TUESDAY April 9th
Romans 8:28
‘And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.’
Well, as we pick up again from Romans Chapter 8, we have come to what is probably one of the most well-known and quoted verses from this incredible chapter, we have all quoted it or had it quoted to us and there is absolutely no doubt it has been a powerful source of strength when we may have gone through difficult situations when we have not been able to see the sunshine through the rain.
It is important to note that all things work together for good to those who LOVE God and who are called according to his purpose.
I want to emphasise today, the importance of loving God. And how do we love God, how should we love God? Well, we know that we begin to love God by responding to the love that he has shown toward us, especially as we have just been remembering through the person of Jesus and all that he accomplished for us at Calvary.
A verse I have often quoted in the devotions is from 1 John 4:10 ‘In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.’ Verse 9 says that this is how God’s love was manifested or made known to us. When you picture the Cross in your mind, when you see the suffering Saviour on that Cross, you are seeing the most powerful demonstration of love that has ever and will ever be demonstrated, the love of God for this world, for you and for me (John 3:16).
This letter from John also gives us one of the answers as to how we can show our love for God, and it is by loving one another! Verses 11-12 ‘Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.’
In the context of our verse for today, we also show that we love God by giving ourselves over to him and to his will and purpose for our lives and we do so wholeheartedly!
When God spoke to the Children of Israel through Moses in Deuteronomy 6:4, he said to them, ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.’ When Jesus was challenged by the Pharisees concerning what is the greatest of all the commandments, this is how he replied ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.’ (Matthew 27:37)
Can I suggest that when we read Romans 8:28 we should understand it this way ‘‘And we know that for those who love God [with all their heart and with all their soul and with all their might] that all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
After all, surely, ‘When I survey the wondrous Cross on which the Prince of glory died . . . Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.’