HOW TO LOVE GOD

December 1, 2024 / Bob /

Read the Scripture: Romans 8:35-39

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Romans 8:35a

How do you love God__You love him by answering this question.

  • Who or what is going to separate us from the love of Christ?
  • Is there any force, anywhere, that can come between you and Jesus?
  • Who can remove us from Christ, once we fully come to him?

 

Paul’s answer is,“Let’s take a look at the possibilities.”

First, can all the troubles and dangers of life separate us from his love:

“Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?” (Romans 8:35b)

  • That is life at its worst. Will that do it? 
  • Will hardship do it?  That means the tight, narrow places we have to go through sometimes.
  • Will persecution do it? That is hurt deliberately inflicted on us because we are Christians.
  • Will famine, lack of food and money do it?
  • Will nakedness, or lack of clothes?
  • Will danger, or threat to our lives?
  • Will the sword (war, riot, uprising) do it?

“No,” Paul says,“In these we are super-conquerors.”

Why?

  • Because rather than dividing us from Christ, they draw us closer to him.
  • They make us cling harder.
  • They scare us and make us run to him.

 

When we are independent and think we can make it on our own, these things strike, and we start whimpering and running for home, and we cling all the closer. We can never be defeated then, so we are more than conquerors.

 

“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 in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)
There is nothing left out of that list, is there? Everything is there — demons and dark powers, black magic and angels, truth and error, death and life — whether in this creation or any other creation.

Paul takes everything in and says that nothing, no being or force, is capable of separating us from the love of Jesus Christ our Lord.

So we love God when we say, “If God be for us, who can be against us?”

We love God because of what he himself has done for us, and the nature of that commitment is that he loves us.

Father, thank you for the security you give in your great love. Let your love be the thing that fuels my own love for you through the challenges of life. Amen

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