Good Morning! - 2010.06.25 - Romans 8:28-29 - God Works It For Good

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. (Romans 8:28-29)

The book of Romans is held by many theologians and many ordinary Christians to be the greatest book in the Bible and also that chapter eight is the high-water mark. Then we come to verse 28 which is considered the pinnacle of the greatest book and the greatest chapter.

It is not merely our tears of repentance which guarantees the salvation of sinners, but God's purpose and persistence. When we say "salvation of sinners" we are not merely speaking of delivering people from the pit of an eternal hell, as good as that is. It goes far beyond that. Salvation of sinners includes God's plan to make them to be like His perfect Son as our text today declares.

If you are in the eternal salvation program of the living God, then you are also in his carpenter's shop and He is going to keep working on you until you bear the characteristics of His son.

That is God's purpose with you and you can count on His persistence to finish what He set out to do. The late Dr. Reuben A. Torrey called verse 28 "a soft pillow for a tired heart." We read that … the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now (Romans 8:22). McGee suggests that even the groanings work together for good.

Romans uses the phrase "We know" five times and the word "know" thirteen times. This knowledge is what the Holy Spirit makes real to us. The world, which knows nothing of the things of God understood by faith, has a hard time and little patience with Christians who say they know things about God. The Bible says For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God (Romans 8:14). If you take the stand in a court room or a school science lab and say the Spirit of God has led you in some activity you will likely be scorned and ridiculed.

If you say you know that all things work together for good to them that love God, some people are going to laugh you to scorn. The reason for this is: But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. (1Corinthians 2:14)

All things. This is not a misprint. All things. I believe it takes as much or more faith to bury your child or your mate as it does to get God to heal you of cancer or a broken bone. I once held a man's leg while God knit the bones of his ankle back together and felt the heat of it through his pants. I saw God at work. I also saw God at work when I buried my wife at age 49. Barbara, my wife now for 24 years buried her son when he was 24.

God's ways and thoughts are above our ways and thoughts (Isaiah 55:8,9) and all those things we don't understand also work for good.God told His prophet Ezekiel:

Son of man, behold, I take away from thee the desire of thine eyes with a stroke: yet neither shalt thou mourn nor weep, neither shall thy tears run down. Forbear to cry, make no mourning for the dead, bind the tire of thine head upon thee, and put on thy shoes upon thy feet, and cover not thy lips, and eat not the bread of men. So I spake unto the people in the morning: and at even my wife died; and I did in the morning as I was commanded. (Ezekiel 24:16-18)

Are you angry with God because He took a loved one from you? All things work for good in order that we may become like Christ. Your greatest faith may not be to get somebody healed. Your greatest faith may be to agree with God when He does not heal someone you love. I have lived in hospitals and funeral homes for over 55 years looking at this huge flood of "all things."

Hebrews chapter eleven trumpets the great exploits of faith for 35 exciting verses and suddenly we counter verse 36: And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment: (Hebrews 11:36). If you have acquired the idea that faith always gets God to do things for you, then you need to study some more. Sometimes faith is accepting God's plan that does not include deliverance. The Hebrews about to be thrown into the fiery furnace told Nebuchadnezzar:

If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up. (Daniel 3:17-18)

But our text today is limited to those "who are the called" ones, and it is "according to his purpose." McGee observes a great, unpopular truth: "This is something that is hard for a great many people to swallow. The called' are those who not only have received an invitation, they have accepted it. And they were born from above. They know experientially the love of God. To them the Cross was the dynamite of God unto salvation."