Romans 8:31-39
Overcoming Everything

What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave Him up for us all -- how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died -- more than that, who was raised to life -- is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
    "For your sake we face death all day long;
      we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

New International Version

There is no more profound event in the history of the world than the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ! In that three day span, we witness "the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world." We are dumbfounded that this was not a clueless lamb, but a 33-year-old man, fully human, yet fully God, whose entire existence had been focused around this event. I cannot wrap my feeble mind around all that was required to gain my forgiveness, but we all can know that God was willing to give everything to rescue us from sin's destruction.

That's one of Paul's points in writing this passage. If "God so loved that he gave his only begotten Son," then there cannot be any limits to God's love for us! What else could God have done to demonstrate this love more clearly?

To put this in the perspective of our weak ways, think back on the last opportunity you had for giving a gift to someone close to you. If you gave a very expensive present, but one without meaning, it was just an expensive gadget. If you gave a gift that had a special meaning, it connected you more to that special person. As an example, my college-age daughter and I have had many special times at coffee shops, so her gift to me at Christmas of a coffee shop gift certificate reminded me so much of what we have shared. I found a way to make the warm glow of that gift last! I used the certificate to buy coffee beans, so for the next several months, every time I make a pot of coffee at home, it will remind me of her gift and her love. Now consider that, in the death and resurrection of Jesus, God gave the most valuable and the most profoundly personal gift that this universe has ever seen! God's love is awesome in every sense of the word.

Paul's next point shows how God has short-circuited the Eternal Justice System in our favor through this event! We are no longer to be tried for our sins in front of an impartial judge, and we know if we were, we would all be found guilty. At its most basic, a fair judicial process consists of the one who was wronged, accusing the one who did wrong, in front of a fair, powerful judge. In later Old Testament times, theologians envisioned Satan, the Accuser, bringing charges of our sins and failings against us, with God as the Judge. Paul sees that Jesus has taken us out of the witness stand and sat us in the Judge's lap! Who is going to bring a charge against a judge's son in that judge's courtroom? But that's not right, we object! Jesus Christ answers, "oh yes, it is, for we already had your trial, and I already served your sentence."

What a horrible sentence we earned! "The wages of sin is death," and we all deserve everlasting Death for rejecting God's ways for our own foolish ways. "I served your sentence," Jesus explains, "and I conquered it, too." Again, I have no concept of how that could be, for there is nothing in my tiny, time-trapped, earthly existence that can fathom eternal ways. I don't have to understand how Death was conquered, I only in faith need to accept Jesus's way to Life.

This is the core of Paul's third point in this passage. We know God's gift is personal and meaningful, but what kind of gift is it that God bestows on us? Well, really special gifts meet a need, and what do we need? God knew we didn't need more "things," for we wear things out, or abuse them, or become so enthralled with them we lose sight of what is valuable. So, God would give us something inside -- what do we really need? We receive Joy and Love from God in abundance as our relationship with God grows, but we lose Joy and Love so quickly if we have lost our Peace. And Peace in us vanishes like a morning mist if all we have to guard it from eternal evil is our mere temporal humanity. At the vortex of evil is the end result, Death... so Jesus conquered Death. Just so we could see what He did, He also conquered physical death and rose, alive, from the tomb.

If Jesus conquered Death, Paul argues, what else is there that could oppose us? How can anything in heaven or earth keep God from us if Death itself falls before Jesus? The foundation of evil's hold on our souls has been shattered, and the whole poisonous structure of evil has collapsed. One common motion picture theme is the "epic battle between good and evil", but the only true, eternal battle between Good and Evil was no contest! John wrote of this overwhelming victory in Revelation 19:11-20. Out from heaven comes Jesus Christ, the living Word of God, on a horse. With Him are legions of unarmed angels from heaven, completely unprepared to fight, for at the very instant that the fully-revealed Jesus comes onto the scene, all evil dies in His presence, and the angel viewing it all from the sun calls in all the vultures from around the world because there are so many soldiers of evil who have been killed.

Through the Resurrection, we are wholly and eternally free. We are free from forces we didn't know existed, and the news is so unbelievable to us that we still forget often and act as if we were still prisoners. In fact, this freedom is so profound that it allows us to choose to become prisoners again, as foolish and nonsensical as that choice is. We are free to become what God made us to be, we are free to be ourselves, and nothing can stop us once we start, in the power of the Risen Christ, to become ourselves.