I invite you, if you have your Bibles, to turn to Romans chapter 8. This was Joe's request. So Romans chapter 8. He asked me particularly to focus in on verses 37 to 39, but I'm going to take a preacher's prerogative and expand that a little bit. We're going to begin in verse 31. If you know anything about the outline of Romans, you know that the first part of Romans, Paul is really developing a theology that leads to a practice of Christian living. We find the practice kind of laid out in 12 to 16. 1 to 11, we have this theology that is building. And in many ways, when we come to the end of chapter 8 here in Romans, We're reaching the summit of what Paul wants to say, which is why I've titled the sermon, Reaching the Summit. The chapters 9 to 11, he deals with the Jews and how God is dealing with the Gentiles and the Jews. But here, in chapter 8, he is coming to a climax in terms of God's dealing with rebellious people. And he's made it abundantly clear that the wages of sin is death, we all have sinned and we have all fallen short of the glory of God, but there is a mercy, there is a life that is outside of that, that is beyond that. There's a righteousness that is greater than the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees. It's a righteousness that is given to us by God, and therefore we are counted to be His children. And nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ. And that's where He is, this is the summit point where we are here at the end of Romans chapter 8. So let me read it for you. Let's read it together in our hearts and then we will ask the Lord for his blessing as we walk through it. What shall we then say to these things? 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 with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies, who is to condemn. Christ Jesus is the one who died. More than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? 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. We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. No. In all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For 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 will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Father, as we open this word, we certainly have that sense as it is read to us that we come to deep, deep, marvelous, wonderful truths. Holy Spirit, we do pray that you would be our teacher this evening, that you would help us to understand, not only with our heads, more importantly, to understand with our hearts what it is that you want to communicate through these words to your people, how we are to hold on to them for encouragement, for strength, as we live out our life before you. We pray this all in Jesus' name. Amen. Start with the I coach a basketball team and a couple of years ago we had a new girl join our team. She was from a rival program and she had decided that she was going to play for us. And we had an opening year tournament and she was very, very nervous. In her words, I was like super duper nervous. about going to this tournament. I was nervous that I was going to be alone. I was nervous that I was going to be left out. I was nervous that people weren't going to like me. I was nervous about a lot of things. It struck me because, you know, this is a 15-year-old girl, but it is such a true condition for all of us throughout life. I don't think we ever really outgrow this sense, like, am I going to be accepted? Am I going to be loved? Am I going to fit in? There's this sense of alienation Do we really belong? Philosophers talk about it. Heidegger, Kant, others. Recently I came across a way that Heidegger talked about the ways that we want to deal with this sense of alienation. He says we become absorbed by everydayness. We give ourselves over to those producers of bustling activity who are more than happy to take the burden of being alienated off of our hands. We learn to forget it by letting ourselves being taken over by the distractions and entertainments and chatter of the world. We trade one sort of self-alienation for another that gives the illusion of belonging. You belong here is a lie that is told to us from everyone from Disney to Vegas. We try to cover up this internal angst that we have by letting everyone else sell us an identity, or at least a distraction from needing one. There is a core condition that people following the fall have always struggled with. Do we belong? Are we loved? Am I really accepted? And I'm guessing that many of you can relate to this. Certainly the Christians in this first century Roman world could relate to this. This was a hard time to be alive. You were under Roman occupation and persecution. You were liable at any moment to have to carry the gear of a Roman soldier. You did not know what the Roman war machine was going to demand from you day-to-day basis in terms of taxes and all of those difficult things. It was a hard time to be alive. And that question, you know, Do I belong? Am I loved? Does anybody care for me?" would be preeminent on the mind of the first century Christian, and that is who Paul is speaking to. Paul is speaking to Israelites who have been displaced. He is speaking to sort of the those who are cohabitating in the Roman Empire. People have been brought from Macedonia and all sorts of different places that are living together. And he says there is a belonging that transcends anything that the world can offer you. There is a belonging that is more sure than anything that you can actually touch. There is a belonging through Christ that will meet your deepest needs. And that's what I wanna, that's what I want us to see. I believe that's what Paul wants us to see, what God would have us see as we walk through the culmination of what Paul has been arguing for, what Paul has been advocating for throughout the book of Romans. But as we go up, I want us to recognize two clouds, as it were, that we have to come through in order to see the summit, to see what it is that Christ is offering us. And there are two clouds, two questions. The first is, am I worthy? And the second is, am I safe? If you notice in this passage, you see that Paul says, who shall bring any charge against God's elect? This is verse 33. It is God who justifies who is to condemn. Christ Jesus is the one who died. More than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God. Here, Paul deals with this constant struggle that we have in our person of facing the cloud of condemnation. You know, am I worthy? Is the grace of Christ that is being offered here, is the grace of Christ something that I am deserving of? And the condemnation comes from various places. Condemnation comes from the world. The world looks at us and says, you know, you're all there in church on Sunday night, but I know your life. I know how you live Monday to Saturday. I know the things that you think about. I know the things that you've done. How can you possibly be a Christian? How do you possibly expect me to believe that this God who saves is all that He says He is when I see the reality of your life? And the reality is, we have to say, guilty as charged. There are so many ways, day in, day out, week in, week out, where I fall short of adorning the profession of faith, as we talked about this evening, where I fall short in my life of living that out. I fall short in my relationship with my kids, with my relationship with my wife. I need to ask for repentance. I fall short in my relationship with my congregants, parishioners. Constantly, I am falling short. And I trust, if you're human, that you would have to make the same profession. But our profession of faith is not based on our righteousness. Our profession of faith is based on Christ's righteousness. And that is what we are holding to. So the world looks at us and says, you don't live up to the standard that you yourself set. And we say, You're right, but Christ has lived up to that standard and it's his robes for mine. It's his righteousness in place of my unrighteousness. That's the story that we tell. So we get this condemnation from the world partially because they misunderstand what the gospel is. And sometimes as a church, we have to admit that we've given them the wrong impression of what the gospel is. You know, we have painted the picture that the gospel is if you believe the right things, if you do the right things, then you're all right. And we've left out that part of the fact that none of us can actually believe all the right things. None of us can actually do the right things. We are all dependent on the grace of God. From the prodigal son who runs away to the elder brother who stays home and says, Father, I've slaved for you all these years. We are dependent upon the grace of God. But not only are we condemned by the world, we're also condemned by our own hearts. Some of you are familiar with these words from 1 John, by this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our hearts before him. For whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our hearts and he knows everything. We hear the words of condemnation because they start with an echo in our own hearts. Satan is the great accuser of the brothers and he wants to get in there and he wants us to look at our own righteousness. And he wants us to say, you're not worthy. And so we look at ourselves, we take our eyes off of the cross, off of the finished work of Jesus. Like Peter, we look at the waves all around us instead of keeping our eyes on Christ, and our own hearts condemn us. And one of the things that Paul is saying here is you have to go through the clouds. Recognize that condemnation is going to come. Condemnation from the outside, condemnation from the inside. But there is a greater truth. Who is to condemn? You know, is there any condemnation? Paul will say earlier in Romans chapter 8, there is now therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. That's cloud number one. Cloud number two is not so much am I worthy, but am I safe? And this is a big question. I mean, if you look at the security industry, the money that goes into the security industry in the United States is absolutely unbelievable. Whether it's your home security systems, whether it is your internet security systems protecting your identity, whether it is the firearm industry, whatever it might be that you lump into that security system. I mean, the dollars that we pour into that are astronomical. Why? Because we're all asking this question. We have this desire. We want to be safe. And so with Paul, we're not only asking questions of condemnation, but we're asking what can separate us from the love of Christ. 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, we're regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. Tribulation is something that we recognize is part of the Christian life. And of course, obviously we're mindful of Joe and his profession of faith this evening, but we're mindful that we're all on this journey. Am I worthy? Am I safe? Can I really trust God? Can I trust God if the world is destroyed? Can I trust God if my sense of security and the job that I have or this relationship that I have, if that craters, can I still trust God? Is there anything that can separate us from the love of God? And of course, Paul's answer to that is no. Whether it's condemnation or tribulation, whether it's from within or whether it's from without, you are worthy and you are secure, as Paul would preach it to us. But how is it that these things are true? How is it that this is so? Well, when we come through the clouds, what we see, what we gain is a panoramic view of the mercies of God that are brought forward in the person of Jesus Christ. We see it particularly in three ways here in this passage. We see, first of all, the victorious Christ, verse 34, who is to condemn? Nobody. No tribulation can stand against us. Why? Because Christ Jesus is the one who died, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, and who is interceding for us. Throughout the book of Romans, Paul has been painting a picture of a story that is contra the story that the world is telling. And Rome was telling a story. The story was that there was a son of God. The story was that he was a conqueror. The story was that you owed your allegiance to him. The story was that he would provide. And the answer to the story that Rome was telling was, Caesar. Caesar was the one who was counted the son of God. Caesar was the one who was victorious. Caesar was the one who would protect you and who would keep you secure. Caesar was the one that would give you identity as a Roman citizen. All of these things. That was what the world promised. But Paul from the very beginning has been talking really in very seditious language as he takes on so much of this language and he says, no, if you go back to Romans chapter one and the first five verses, he says, the true son of God, the only son of God. was the Lord Jesus Christ, and He is Lord. He is the one who stands preeminent. He is the one who is the victor. He is the one who is worthy of your worship, who is worthy of your hallelujahs, who is worthy of your glory. He is the one who died, who rose from the grave, who ascended into heaven and is now reigning from the right hand of the Father. He paints a picture to counter anything that the world would offer. And that is the true picture for us here and now. We live in a world right now where war has come into our world in a different way. than it's come into many of our lifetimes. We haven't experienced it exactly like this. And there is a threat of it expanding, and there is the threat of it going from different place to place. And there is a certain sense in which we rightly say, I wonder what will happen. I wonder what my kids and my grandkids will experience. I wonder about, you know, could it ever cross the Atlantic? We rightly say those things, but then we come back to a truth that says, I can wonder, but I know. I know who the victor is. I know who is reigning currently from the right hand of the Father. I know who has defeated death and Satan and the devil and all of his dominions. I know the end of this story. I know the one who is the victor." But not only do we meet the victorious Christ here, but we also meet the interceding Christ. We see that particularly in verse 34 as we're given sort of the picture of the victorious Christ. We are told that he is indeed interceding for us. Again, picture those first century Christians. Those first century Christians, they lived a much tougher life on the outside than any of us will ever live. And how do they get through it? How does this slave to this Roman official, how do they get through it? How does this person who has been displaced from their home, how do they go? One of the things that Paul uses to encourage them, and I love this because it is so true now, is that he says, not only is Christ the victor, but Christ is interceding for you. You know, think about the intercession of Christ on the cross as the Roman soldiers were nailing the spikes into his wrists and into his feet in order to suspend him on the instrument that will eventually take his human life from him. What is he doing? He's interceding. Father, forgive them. for they do not know what they are doing. He looks on these people and he loves them. And I don't know if we'll meet some of those soldiers in heaven or not. There's a possibility. There's a possibility not. But I know that the intercession of Christ has not diminished. He continues to intercede for you and for me. And so we face these things all the time in our life, and we're like, how can I face this? How can I face this very real and present temptation? How can I face this very real and present conflict? How can I face living in a world that seems to have turned its back on the truths of the gospel? How can I do this? Well, part of the answer is Christ is interceding for you right now. He knows you. He knows what you are facing, and he is praying to his Father. Five bleeding wounds he bears, received on Calvary. They pour effectual prayers. They strongly plead for me. The intercession of Christ never ceases, and I hope that is of great encouragement to those of you as we seek to live out this Christian life. And all of this culminates In what we see in verses 35 to 39, there's this inclusio where it says, what shall separate us from the love of Christ? Or who shall separate us from the love of Christ? We read through tribulation, distress, persecution. Paul concludes and he says, no, none of this can separate us because we are more than conquerors. I don't know what that means. I do not know what being more than a conqueror means. I've thought about it. I've meditated on it. Maybe some of you have deeper insights. I'd love to hear them. I wonder if part of it is the nature in which Christ has conquered. It's not just simply the conquering of a Caesar. You know, a Caesar went with brute force and brute power, and you didn't have to love the Caesar to be conquered by the Caesar. But our Lord Jesus Christ comes in a different way, and he conquers us not by exercising might, not with swords, loud clashings, and roll of stirring drums, but he conquers by giving himself up to the cross. And he says, you are more than conquerors because you are loved. You are loved and nothing can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor heights, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation I mean, all creation, not just the birds and the bees, but think about the black holes and the wormholes and the stars and the far-flung universes. Nothing, nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Remember, when Paul prays for the Ephesians, he prays that they would be strengthened. And how is it that they are going to be strengthened? By knowing the love of God. When we come through the clouds and we're asking these questions about belonging and worthiness, we're asking these questions about safety and security and tribulation, We are called, Paul calls us, Paul calls all of us on our journey to look at Jesus. Jesus is the one who is victorious. Jesus is the one who is interceding for us. And Jesus is the one who loves us. Whether you are a prodigal and you have been in a far country, you have been seeking your own joy through hedonistic pleasures far, far, far from the home of your father, or whether you are the elder brother. And you've been there, you've been dutifully slaving for Him, but still intending to manipulate the Father in order to get what you want through your own obedience. You remember, each of them is loved. The father pursues the younger son, running, making a fool of himself in that culture in order to embrace him and bring him back. And when the older son won't go into the party, the father goes out to find him and he says, son, I have always loved you. Come in. You know, this your brother who was lost is found and he has come home. The love of Christ, the love of the Father, the Spirit, the Trinity is so real. And Paul says, do you know it? Have you ever experienced a love like that? Because once you have, you know that nothing, nothing is going to separate you from belonging to Christ. You are fiercely, fiercely loved. Tony Dungy is a Super Bowl winning coach. Some of you know a little bit about him, a little bit of his story, loves the Lord. In 2005-ish, he lost his oldest son, James. He took his own life. And Tony shared at his funeral. And then later on, he was actually sharing at a prayer breakfast of some sort that had NFL players and all of that. And he talked about just the experience of losing his son and what that meant. And he shared some stories of, you know, based on his sharing, how parents reunited with their kids and gave them a hug and loved them. He talked about how they were able to donate some of James's organs to science and gotten letters about two people that had received corneas and now could He said, even at the funeral, or after the funeral, there was a family friend that was there, and it was a woman that had never submitted her life to Christ, and just walking with the Dungys through this, she gave her life to the Lord. And he said, these things thrilled my heart. Even in the midst of the difficulties, there was some encouragement for these things happening. But he said, I have to be honest with you. If God had come to me before all this and had a conversation with me and said, I can help some people see, I can heal some relationships between family members, I can save some people's life, I can even give some people eternal life, but I will have to take your son to do it. You make the choice. He said, I have to be honest with you. I don't know if I could have done it. I don't know if I would have given my son in order to see all of those things happen. But the coach said, God has made that choice. every time, faced with a rebellious people, faced with a people who were facing their own damnation, he gave a son in order that we might know him. This is what Paul says, what can we say to these things? 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 with him graciously give us all things? Joe, you have made a great profession because you have a great God. And all of us who stand before this Lord recognize that it's not about us. It's not about our orthodoxy. It's not about our righteousness. It's not about this, that, or the other thing, but we have a great God who did not spare his own son. How will he not also along with him graciously give us all things? Will you pray with me? Oh Lord, this word. it comes to us in such a real living way as we think about the first century Christians and how what they walked through as they, we think about our own lives. We recognize the fears of condemnation. We recognize the fears of safety and security. But then we look at Jesus and we see a victorious Jesus. We see an interceding Jesus. We see a Jesus who has loved his people. while we were still sinners. We see a God who did not spare His own Son. Lord, help us to trust You more. Help us to rest in You more. Help us to know that love that passes all understanding. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.