us?
SPEAKER_00: It's hey, whoever is against us, it doesn't really matter.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because God is for us.
SPEAKER_00: How do you know God's for us?
SPEAKER_00: Because he didn't spare his own son.
SPEAKER_00: Focus on that little word, own.
SPEAKER_00: His own son.
SPEAKER_00: Not one of his adopted children like me and you.
SPEAKER_00: If you're sitting in this room and you're a Christian, no, but his own son, his homousias, his son from and of the same substance, way that he foreshadowed way back in Genesis 22 when he said to Abram, Hey, get up and take your son, your only son, Isaac, and offer him upon a mountain that I will show you.
SPEAKER_00: God's kind of given a little peek into the divine plan for redeeming people whom the cross indices.
SPEAKER_00: The cross says to me that I am so born, so depraved, and so by nature and choice of sinner, that Jesus, for me to know God and go to heaven, Jesus has to die for me.
SPEAKER_00: But I'm so loved and so valued by God that Jesus was glad to die for me.
SPEAKER_00: And so I cannot anymore the rest of my days wonder how God feels about me.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because God spared not his own son, but he offered him up for us all.
SPEAKER_00: And then he, having said that, he didn't leave us there.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Oh, by the way, here's kind of let me connect the dots so it's not a bunch of little little dots on a map.
SPEAKER_00: It's a picture.
SPEAKER_00: He who spared not his own son, but freely offered him up for us all, and then he lays this on us.
SPEAKER_00: How shall he not also along with him in the same way he offered up freely his own son?
SPEAKER_00: How he not also along with him graciously give us all things.
SPEAKER_00: See, the Bible doesn't leave you alone at any point and say, Hey, you get a hall pass, just a little thing here.
SPEAKER_00: No, he just kind of spools it out like the guy making cotton candy at the Fort Bend County Fair, just a few swirls, and you got a buffon pink wig of happiness.
SPEAKER_00: Some of y'all are like, Have you been eating cotton candy this morning?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want you.
SPEAKER_00: See, if God be for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: What Paul is saying is, hey, bring on anybody and anything.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because God is for us.
SPEAKER_00: You say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: And then maybe this will get at it a little bit better.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, I've got many since we announced last week that I'll be on sabbatical this summer.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, I've got emails and phone calls and texts from you all.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the one prevailing question that y'all have, what are you gonna do?
SPEAKER_00: What is a sabbatical?
SPEAKER_00: Oh man, what are you gonna do all the time?
SPEAKER_00: One thing I'm gonna do, because I like to ask my children, because I want them to understand the fatherhood of God.
SPEAKER_00: And there's no pressure, mom and dad.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but but if you want to, your your children's first understanding of the fatherhood of God is gonna be from their relationship with you.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not pressure, it's just it's it's an incredible privilege.
SPEAKER_00: And so I say to my children every once in a while, hey, what can I do to bless you?
SPEAKER_00: What would bless you?
SPEAKER_00: Now I asked my nine-year-old and she's like, uh, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Uh let me think about it.
SPEAKER_00: I asked my 15-year-old, she's like, hang on a second.
SPEAKER_00: It's funny you ask that.
SPEAKER_00: I got a list in my room.
SPEAKER_00: I was writing it down just the other day.
SPEAKER_00: And so I said, she said, Well, Dad, what are you gonna do in your sabbatical?
SPEAKER_00: I said, Max, what do you want to do?
SPEAKER_00: I want to go see movies, and I got a list.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you know, Superman's coming out this summer.
SPEAKER_00: Bam, it's on the list.
SPEAKER_00: They're making a sequel.
SPEAKER_00: This week's sign that the apocalypse is upon us.
SPEAKER_00: They're making a sequel to the Hunger Games.
SPEAKER_00: And my wife, my 50 year old can tell you all the little, all the really intense plot twists.
SPEAKER_00: Bam, it's on the list.
SPEAKER_00: Is that coming out this summer?
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, but we got it on the list.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's my that's my daughter's love language.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, yeah, we go see movies.
SPEAKER_00: Case in point.
SPEAKER_00: A couple months ago, we went and saw a movie called Jack the Giant Slayer.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: And my grown-up 48-year-old jaded cynical mind, it's like, oh, Jack and the Beanstalk, you mean?
SPEAKER_00: No, no, Dad, it's Jack the Giant Slayer.
SPEAKER_00: It's not Jack.
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's the story of Jack and the Beanstalk, but it's in kind of contemporary.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, okay, it's Jack and the Beanstalk, is what it is.
SPEAKER_00: Just boil it down for me because I just I don't want to miss one juicy morsel of this incredibly predictable movie.
SPEAKER_00: But I don't say that because she's 15 and we got to go to the Starbucks and get that$9 drink they serve there.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, hello, what is this?
SPEAKER_00: Liquid gold?
SPEAKER_00: Then we roll up to the movie and oh, we can't go to matinee.
SPEAKER_00: Because I said, hey, why don't we get up early this summer and go to 11 o'clock matinee?
SPEAKER_00: It's like$5.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I won't be up then.
SPEAKER_00: Let me just ask the people over here.
SPEAKER_00: Can you ever remember saying to your parents, you wouldn't be up by 11?
SPEAKER_00: That is cracolactic.
SPEAKER_00: I would have, that would not have crossed my mind to say to my dad, hey, hey boys, we've got to be up at six, we've got to gather these eggs.
SPEAKER_00: 11,000 chickens lay a lot of eggs, in case you're wondering.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, Dad, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna be up by 11.
SPEAKER_00: Hit me up, give me a little stark, mocha frappuccino, with some extra shot in there, and then see me about 1145.
SPEAKER_00: And can you get Chick-fil-A, please?
SPEAKER_00: Because I like Chick-fil-A on Saturdays.
SPEAKER_00: We go see Jack the Giant Slayer, and I'm like, here is$18.
SPEAKER_00: That's how much it costs for two of us to go to a movie.
SPEAKER_00: By the way, she likes to go to the late movie, like 10 45 at night, and is wired like a chihuahua on crack.
SPEAKER_00: Just and I'm like, can we get to the Starbucks before it closes?
SPEAKER_00: Because I need some caffeine to get through this.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm sitting there thinking, I just paid 18 bucks to see something I read when I was six.
SPEAKER_00: But there was a little subtle twist in the movie Jack the Giants, in case you didn't see it, it is about these giants that are up there at the top of the beanstalk, and they are ruled by somebody.
SPEAKER_00: There's this magic crown you gotta get, and whoever has the crown, they're subject to that person who wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: And so the whole movie is twisted around.
SPEAKER_00: Not the goofy love story between Jack and the princess, and my daughter's like, oh, I'm like, that's so predictable.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, really?
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna fall in love?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I never saw that coming.
SPEAKER_00: What I didn't see coming was there's a great scene in the movie where this one guy, he's a valiant soldier, he's kind of defending everybody, he's got a sword.
SPEAKER_00: And these giants are giants, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I don't mean like Manute Bowl.
SPEAKER_00: I mean like as tall as this building, and they have power and they sling stuff, and the guy's got his sword in for the brief, and they all just kind of stop and they bow down.
SPEAKER_00: They all take a knee and pay homage, and he's kind of like living under the illusion that they're afraid of me and my little bitty wooden, my little metal toothpick here.
SPEAKER_00: And then it dawns on him, there's someone behind me, isn't there?
SPEAKER_00: And he turns around and someone behind him is wearing the crown.
SPEAKER_00: And the giants are subject.
SPEAKER_00: They bow and pay homage to whoever wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: Fast forward to right here, when Paul says, if God be for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: What he's saying is, God wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: When he died and was buried and rose again, and he has ascended to the right hand of the Father, he's saying that every knee is gonna bow, every tongue is gonna confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of the Father.
SPEAKER_00: And so just relax because all the giants in your life, in my life, are subject to whoever wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm in a goofy, overpriced movie.
SPEAKER_00: Did I tell you it was nine dollars to go to a movie?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that is just like, I mean, we're going to hell for that right there.
SPEAKER_00: And don't even try to buy a drink when you go in there.
SPEAKER_00: It's like$7.
SPEAKER_00: And I mean, by the time the movie starts, I'm so angry I want to punch somebody in the neck because it's not enough that we go to Starbucks and they go, you can't bring it in, so you slam it down and get brain freeze.
SPEAKER_00: Then I kid announces, Dad, I'd like an icy.
SPEAKER_00: There's six dollars for an icy.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm sitting there just simmering in my own juices, and then this begins to kind of un kind of unfold, and I didn't see it coming.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm good thing it was dark because the Holy Spirit just kind of whispers, Well, by the way, it's that way in your life too, Jack.
SPEAKER_00: They're all subject to the one who wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: All the giants, all the things that just are really big in your life are gonna bow and pay homage to the one who wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: And when Paul says, hey, if God, the crown-wearing king of the universe, is for you, who can be against you?
SPEAKER_00: Second question that he asked to make a point is who shall bring any charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: It's right there in verse 33.
SPEAKER_00: After verse 32, as if that wasn't enough, he just pummels us to the ground.
SPEAKER_00: We're like Mike Tyson on all fours looking for a mouthpiece because we want to get up and take another beating.
SPEAKER_00: Then he just drops this bomb on us in verse 33.
SPEAKER_00: Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: And I don't have time to go into this, so let me just say it.
SPEAKER_00: Without this biblical understanding of the doctrine of election, you are forever open to the what-ifs of human nature.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_00: Without a biblical understanding of the doctrine of election, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: He says, Who will bring a charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: In other words, that my being a Christian wasn't my idea.
SPEAKER_00: God revealed himself to me and acted upon my hard heart and my indifferent will in such a way that me bowing before the one who wears the crown and saying, You are Lord of me.
SPEAKER_00: You have earned the right, you with your blood, you purchased me for God.
SPEAKER_00: God revealed himself to me in such a way that me doing that was the most natural thing I could do.
SPEAKER_00: You say, Well, I don't I don't get it.
SPEAKER_00: See, see, God, he said, who will bring a charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: Those whom God has chosen.
SPEAKER_00: You say, Well, how do we know whom God has chosen?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody that knows Christ, if you're in this room and you have any inkling of a desire or a thought or a curiosity, don't be sitting there thinking, well, I'm probably not chosen.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, can you think of all the things that I've done?
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't base, he doesn't, he doesn't choose you based on what you've done.
SPEAKER_00: He chooses you out of the kind intention of his heart.
SPEAKER_00: You say, Well, I'm kind of curious about this.
SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of thinking about it.
SPEAKER_00: That's an indication that God is revealing himself to you.
SPEAKER_00: You say, Well, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Let me say it again.
SPEAKER_00: Without the biblical understanding of the doctrine of election, you're forever open to the what-ifs of human nature.
SPEAKER_00: Things that people have said to me who've come to my office and made an appointment and sat there and said, you know, I'm not sure if I'm a Christian or not.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I mean by the what-ifs of human nature.
SPEAKER_00: What if I didn't do the right thing?
SPEAKER_00: What if I didn't say the right thing?
SPEAKER_00: What if I didn't really mean it?
SPEAKER_00: What if I just wanted, what if I was uh I was little when I when I prayed the prayer?
SPEAKER_00: What if what if I was just afraid to go to hell?
SPEAKER_00: Or what if I was just doing it because everybody else was doing it because I went forward and prayed the prayer at youth camp once again without a biblical understanding of the doctrine of election, you're forever open to all the what ifs of human nature.
SPEAKER_00: What if I wasn't serious enough?
SPEAKER_00: Paul says, Who shall bring a charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I just tell you, your conscience will.
SPEAKER_00: Your conscience will condemn you.
SPEAKER_00: The devil will.
SPEAKER_00: People who know your past and your failures will.
SPEAKER_00: They kind of look at you like, yeah, don't get too big for your britches, because I got right here in my pocket this little known fact about you, and I'm gonna whip it out and use it to kind of bring you down a few notches.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says this in Isaiah chapter 50, verse 8 and 9.
SPEAKER_00: It says, He who vindicates me is near.
SPEAKER_00: This is the suffering servant of Isaiah.
SPEAKER_00: He who vindicates me is near.
SPEAKER_00: Who will condemn me?
SPEAKER_00: The person that stands up and speaks on my behalf is near.
SPEAKER_00: So, so so who's gonna contend with me?
SPEAKER_00: Let us stand up together.
SPEAKER_00: Who's my adversary?
SPEAKER_00: Let him come near to me.
SPEAKER_00: Behold, the Lord God helps me.
SPEAKER_00: Who will declare me guilty?
SPEAKER_00: Behold, all of them will wear out like a garment.
SPEAKER_00: The moth will eat them up.
SPEAKER_00: See, here's this rhetorical question that is just unanswered.
SPEAKER_00: Who will bring a charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: See, I I I don't I don't know what maybe think about it this way.
SPEAKER_00: Uh remember the Boston Marathon bombers?
SPEAKER_00: And the one that one of them was killed, and one of them lived, and and for whatever reason, we're gonna spend taxpayers' money to make sure that guy gets three meals a day and whatever.
SPEAKER_00: I could save you a lot of money.
SPEAKER_00: That's all I'm gonna say.
SPEAKER_00: Nonsense is destroying this country.
SPEAKER_00: But that's a whole nother sermon.
SPEAKER_00: I feel my red neck rising up in me here this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Gotta get that thing down.
SPEAKER_00: But see, uh uh Tamerland Sarneev, the older brother that was killed, because he tried to kill, come against our country, he was killed and he got what he deserved.
SPEAKER_00: But anyway, uh uh, and now hey folks, justice is not something we have to apologize for.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: You gotta stop becoming famous for what you tolerate.
SPEAKER_00: You need to become famous for what you believe.
SPEAKER_00: And so any.
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, uh, they got this cat up there, the older brother.
SPEAKER_00: And by the way, that's a human being.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm not I'm not hating on him, I'm just telling you the truth.
SPEAKER_00: They got the older brother, and the big dilemma now is there's not a cemetery in America that's gonna say you can bury that cat here.
SPEAKER_00: That guy's been on ice since the day that night he was killed.
SPEAKER_00: They they can't find anywhere to put him because just as they get it figured out, people find out, oh, you're gonna bury him here, and they're like, oh no, you're not.
SPEAKER_00: People hold up signs.
SPEAKER_00: If you bury him on American soil, we will unbury him.
SPEAKER_00: And that's somebody's mom holding that sign.
SPEAKER_00: That's not a man, that's a woman.
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine?
SPEAKER_00: Her kids are kind of like, my mom is crazy.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: People aren't hating on that.
SPEAKER_00: We're not hating that person's religion.
SPEAKER_00: What they're saying is, it is unconscionable to think you can do this against America and then find your rest in peace on American soil.
SPEAKER_00: Uh-uh.
SPEAKER_00: Now, why did I tell you that?
SPEAKER_00: To stir you up?
SPEAKER_00: Not at all.
SPEAKER_00: It's to say, this is what Paul has in mind when he says, who I mean, I mean, who will bring a charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: Translation, what courtroom is going to convene this trial and who's going to sit on the jury?
SPEAKER_00: Who's going to say, my opinion of you holds more weight and water than God's opinion of you?
SPEAKER_00: Because at the core of this, you got to ask yourself, what did God not, what did what is it about you that God did not know when he chose you that had he known it, he would have never chosen you to begin with.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, Paul just says very simply and subtly, and without any adequate response, who will bring any charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: See, the doctrine of election brings great security to the Christian because we got to ask that question.
SPEAKER_00: You know, what did God not know when he chose you?
SPEAKER_00: He knows everything.
SPEAKER_00: Well then, you don't think he knew?
SPEAKER_00: Do you think anything surprises him?
SPEAKER_00: Who can bring a charge against those whom God has chosen as his own?
SPEAKER_00: That God looked down and said, I want this person to be in my family, and I want that so much that I'll give my own son to realize that it happens.
SPEAKER_00: Who's gonna stand up and say, but what about blank?
SPEAKER_00: Third question that he asks is in the next verse Who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?
SPEAKER_00: It is God who justifies.
SPEAKER_00: This all-knowing God has justified us, made us right.
SPEAKER_00: And therefore, verse 34, who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: Christ Jesus is the one who died more than that, who was raised.
SPEAKER_00: When you see the phrase more than that, it's like a literal, like a literary speed bump.
SPEAKER_00: You say, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Because we talk about the death of Jesus a lot, but we talk about the resurrection of Jesus just around Easter.
SPEAKER_00: And you need to understand that the resurrection is indication that full and final payment has been made and accepted.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: Christ Jesus is the one who died.
SPEAKER_00: More than that, who was raised, who's at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.
SPEAKER_00: See, the resurrection is proof that God has accepted the payment of his son for my sin and your sins.
SPEAKER_00: These very same things that condemn us, these things that who shall condemn?
SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you who condemns you.
SPEAKER_00: You do.
SPEAKER_00: You are your own worst enemy.
SPEAKER_00: Somebody asked me one time, they said, Man, what do you think the biggest difference in you and me is?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I mean, besides, you know, uh, I mean, just but you you just seem so happy and content and you're always in a good mood.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not always in a good mood.
SPEAKER_00: That's my wife.
SPEAKER_00: She'll tell you, that's he's the most highly functioning bipolar I know.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: God's like, what is what is it, what is the difference?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, just boil it down and don't hold back, be honest.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the difference I believe what the Bible says about me, and you don't.
SPEAKER_00: I don't believe that by hating myself I'm being spiritual.
SPEAKER_00: Matter of fact, I think that's the lazy man's shortcut to holiness.
SPEAKER_00: It's hard to find your identity and how bad you feel about yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: He says it was it was Christ who died.
SPEAKER_00: More than that, he's saying again, the resurrection is notification, payment has been made.
SPEAKER_00: And as if that wasn't enough, he then goes on to say in the very next verse, hey, don't forget this either.
SPEAKER_00: He said, He's at the right hand of God and who indeed is interceding for us.
SPEAKER_00: If there was something more to be done in relation to your sin, or if somehow Jesus didn't do enough, then what is he doing sitting at the right hand of the Father, interceding for you?
SPEAKER_00: He should be pleading for God to forgive you, but no, he is interceding on your behalf.
SPEAKER_00: Remember last week we saw in the Bible you have two intercessors, you have Jesus in heaven and the Holy Spirit in your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Why is he interceding?
SPEAKER_00: By the nature that he has fulfilled that office, he is saying, I'm done being a sin bearer, I'm done atoning for sin.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he meant on the cross when he said, It's finished.
SPEAKER_00: It's finished, it's done.
SPEAKER_00: Who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: It's the truth we started this chapter with.
SPEAKER_00: Look in verse one to four.
SPEAKER_00: Are you still with me?
SPEAKER_00: We're just about done.
SPEAKER_00: You still with me?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse one.
SPEAKER_00: He says, There is therefore no now, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
SPEAKER_00: For God has done finished, accomplished reality.
SPEAKER_00: God has done what the law weakened by our flesh could not do.
SPEAKER_00: How did he do it?
SPEAKER_00: By sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin.
SPEAKER_00: He condemned sin in the flesh.
SPEAKER_00: Why did he do it?
SPEAKER_00: 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.
SPEAKER_00: Because there is no condemnation, who is to condemn?
SPEAKER_00: Fourthly and finally, he asks this question: Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: He picks up the dialogue.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 35, who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: And then he lists these possible things, shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword, as it is written, for your sake, we're being killed all the day long.
SPEAKER_00: We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.
SPEAKER_00: No, in all these things.
SPEAKER_00: Now stop right there.
SPEAKER_00: See, this is the part, this is the most preachable part of this thing.
SPEAKER_00: He says, No, in all these things.
SPEAKER_00: What things?
SPEAKER_00: In tribulation, and distress, and persecution, and famine, and nakedness, and danger, or sword.
SPEAKER_00: By the way, Paul's writing to people in Rome who, most of them within the next 10 years, are going to be killed for their faith.
SPEAKER_00: Nero is going to cover some of these people with tar and set them on fire to light up his gardens at night so he can walk outside and be able to see.
SPEAKER_00: He's going to take some of them, dress them in animal skins, and put them in the Colosseum and loose lions, and they're going to devour them and tear them apart.
SPEAKER_00: Say, well, I don't know what you mean.
SPEAKER_00: If you got your Bible and you're in Romans, just turn to the right to 2 Corinthians, and I'll be done this morning.
SPEAKER_00: 2 Corinthians chapter 11.
SPEAKER_00: I'll just start reading.
SPEAKER_00: It'll come up on the screen if you don't have a Bible.
SPEAKER_00: I'll start reading.
SPEAKER_00: About verse 24.
SPEAKER_00: Paul says, because see, it's in these things, in these tribulations, in these hardships where you don't know what you're going to do that you realize what you really believe.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say this again.
SPEAKER_00: It's in these tribulations where you and I don't know what we're going to do that you realize what it is you actually really believe.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 24, he says, Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes, less one.
SPEAKER_00: Three times I was beaten with rods.
SPEAKER_00: Once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked.
SPEAKER_00: A night and a day I was adrift at sea, on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers.
SPEAKER_00: There's a theme here.
SPEAKER_00: In toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure, and apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.
SPEAKER_00: As if that wasn't enough, Paul says.
SPEAKER_00: Can anything change your mind about God?
SPEAKER_00: Because Paul makes it clear when he says, Hey, who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: He lists all these things and he says, Knowing all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
SPEAKER_00: For I am sure.
SPEAKER_00: And that's the point and the place I'm laboring for you to get to this morning.
SPEAKER_00: To this place of, I am sure, I am convinced.
SPEAKER_00: One translation says, convinced people live with these convictions.
SPEAKER_00: And people that live with convictions, their life is guided by certain principles.
SPEAKER_00: And so it all starts with you and I being able to say this morning with Paul in Romans, I am sure, I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing going on right now, and nothing that's coming down the pipe is gonna separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: As a matter of fact, it's gonna just enhance to me the wonder of it all.
SPEAKER_00: Nor powers, nor height, nor depth.
SPEAKER_00: And then just to make sure, hey, in case I've forgotten anything, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And by the same token, and I'm done this morning, if you're not in Christ Jesus our Lord, if you don't have a relationship with God, not a God, but the only one true God, the God of the Bible, nothing else in all creation can get you there into this place either.
SPEAKER_00: That comes only because of a relationship.
SPEAKER_00: That's why Paul says over and over and over in Romans 8, in Christ Jesus our Lord.
SPEAKER_00: There's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus our Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He begins and ends the chapter in the same way.
SPEAKER_00: And it's simply this all these truths apply to people who are in relationship, not just in belief, but I'm just kind of in curiosity.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're there today, that's great.
SPEAKER_00: There's no pressure.
SPEAKER_00: Just want you to know that you can't claim this as yours unless you are in Christ Jesus our Lord, unless you have bowed your life before the one who wears the crown.
SPEAKER_00: None of this applies to you.
SPEAKER_00: But if you're in Christ, if there's ever been a point where you just kind of bowed and said, I give up.
SPEAKER_00: I trust in what Christ has done for me, what I could never do for myself, and I accept that it's payment, and I want a relationship with Him, then this is for you.
SPEAKER_00: And so the Bible asks questions for which there is no answer.
SPEAKER_00: And not because it wants to make a point, because it wants to provoke us to think about God in a way that we by nature don't think about God.
SPEAKER_00: And so let's just spend a moment doing what the Bible invites us to do, and that is simply thinking about God in light of these four questions.
SPEAKER_00: Stand to your feet.
SPEAKER_00: We speak a blessing over you.
SPEAKER_00: In giving you a mother.
SPEAKER_00: Your God is coming to remind you that He's never going to stop loving you.
SPEAKER_00: He knows.
SPEAKER_00: And He keeps loving.
SPEAKER_00: That is the tangible fleshly person you refer to as a mom.
SPEAKER_00: Today let her be unto you a reminder of the love of your Father, who is in heaven, who knows and keeps loving, and is never, ever, ever gonna stop or have his mind changed about you.
SPEAKER_00: Depart now.
SPEAKER_00: Live and accept love as the chosen of God.
SPEAKER_00: In the name of the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Bless you, you dismiss.