Can Anything Separate You from God's Love? Romans 8:33-39

(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Hello and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Again, we like to remind our new listeners that all the past programs way back to Genesis chapter 1 and as the cake that the studio has just presented us with, we'll show it on the screen here in a minute. We have now been on the air five years, we're into our sixth year, and the Lord has been good. I told people more than once, I never dreamed it would ever go beyond Tulsa and the surrounding communities, but the Lord had other things on his mind and so we have. We've branched out and it's just gone beyond what we could ever ask or think. Also, we've got all the programs available in print, the little books. The books are just simply the program material transcribed word for word. They don't even take out what I call the superfluous words that I use, as much as I try not to. But when Jerry transcribes it, he says, I can't take them out, it wouldn't sound like you. So anyway, the little books are catching on, and we just love to send them out. For missionaries and people that are in prison, I will send them free of charge. For the rest of our listening audience, we like to get enough to cover our costs, which is five bucks if you're here where we can hand them to you, and six if we have to mail them. But that's just about enough to cover our costs on those. All right, I think that's enough for announcements, and let's get right back into Romans chapter 8. We only covered two verses in our last program, and so we're still in verse 32. And I can't overemphasize enough that everything that God now has done and is doing on our behalf is based upon that finished work of the cross, where God even, I think another translation may put it that way, that He even did not spare His Son. Why? So that He could purchase mankind back to Himself. Now the first thing we may wonder, if we're not taught in these things, well why does God have to do this? He's sovereign, He could do any way He wanted, but you see God never goes against His own principles. God is holy, God is righteous, God is omnipotent, He is full of all knowledge, and so He knows what has to be done to reconcile fallen man back to Himself. And so in His knowledge, in His understanding, He is the one who determined that it had to be the sacrificial death of Himself on our behalf. And I'll never forget the first time I taught that Christ was the Creator God, and all people just stood there aghast, and they just sat there aghast, they had never heard this before. And they were so aghast that as we talked about it afterwards over a cup of coffee, and they said, Les are you sure you know what you're talking about? Now this goes back a long time. And I said, I sure hope so, I've never taught it before, but I've just seen it in the last few weeks, and I have to teach it. Well it wasn't long until like so often I read someplace else for the first time where another writer said the same thing, that Christ was the Creator. And of course since then I've seen it now many, many times, but for the longest time you just don't see that very often in print, you don't hear it very often. But yes, Jesus Christ as He died on that cross was the Creator Himself, a member of that Godhead. I think it was Martin Luther who struggled over Psalms 110 verse 1, where it says, And the Lord said unto my Lord, Come sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool. And Martin Luther just couldn't comprehend it, and he had been wrestling with it for almost years. And then one morning he came bursting out of his study as I read the account, and he almost screamed at his wife, Now I see it! And she said, You see what? It was God crying out to God! That's what it is, because Christ is God. And back up here in Romans chapter 8 we looked at it a few weeks ago. Here we have within just a few verses all three persons of that Godhead. I know there are people who refuse to believe that there is a Trinity, and they say God is One. Yes God is One, but He's in three persons. And if you'll just go back up, I didn't intend to do this now in this half hour, but let's go back and look at it a little further ahead in Romans chapter 8. Romans 8.26a "...he that searches the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God." Now there you've got the Spirit, and there you've got God in His triune entity, but then you come down a little further, and of course we're dealing with Christ. So here you have all three persons of the Trinity within just a few verses, and yet whenever you see the term God, it is the triune God, the whole Godhead as Paul calls it. And what is it? God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit. Three distinct entities, and yet one God. Now let's come on down then to verse 33, "...since Christ died, and God let him..." God permitted it to happen. He directed it really that it happened. It had to happen in order to purchase our salvation. There would have never been a man saved, not even in the Old Testament economy, without the work of the cross. It had to be to satisfy a holy and a righteous God. Now then verse 33, "...so who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" Now what does that word elect mean? Chosen. When you elect someone, you designate them to be whatever you intend them to be. And the word election is just exactly that in the Greek. It is an act of choosing, and that's what God has done with every one of them. Now I think I want to finish the chapter, and then I'm going to take you back even to some of the statements that Jesus made Himself in His earthly ministry, that He has chosen us, and that no man comes to God of his own prerogative. Sometimes we like to think, well, I can just decide to go with God anytime I feel like it. Oh no you can't. Oh no you can't, because you have to be back again in that chosen aspect. But on the other hand, like I said in the last program, we have that whosoever will. All right, reading the verse again, "...so who can lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" It is God who justifies, not our neighbor, not our boss, not our husband, not our wife. We don't have to give an account to any of them. It's God, the triune God, the creator God, the sustaining God. He's the one who determines who we are and what we are in the realm of the Spirit. And then verse 34, "...so if He is the one who has chosen us, if He is the one who has forgiven us, if He is the one that has taken us unto Himself, then who can condemn us?" Who is He that condemns? It is Christ that died, yea rather is risen again. Now you see how Paul is constantly hammering that away? Everything revolves around that finished work of the cross. The fact that Christ died, His divine blood had to be shed, because remember I've used it over and over on this program. Without the shedding of blood what? There is no remission. You can't bypass the blood, it had to happen. And so He's the one who died, He's the one who rose from the dead, and He's the one who is at the right hand of God interceding for us. He's the one who is watching over us, He's the one who has promised. Who can be against you? I'm for you, and never lose sight of that. But like I said in the last program, don't ever interpret that to mean that nothing bad can happen to a believer. Don't ever get the idea that the things of this world can't attack the believer, and Satan can transform himself into an angel of light, and he can confuse the issues. But we have these promises, if we'll rest on them, that God is still in total control, He's sovereign. Now we're coming into a series of verses that will probably disturb one group of people of various denominations, and that is that group of people who feel that you cannot be assured of your salvation. You have to hope that you make it, you have to work like the dickens to hang on, and you have to be sure that you don't ever sin in such a way that you will lose your salvation, and end up in hell instead of God's heaven. These verses are just going to fly in the face of that kind of thinking. I can't help it, because all I'm going to show you is what the Book says. Who shall separate us? That means just tribulation. Now let's just stop. That word tribulation is used I think something like 29 times in the New Testament, and always tribulation is associated, I won't say always, maybe with one exception, but most of the time tribulation is associated to the activity surrounding the believer. You go back into Revelation, let's go back and look at it. Some day we're going to teach this part of Revelation, the letters to the seven churches in the opening chapters. Revelation for example chapter 2. Let's just drop down for sake of time into verse 9 and 10, and it's the letter to Smyrna, and Smyrna of course actually meant just like myrrh, that myrrh does not exude its fragrance until it's crushed. Now this is exactly what the church at Smyrna was indicating. That the more persecution crushed those believers, the more they exuded their testimony. See that's why Satan had to give up persecuting the early church, because he couldn't get ahead of it. The more he persecuted, the more it thrived. And so he took the office attack, and that was join them. And then of course Christianity began to slide. But all right here in Revelation chapter 2, the letter to Smyrna in verse 9, he says, I know thy works, and what's the next word? Tribulation. See God knew about it, and the church of Smyrna was going through horrible pressure. I know thy tribulation and poverty, but you're rich. Oh they were poor in material things, because the persecution was taking them away from their income. It probably took them away from their job situation. It took all their wealth away if they had any. That was part of the persecution. But oh spiritually they were what? Rich. See the church today is just opposite, and that's what the letter to Laodicea is all about. All right so he says, thou art rich. I know the blasphemy of them who say they are Jews and are not. And I think the word Jews there is referring to again believers, but they weren't. But they are the synagogue of Satan. They were imposters. Now verse 10. Fear none of those things which thou shalt. What? Suffer. Believers suffer? Oh you bet they did. Behold the devil shall cast some of you into prison for their faith, that you may be tried or tested, and you shall have, and here's the word again, tribulation. Ten days. And I think the tribulation in ten days was spoken of ten distinct periods of time during the Roman Empire when the church came under horrible pressure. But these believers didn't give up. They went through it, because the Lord had promised to be with them. Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. All right back to Romans again. So we're going to suffer tribulation. As I mentioned in the last program, it's only been in the last couple hundred years that western civilization at least has been able to guarantee the rights of the individual, and the freedom of worship, and so forth. But for the most part this has been unheard of. We're living in an extremely different time than most Christians had to live in, because we do have a government that so far at least guarantees our our rights to assembly and to religion. I don't like the word, but whatever. All right let's go on. Romans 8. Tribulation or distress or persecution. Can the devil bring in enough persecution to force a believer out of his place in the body of Christ? Never. Because God is guaranteed because of the work of the cross we are secure. Not because of what we have done, not because of what we merit, but only because of what He has done. And let's never lose sight of that. We never maintain our assurance of salvation and our security because of who we are or what we are. That is never part of the picture. Everything that keeps us secure is that finished work of Christ. All right read on. Can famine, what did we read back in Hebrews in the last program? They experienced famine, many of them probably died of starvation, but that didn't separate them from the love of God. Nakedness, Paul mentioned it in those verses we read in 2nd Corinthians 11. He went through times of nakedness, he went through times of cold, he went through times when he had no redress from the heat, he was thirsty. Peril or sword, how did Paul die? Beheaded. He wasn't spared the Roman sword, there is nothing saying that we will be, but nevertheless the promises are secure that none of this will separate us from our Lord. Now verse 36, as it is written, For thy sake, for the sake of the Christ of the cross, for thy sake we are killed all the day long. We are counted as what? Sheep for the slaughter. I read an account not too long ago, someone years back when Chicago was still the capital of the meat packing business, and they would slaughter the cattle, and the sheep, and the hogs all within one huge complex. And as this guy was being taken on a tour through all this, he just couldn't help but notice that as he went from the hog killing area with all of the squealing, I don't know how many of you ever heard hogs squeal, but oh they can put up a commotion, and they can make more noise than you can imagine. But then he went from the hog kill, to the sheep kill, and what happened? Utter silence. And I've witnessed it myself, I'll never forget it, it just made me so mad I could have killed the little animal. Do you know how they take sheep to the slaughter? They have a goat, and that goat leads them down the alleyways, and up to the place where they are ready to be killed, and then he slips out a side door, the goat does. And then he goes back and gets another bunch, it's just amazing. But those sheep just go to the slaughter with utter silence, not a sound. And this is the analogy Paul draws of the believer, that's what we are. We may someday come to the place where we too will just go like sheep to the slaughter. Are we going to scream and squeal like a bunch of pigs? No, because that's not the way God works. Even the Lamb of God Himself, what did Isaiah say? He answered not a word. Why? Because there was no need for Him to scream and argue, and so it has been with Christians down through the ages. I was mulling all these things over earlier this morning. You take a lot of macho people, a lot of the hunks today, and they think Christianity is for women and children. They've got it all wrong, because you see back in the days when persecution was running rampant, it took 10 times more men to stand up for the slaughter, to be burned at the stake, and to be put on the rack. You all know what the rack was, when their bones were just literally broken and not killed. Hey, that's when it takes a man, and I'll bet a lot of these so-called machos would never be able to hold a candle to it. But you see Paul says that this is all part and parcel of what God has imparted to us, the promise that even though we may have to go through these things, and many have, it will never separate us from the love of Christ. And remember, this life at most, and I've said this over and over, at most maybe we would be fortunate enough to live 95 or 100 or a few over, but even 100 years, what is that compared to eternity? Eternity, never ending, forever and ever, and yet the human race will not consider that. All they look at is, what can I enjoy in the here and now? But this book looks at everything in the light of eternity, and so this is why we have to take this blessed assurance that regardless of what may happen, nothing can separate us from our spending eternity with our Creator God. Well let's move on. Chapter 8 again, verse 37. Ephesians 4, verse 37. Ephesians 4, verse 37. Now wait a minute, those sheep going down that alley quietly to their death, conquerors? That's the analogy. We're led like sheep to the slaughter, but the next verse says yet we're conquerors. Fantastic, isn't it? And so we don't have to mind being meek. We don't have to mind being quiet. We don't have to mind coming under persecution and do it without squealing like a hog, because in the end we're still going to be more than conquerors through the One that loved us. That's where it's all at. We can't do it. You and I and the energy of the flesh can do nothing. We are nothing. And then verse 38. Paul says, I am, what's the word? Persuaded. Now what does it mean to be persuaded? Totally convinced. You see, you remember I think it was old King Agrippa back there in Acts and Paul had been witnessing to him more than once, and old King Agrippa said, Almost Paul, you've persuaded me. But I don't believe he ever did. You know why? Because Agrippa could never be convinced that what Paul was telling him was true. And that's where a lot of people are today. They hear the Gospel, they hear this book taught, but they can't be convinced. They just say, I can't believe it. And I've had people approach me and say, Well what have you got? And I'll tell them, but I can't believe that. I can't believe that that's all it takes. I'll never forget I had a young man in my class down at Wilburton, and I think he may still be getting the tapes, and if he does I hope he hears this, and it will jog his memory. He was one of these kids who from the time he was about 5 or 6 years old had no home life, he had no parents, he just made it on his own. And he came up after class one night and said, Les do you mean to tell me I can have all of this free for nothing? And I said, Yes. He said, I can't believe that. And then he told me of how he had to scratch and fight for every little bit of food he had as he was a kid growing up. And he said, Now you can tell me I can have all of this for nothing? He said, I can't believe that. And I said, Well I'm sorry, but until you believe it, you won't have it. And so he left. But I'm hoping that maybe sometime in the interim he has still come to his senses that yes, all of this is ours for the taking if we'll believe it, and that's where it's at. Believe it. I'm persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels. Now why do you suppose the Holy Spirit inspired the apostle to start with death rather than like we would normally put it, neither life nor death? But hadn't we put it? It's put neither death nor life. Now stop and think for a moment. What's he driving at? Death is the easy way out. Death is the easy way. See, that's why we have so many suicides. They think that that's their easiest way out. They can't cope with their problems. They can't cope with their circumstances. So they take their life. That ends it, for this life is concerned. But what about life? Oh, we're living in a world that's filled with heartache and turmoil. A life that's lived with all kinds of opposition to the home and to the family. Life is difficult. Life is not easy. In fact I was reading a book someone sent me a while back, and I almost had to quit reading it, because all he was pointing out were all of these things that make life difficult. True, but it wasn't necessarily what I wanted to be thinking about. All the difficulties that people have to put up with, their heartache and their sorrows. So you see death is easy by comparison, but even all the difficulties of life, Paul says, will never separate us. I wish I had more time. Now the next word are principalities and powers. I may not be able to end this yet tonight. Principalities and powers, nor things present, nor things to come. Now the word principalities here in the Greek is the word archio, but nevertheless it deals with people who are in a position, a high position, a principality. And then the word power here is from the Greek word dunamis, from which we get dynamo, and it means energy. Now what Paul is delining here is that principalities, the position, and the energy that comes from that position are going to do everything they can to take us away from the love of Christ. I wanted to go even to Ephesians chapter 6 where he uses the same word. We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against what? Principalities and powers, only there it�s a little different Greek word, and there the word power does not speak of energy, but it speaks of power as Jesus gave to the twelve when they went out and could perform miracles and so on and so forth. But nevertheless the powers that be in the realm of Satan are positioned and they are loaded with energy that seemingly never runs out. Right to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, OK 74552. That�s Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, OK 74552. 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