Wanna discover your freedom in Christ? Then listen in as Mike Stone and Kevin Smith talk about it today on Grace Coach. Welcome to Grace Coach. My name is Kevin Smith, and I got my best friend, Mike Stone, with us today. How are you doing, Mike?
I'm doing good. Good to see you. Good to see you too. We are gonna be talking about Romans chapter 8 starting in verse 28 and going through the end of the chapter. And we are excited to get to it because it is talking about the love of God and how secure we are in God's love.
So I'll start off and just read a couple verses in Romans chapter 8 verse 28, which says, and we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those god foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called, and those he called, he also justified, and those he justified, he also glorified. Yeah. And there's a few things here that jump out at me that I underlined.
Of course, that God works together for the good of those who love God. I mean, he takes everything, good and bad, things that are happy and sad, and he works them together for our good. I mean, that is just so wonderful to know even when it doesn't feel good. You know? And it doesn't feel that God is there for us, but he's always there working everything together for good.
And then it says in 29, he knew his people in advance. And that is like, wow. He didn't force us to believe. He certainly did know in advance who would and who wouldn't believe, and so that's mind blowing to even think about. And then the third thing is that he chose us to become like his son.
That's my version. And when I think about that, you know, I know we're we're not gonna, perform miracles and raise the dead and do things like that, but it's that the God of the universe was living in Jesus, and he was he was made and born in the image of God's likeness. So when I think about that, we have now been also made into God's likeness when we came to believe. We were not in the image and likeness of God. We were born in the image and likeness of Adam, but it says that he chose us to become like his son and now to be made in the image and likeness of now Jesus that and that only means that the spirit of God is now living in us like it was living in him.
Okay. Clarify for me what you just said. God was living in Jesus? Yes. Chapter 14 of the book of John.
Let me just go there real quick. The only reason why I'm saying that while you're going there is because I I don't want the audience to be confused that, Jesus wasn't God. That No. He was God. Jesus was God in the God in the flesh, fully God, fully man is what we would, say and believe.
Yeah. It says in John 1420, on that day, you will realize that I am in my father, and you are in me Yes. And I am in you. So God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting men's or people's sins against them. And so God was in Christ, and now God is now living in a born again Christian.
So that's how I look at the image of God, that the likeness and the image or the spirit of God is now living in us, and I love it. Alright. Let's go on and read Romans 831 to 834. I'll do that. What shall we say then about such wonderful things as these?
If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare us even his own son, but gave him up for us all, won't he also give us everything else? Who dares accuse us whom god has chosen for his own? No one. For god himself has given us right standing with himself.
Amen. Who will then condemn us? No one. For Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he's sitting in the place of honor at god's right hand pleading for us. Amen to that.
Says who dares accuse us? Who accuses us is Satan? Absolutely. He does that through through people through people who aren't saved. Yes.
People are trying to condemn us for our actions and behaviors and Our belief systems. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think he's up there accusing us to god too. But god's basically Jesus is interceding for us saying, I shed my blood for each one of these people. Their sin is on me.
And so the the case is settled. And if you you didn't spare your own son, you know, if we bring that down to earth and think about if I sacrifice my son as god did Yes. How much more would I I would do anything for you if I've done that, and I think that's what he's saying here. Absolutely. He has given us everything we need for life and godliness in Christ Jesus.
Well, that's the best thing he can do, and he gives us so much more. I'd say this all the time. You know, our family, our friends, our our home, our health. I mean, he's given us all this stuff, but the basis of it is Christ. That is the foundation of everything.
Everything else is meaningless without Christ being the foundation of what we have. So everything else is basically icing on the cake. Jesus Christ is the cake. So you think you're gonna have your cake and eat it too, I suppose. I'm I'm game for that.
Well, in verse 33, it says that God has given us right standing with himself. That means we're in God's eyes. We are perfectly right with him 100% of the time, and that is if you're in Christ because then you have the righteous one, Jesus, living in you. You know, it's not the it's not that we do righteous things or whether we do righteous or unrighteous things. It's the fact that the righteous one lives in us, and that's why we have this right standing with him all the time because it also says that Jesus will never leave us.
The righteous one will never leave us. We're always righteous even though we don't feel like that might be true. The scriptures say over and over and here in verse 33 that God has given us a right standing with himself. Amen. And there's a saying that's it's very old saying, but at the foot of the cross, the ground is level.
Nobody is any better than anybody else. We are all righteous because of Jesus Christ. Billy Graham is no more righteous than us. Mother Teresa, no more righteous than us. And it's not because of all the things they've done.
It's only because they have received the gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ by believing. Yeah. It's awesome. Verse 35 says, 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 for the slaughter. Know 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, and all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, our lord. Very cool. Yes. I the other day, I was reading in my little pocket bible, and I underlined how many times God or Jesus or the holy spirit, you know, in this last section.
It was amazing how many I mean, and this is just the conclusion of it, but it's like God is doing all of this stuff. God has done it, in Christ, and he has made a way that is without separation. We are solid in our relationship with God because of Christ. There is absolutely nothing that can separate us. No no spiritual demons.
There's so many people out there, you know, talking about demons and all the books that have been written. It doesn't matter. They can't touch us. We are secure in Christ. You know, there's two reasons I think that nothing that nothing can ever separate us from Jesus Christ and the love of of of God.
1, Romans 835, it says that. Nothing will ever separate you from the love of Christ. But 2, it's because we are forgiven people. Yes. All our sins have been taken away.
So what caused the spirit of God to leave Adam in the garden in the book of Genesis was sin, his disobedience. He he did exactly what God told him not to do. What caused the spirit of God to leave Jesus? It was our sins. Yes.
Right? What's the reason why the spirit of God will never leave us is because all of our sins are taken away, and it's an impossibility. And so between those two things, I'm like, of course, nothing will ever separate you from the love of God. Christ will never leave you. Yes.
John 102829, I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. Well, that's what eternal life is. Right? That means you'll never perish. Otherwise, it's temporal life.
Absolutely. Will snatch them out of my hand. My father who has give them who's given them to me is greater than all, and no one can snatch them out of my father's hand. Bam. Either that's true or not.
Yes. It is true. No one is gonna snatch us out of god's hand. Well, this chapter opened up with no condemnation, and it's concluding with no separation. That's the book ends of, chapter 8 in the great book of Romans, which I am so excited for.
Yes. It is amazing. He, you know, Paul wrote 80% of the New Testament and, you know, there's a lot of people out there who says, well, what about the book of James? Well, okay. Well, James was a Johnny come lately, but still, I believe you could see the grace of God in the book of James without a doubt, and that's for another podcast.
But, really, if you really concentrate on this New Testament and read about the love of God, the forgiveness of God that he's living inside of you, he'll never leave you or forsake you, your life will never be the same. Amen. Will never be the same. And as Romans 12 says, we're gonna get to it in a few weeks, to renew your mind on these these truths. Yes.
It it's just a constant renewal of your mind. And that's that's the beautiful thing about God's word is that no matter how many times you read it, you can just because of what you're going through in your life, it will it will hit you in a different way. You may miss something. It's it's amazing to to study that the Bible is like no other book in history. It is the all time.
They don't even put it on the best seller list because for years, it is the absolutely hands down most sold book in the world. Every year there are more Bibles bought than any other book hands down. They don't even put it on a list anymore, which I think there's probably more going on there than than that, but, it is an amazing book and we hope that everybody just understands the major point of it and that is God's love for you. Thank you for listening to Grace Coach. If you want to connect with us, we would love to engage with you.
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