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5 Questions to answer a Question: What shall we say to these things?
5 Questions to answer a Question: What shall we say to these things?
What are these things?
Paul clearly has stated throughout Romans several truths that are undeniable: God has foreknown, predestined, called, justified, sanctified and glorified us. We are saved because of the glorious grace of God displayed in the birth, life and death of Jesus Christ and secured by his resurrection from the dead and as such there is a great truth for you and me here:
You did not EARN your salvation.
You were foreknown, predestined, called, justified, sanctified and glorified and you didn’t do one thing to deserve or earn that.
So Paul says, “So what?” Why does it matter that these things are true? What is the hope we should derive from this truth. There are some truths that are fleshed out of this truth and this is where Paul is headed. You and I didn’t earn our salvation, so what?
Question 1: If God is for us, who can be against us?
Question 1: If God is for us, who can be against us?
Paul’s first question Paul asks to the question of what shall we say to these things is this, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” This simple question is a rhetorical question that if put another way would be ridiculous.
If Paul had said, “Who can be against us?”
The answer to that question could be answered in a whole host of ways. Paul lists these in v. 35
The unbelieving world
Powers:
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
We have spiritual adversaries that are powerfully aligned against God and his kingdom.
Indwelling Sin:
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.
Inside of our hearts is sin that would destroy our faith and leave it shipwrecked on the shores of life. Indwelling sin is a powerful adversary.
Death and the specter of death is the ultimate separation of man from God
As John Stott stated, “The world, the flesh and the devil are together marshalled against us, and are much too strong for us. Sometimes under calamity the whole universe seems to be against us.”
But Paul gives a qualifier: If. If God is for us and this if changes the whole dynamic of the question. If the God of the universe is with us. The all-powerful sovereign over every molecule of matter in space and time is for us, the who can possibly be against us.
Since God, as Paul has noted before in Romans, has foreknown, predestined, called, justified, and glorified us then who can be against us?
But how do we know that he for us?
Question 2: 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?
Question 2: 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?
The second question answers the objection to the first. How can we know that the God of the universe is for us? Well, we know this because the God of the universe sent his son Jesus to die for us.
Paul logic is this: The reason that I am sure that God is for me is the fact that he sent his Son to this fallen world, to suffer the humiliation of humanity, to be tempted by Satan, maligned by his creation, beaten by sinner, crucified by the religious, and die and be buried in a borrowed tomb.
And if God would do this? Why would he not be for us?
The Message of Romans c. Five Unanswerable Questions (31–39)
‘Who delivered up Jesus to die? Not Judas, for money; not Pilate, for fear; not the Jews, for envy;—but the Father, for love
-Octavius Winslow
Question 3: Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect?
Question 3: Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect?
The third question is this: Who brings the charge? Who in the world can judge the world?
We tend to judge everything. The psalms often speak of God’s righteous judgment. It is God who judges men:
For by fire will the Lord enter into judgment, and by his sword, with all flesh; and those slain by the Lord shall be many.
No one else in all of creation has the right to judge the universe but its righteous creator, and if God does not bring judgment against those he has foreknown, predestined, called, justified, sanctified and glorified, then who will?
What a glorious truth: God saved you. And once he saved you he worked in you a righteousness, as his elect child, that will never go away.
The God who foreknew you, predestined you. And the God who predestined you called you to salvation. And the same God who called you to salvation justified you. And that self-same God will SANCTIFY you and one day glorify you.
Question Four: Who is to Condemn?
Question Four: Who is to Condemn?
The fourth question is like the third. Some may answer the question of “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect” with “Jesus, the son who God gave up”.
Paul answers this objection with this truth:
“It is Christ who died - more than that, who was raised- who is at the right hand of God, who is interceding for us.”
Just as it is God who is the judge, if we were in court the plantiff in our trial would be Christ himself.
It was for our sins that Christ suffered all things. Perhaps Christ would bring a charge against us.
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father.”
Paul’s answer is Christ. Yes, Christ could condemn us, but Christ proclaims before his death that he lays down his life for us and that he is the only one who had the authority to lay down his life.
This Christ is now, having died in our place, and risen from his grave, and sitting in the place of the highest honor at the right hand of God, now intercedes on behalf of the elect whom God loves.
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
Question 5: Who shall separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus
Question 5: Who shall separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus
Finally we come to our final question and in it we find the Doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints.
This doctrine is encapsulated in Paul’s question and in the answer we find in v. 37-39
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.
In this we find this glorious truth: For those who belong to God nothing can keep God from calling, justifying, sanctifying and glorifying us.
Why?
Because we cannot LOSE what we did not EARN.
Because we cannot LOSE what we did not EARN.
God will preserve those he loves.
This is the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. Now I hold to this doctrine. I do not hold to the doctrine of eternal security of the believer. Now that may bother some of you, but let me tell you why?
Security means “no matter what I’m going to heaven.”
Perseverance means, “no matter what God will bring me sanctify me and bring me safely home with him.”
One says, as Sinclair Ferguson, “There is no mere doctrine of “the security” of the believer, as though God’s keeping of us took place irrespective of the lives we live. Indeed there is no such thing in the New Testament as a believer whose perseverance is so guaranteed that he can afford to ignore the warning notes which are sounded so frequently.”
In other words, we are saved to something: Sanctification and Eternal Life and not from something.
This doctrine has been taught by believers throughout history in various ways, but in the Synod of Dort this truth was proclaimed in great beauty and detail.
Article 4
The wrath of God abideth upon those who believe not this gospel. But such as receive it, and embrace Jesus the Savior by a true and living faith, are by Him delivered from the wrath of God and from destruction, and have the gift of eternal life conferred upon them.
Article 7
(Those God Saves) though by nature neither better nor more deserving than others, but with them involved in one common misery, God hath decreed to give to Christ, to be saved by Him, and effectually to call and draw them to His communion by His Word and Spirit, to bestow upon them true faith, justification and sanctification; and having powerfully preserved them in the fellowship of His Son, finally, to glorify them for the demonstration of His mercy and for the praise of His glorious grace...
And in the Baptist Faith and Message
Article 5:
God’s Purpose of Grace
Election is the gracious purpose of God, according to which He regenerates, justifies, sanctifies, and glorifies sinners. It is consistent with the free agency of man, and comprehends all the means in connection with the end. It is the glorious display of God’s sovereign goodness, and is infinitely wise, holy, and unchangeable. It excludes boasting and promotes humility.
All true believers endure to the end. Those whom God has accepted in Christ, and sanctified by His Spirit, will never fall away from the state of grace, but shall persevere to the end. Believers may fall into sin through neglect and temptation, whereby they grieve the Spirit, impair their graces and comforts, and bring reproach on the cause of Christ and temporal judgments on themselves; yet they shall be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.
Today, if you are in Christ let this truth be a great balm for your soul: The one who foreknew, elected, called and justified you will sanctify you and ultimately glorify you.
But this also means that if we see no sanctification in our lives, and by sanctification I’m not talking about being a better person, but a growth in our desire for holiness, a strengthening in our desire to know and be known by God, then we are saved.
But if you don’t, then you never were truly saved.
John MacArthur states, “A guarantee of our inheritance is our persevering faith. Peter said we are protected by God’s power through faith (1 Pet. 1:5). Faith is God’s gift to us; we don’t generate it on our own (Eph. 2:8-9; Phil. 1:29). Faith is aroused by grace, upheld by grace, and energized by grace. Grace reaches into the soul of the believer, generating and maintaining faith. By God’s grace alone we trust Christ, and by grace we continue to believe.
Are you saved today?