Jesus, what a beautiful name, rescued my soul, my stronghold
Lifts me from shame, forgiveness, security, power and love
Grace that blows all fear away - Jesus, what a beautiful name
Tanya Riches © 1995 Hillsongs
Praise God for all that Jesus means to you.
Our bible reading this morning is a very well-known passage that many of us found helpful at the beginning of lockdown as we adjusted to not being able to meet together to worship. Read Romans 8: 31-39
In other parts of this letter to the Romans you might have to really concentrate to understand what Paul is writing about, but these words aren’t difficult to understand. Paul is not writing anything ambiguous or confusing - he is speaking very plainly, he makes the same point again and again, emphasising it by giving example after example, yet I see Christians living their lives as though it isn’t true!
I encounter Christians who worry that God doesn’t love them and Christians who worry that they have let God down so many times that he can’t possibly still love them. I also meet Christians who don’t feel worthy of God’s love and so feel they have got to do something to make themselves worthy of his love! Paul confidently tells us that no matter what is going on in our lives - God loves us and so with God on our side we can overcome everything – Do we believe him?
Let’s look in detail at just 3 of the verses we have read, starting with verse 35
Look at the question he asked: Is it theoretically possible for us to find ourselves disconnected from God’s’ love? Well, Paul gives us seven situations which he knows cannot separate us from Jesus. I’m sure we can all easily put specifics onto some of those general words - troubles, problems and suffering, either we have experienced them ourselves - or someone we love has had to face them.
We might find the other four words more difficult to attached to our own experience, but perhaps you can recall a conversation where someone says “I do it – to put food on the table and clothes on your back” – another way of saying to stop famine and nakedness – the basics of life. Paul says even losing those basics won’t separate us from God’s love.
I’m sure we can think of dangerous circumstances especially when we link it perhaps not with the word sword, but a much smaller blade - a scalpel, then those words become more pertinent to our lives - no just operations but generally concerns about our health.
So we have a list which we could summarise as the worries of life - and we can probably think of how they have caused some people (perhaps us) to feel separated from God – but Paul is saying God won’t let these things stop him loving us – he isn’t saying that God will stop them from happening - but he is saying God will help us.
Read Luke 15: 11-24 I’m sure we’re all familiar with the story Jesus told about a father and his 2 sons – one of them we call the prodigal son – or lost son. He walks away from the father’s love and care and makes a mess of his life, but the father never stops loving the son and is always looking out to see if the one he loves is going to return – and when he sees his child turning around – repenting the Father runs out to welcome him. We can walk away from God and his love for us, but nothing can ever stop God from loving us and so we can always know that love – when we turn to him. Troubles, problems & hardship are things each of us will always have to deal with - we can try to cope alone, or we can allow God’s love to strengthen and help us
In v.38-39 Paul makes another list - he talks about things we know about – and the things we don’t understand - he says that they needn’t separate us from his love. Nothing dead and nothing alive - nothing human and nothing that isn’t human can separate us from God’s love. The only thing that can separate us from God’s love is us - is our own focus – when we become distracted / preoccupied with the things in these two lists and forget to include God in our situation. Then we can feel separated from God’s love.
Now this isn’t the only place in the bible which gives us this message, Paul is simply summarising the message which is there throughout the bible – nothing is more powerful than God’s love. We not only have words which tell us of God’s great undefeatable love for us – God has given us emblems to remember that love. The bread and wine which we share together are not just emblems of a dying body - of a perfect sacrifice. They are also reminders of a love which knows no limits, a love which is greater than the power of sin and death.
Communion at 11:15am and 7:15pm
Those gathered at church will be considering words from Romans 5: 6-8:
You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless,
Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person,
though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die.
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this:
while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
As we eat bread and drink wine we will be listening to:
I know a place, a wonderful place
Where accused and condemned find mercy and grace
Where the wrongs we have done and the wrongs done to us
Were nailed there with Him - there on the cross
At the cross - You died for our sin
At the cross - You gave us life again
Randy Butler, Terry Butler © 1993 Mercy/Vineyard Publishing.
We will then say the tradition words of the Lord’s Prayer before praying for Kevin, Helen and family as they go into 2 weeks isolation before Kevin’s operation on 9the September.
I will restart Wednesday articles in September, if you would like to write an article, I will also restart publishing ‘Guest Writers’ on a Friday. This week there won’t be any articles until next Sunday - Stephen