May 3 | Romans 8:35-39

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DAILY READING

Romans 8:35-39

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REFLECTION

Us With God

by Dave Thompson 

These verses are pretty familiar to many. A lot of good promises are here like "that it is impossible to be separated from God's love" (versus 38-39). For God to promise something, you can bet that it will or perhaps won't happen, just like He said.

One of His first promises in this passage is, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?" It continues with, "No, in all these things we are considered more than conquerors by Him who loved us." Further it states, "For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons nor the present nor the future, nor any powers." It then it ends with, "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."

Did you get that. If we believe in Christ and are wishing to live for him, nothing can hurt us beyond what we can bear, nor stop us except if it is in the plan of God. I love to read that when I am feeling down and want some relief.

I was on a visitation with the pastor of the church I attended a number of years ago. He wanted to visit a sporadic attender. So I said fine hoping we might lead this man to the Lord. We went through the memorized talk and got to the final question "Is anything stopping you from giving your life the Lord right now?" To my surprise, he said the loss of his friend's daughter when she was very young made him a bit sour on God. He continued to ask the pastor (as now I was just on for the ride), how could a loving God allow that to happen. The pastor did a good job of talking about Christ not causing anything like that to happen. The pastor spoke of demons that were the opposite of God and how bad things happen due to them. To my surprise, the man said that it was all making sense, and that he would give this whole Christian thing some thought. I never got to see him become a Christian as the pastor and the man moved on. But I hope the seeds planted that night might have contributed to him becoming saved later in life.

However, that night I was left with a nagging question that I was hoping for an answer to, "Why do the good die young?" I have never really figured that one out, but I know if I still have it on my mind when I get to Heaven, I will ask about it. But what I always remember on today's topic are two scriptures that I know are true for each of us; "I will never leave you, nor forsake you." (Deut. 31:8) and "I will give you no more than what you can handle." (1 Cor. 10:13) So be assured dear brothers and sisters that God is always with you; even when a bad thing happens, God will give you the physical and mental strength to handle it.

Prayer

Dear Lord,

I praise you for your many promises that can get us through tough times when we have a belief in You. You are amazing. Amen.

Find additional "Dying to Live" study materials designed for small groups or individual use here.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

DAVE THOMPSON

I am the administrator of the Daily Worship Blog. My wife, Carla, and I have been attending UALC for seven years at the 9 o'clock service at Mill Run. We have two children, Catherine and Aaron. I have been a Christian for 53 years and am thankful that my Savior has given me two spiritual gifts that have carried me both spiritually and vocationally all my life: they are teaching and administration. I look forward to spending many years here at UALC to serve my Lord and Savior.

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