What greater passage speaking of God’s love do we have than Romans 8? I do not know of any. In Romans 8, we find great comfort as an introduction to the Ordo Salutis, in verse 28: “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”
The idea that some of
our greatest tragedies, sufferings, trials and loss, which are incomprehensible
from this side of eternity, somehow bring good for the people of God and glory
to Himself, is a divine mystery. Yet, I have seen God work miracles through
such darkness, for me as well as for others. We don’t always understand the
‘why’ of such events. Nevertheless, we know the nature of the one who “causes
all things to work together for good to those who love God,” and rest in Him by
faith. Such faith, however, is not a blind faith, for although we see in a
mirror dimly now, we will then see face-to-face, as Paul puts it in 1
Corinthians 13:12.
The Christian life is filled with many paradoxes.
‘The least shall be first,’ we are exalted even as we are made low. Humble, yet
heirs of the Highest. We walk with God, yet we are beneath Him. 1 Corinthians
1:25 states "Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the
weakness of God is stronger than men." Our best is bested by His least. Despite the seeming contradictions, He redeems
us, and redeems us for His purposes.
However, as much as this writer loves this
entire chapter, which begins by giving us reassurance of our justification and
ends with in a crescendo of the invincible love of God for His people, it is
the glorious calling of God I wish to touch on in the rest of this article.
Verses 29 and 30 are often referred to as the Ordo Salutis, or the Order of
Salvation and it these verses I would like to expound.
“For those whom He foreknew, He predestined.”
I admit, I could have broken these into two separate categories, but really,
the two fit so perfectly hand-in-hand that it would be superfluous to do so. If
He “works all things together for good to those who love God,” it stands to
reason that there must have been a plan all along. A Sovereign plan. Isaiah
46:10 really hammers this concept home: "Declaring the end from the
beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, ‘My
purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.’"
His Sovereign good pleasure. The slave of sin wanders aimlessly, searching for
peace, for joy, but apart from hearing the Master’s voice, he only ever finds
fleeting happiness, unconnected to future hope and promise, and a restless
emptiness. In Narcotics Anonymous, they state that ‘One is too many, and a
thousand is never enough.” While their reference is to drugs, I would argue it
equally applies to all human efforts apart from Christ. One sin fully separates
us from God, and a thousand pleasures will never do. If we trust that God has
redeemed us for His own, and we trust that His Sovereign will has a definite
plan that includes us, we have joy and peace. A joy that isn’t connected to our
circumstances as our heart inclines toward God. A peace that surpasses all
understanding. That God took notice of us at all, foul as we are, for any
purpose other than the just and righteous punishment we so begged for in our
proud, treasonous sinning against Him, is a thousand-fold mercy that should
leave us befuddled for the rest of our days.
The second part of this passage, this ‘golden
chain of redemption’, as it is also referred to, is the purpose to which we are
called. It states His purpose plainly, ‘To be conformed to the image of His
son, so that He would be the firstborn of many brethren.” We are not called for
some other purpose, but to be adopted as sons and heirs of God Himself. Not
only did He not give us what we deserved, He, as only He can, gives more
abundantly than we can imagine. The passage tells us that those He predestined,
He also called. He touched my heart of stone, gave these dry bones new life.
His plan was to pluck me from darkness and bring me into everlasting life in
Christ, the light of the world. Let no man take that away from God, that
glorious moment of redemption, not even yourself. If you are saved, sinner, it
was by a grace underserved, given Sovereignly to an undeserving recipient. Oh,
that God, in pity, saw my wretched estate, my lowly, wasted life, and not only
spared me, but calls me son, is a more humbling reality than I could find words
for. He called, and I answered. Not my flesh, but my heart that was regenerated
in Him and called according to His purpose, to be conformed to the image of His
Holy Son, Jesus the Christ. He is our Messiah, the King of King and Lord of
Lords, from age to age the same. I responded because for the first time, I was
alive. Not just alive, alive in Him.
Unpunished but alive means little, though. I
still have no righteousness of my own. I still cannot stand before God. In
Christ, and conformed to His image, however, I can. In a way I cannot fathom,
God looks at me and sees the finished work of His Son on the cross. His only
begotten Son. Begotten, not created, God of very God, who kept the law in
obedience, for He was both totally God and totally man, and with no division of
His will. Diving into this nature further we must understand that there was no
argument between His human will and His divine will. Even in prayer, when His
trial was at its peak, He resigned the will of His humanity to the will of the
Father. Never once did he succumb to the
schemes of the world or the devil. His humanity untainted by sin, so that even
His flesh conformed to the Law of God, in which, we see the very nature of God,
and so in it, Christ saw His own nature. In His humanity, He would have lived
and experienced all that we do, but in His Divinity, something altogether
different, and better. The true and better Adam. In His obedience, He secured
for those of us who believe an eternal prize. We have been justified by His
blood, the Suffering Servant is now our Sovereign.
And those whom He justified, He also Glorified. This truth is perhaps the most amazing of all. Reader, if you have been saved, and I pray you have, and are on that roster of the elect from before the foundation of the Earth… nothing should perplex you more than the fact that you are a sinner, saved by grace. Saved not only from His just and righteous wrath, but saved for His perfect purpose, a purpose that says ‘foul though you are, you will be My son, and you shall find your glory in Me, forever.” We bring Him glory as ones redeemed in Him, by His good pleasure, for His purpose. We therefore are glorified as we fetch Glory for Him by living as those called for a purpose. See what Paul states in Phillipians 1:6 "For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus." If he has called you according to His purpose in Christ, He will see it through and perfect it, (by sanctification), until the day of Christ Jesus. The believer’s only assurance is that the God who is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Malachi 3:6; Hebrews 13:8) has declared the end from the beginning (Isaiah 46:10) and has called you to be His son. Let us rejoice in our lowly estate, because it is to His Sovereign Glory.
Editor's note: The author is a member of GBC.
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