Romans – The Play Part 8, Ep 2

Alright, then, does running out of food, getting so poor that you don’t have anything to eat— that is obviously evidence that God’s blessing has left you? You have got no friends in this world. Everybody dislikes you. You’re under enormous stress. You’re down in the dumps. And now you run out of food. You’ve got nothing to eat. That must be proof God doesn’t love you, is it? No! Praise the Lord. And neither tribulation nor stress, nor persecution nor famine. I’ve got no food, and now I’m down to no clothes. I am in debt. I am down in the dumps. I am under stress. Nobody, nobody likes me. I have run out of food, and now I’m out of clothes.

Now, saints, don’t kid me —if there’s any message in this whatsoever, that message is: never let circumstances tell you how God feels about you. Never let any circumstance or all circumstances— I think that I can handle not any circumstance, but I can handle a circumstance, but when circumstance begins to breed and breed and breed and breed, then I begin to wonder about me and God. And I begin to wonder about God and me. And I wonder…

Neither getting down in the dumps, nor living under stress, nor losing everybody on earth’s good feelings about me, nor running out of food and running out of clothes, nor even a physical threat to my life. Now, let’s put all that together. I’m down in the dumps. I’m under stress. Nobody likes me anymore. Have you ever had this feeling? Let me tell you what it’s like to be a controversial person. And most of you don’t really know what that’s like. I mean to be consistently controversial wherever you go and not mean it and not intend to. You can really begin to wonder if there’s anybody on this earth who likes you. And you don’t blame them. You’re not feeling sorry for yourself. You really begin to wonder about you— about me.

Down in the dumps. Stress. Nobody likes you. Out of money, out of food. You can’t be out of food without being out of money. You’re out of food. You’re out of clothes. And now you’re in peril of your own life. Surely, God doesn’t love me anymore. Surely, I have really done something wrong. I have done something bad.

God is for me. And even here, He’ll work it to good. And now I am literally being chased for my life. I am in peril of death upon this earth. Now, would you not say that you could lose, at this point, a sense of security in your relationship to the Lord? You would, would you not? Most assuredly. And then the door opens, and someone walks in with a gun and takes aim and says, “This world has had enough of you.” There you are – unliked by anybody, broke, haven’t eaten in weeks, because God doesn’t love you. Got no friends left in this world. Everybody’s turned against you, and you’re stark naked. “We’ve been looking for you for days, and we finally found you. You are absolutely the scum of this earth. And now, old fella, you’re going to get it. Right between the ribs.”

Is God for you? I mean, really and truly, is He for you in that moment? Has anything changed? Listen: He committed Himself to put you into the image of His Son long before one atom of you ever existed. And in that moment, the Son of the living God is praying for you. The Holy Spirit is witnessing, is inventorying your spirit, and telling God what a wonderful state you’re in. And the Father is hearing, and the Son is interceding, and angels are preparing to rejoice.

Listen to this old man. Wrap it up. It’s true. Verse 35 is true. Why is it true? Why? How could anybody get in that many messes all at once? For the sake of our Father, it has happened. You are about to die for His sake. That’s why you’re about to get the sword. It is for His sake. I would say, for His glory. But in your being down in the dumps, in your being under stress, in your having lost all your friends, in your having run out of money and food and run out of clothing and being disliked and even hunted down, you are, now, you have been, and in that moment unchanged, you have conquered everything. You don’t know it, but you conquered the down in the dumps. You conquered the stress. You conquered the persecution, the being disliked. You conquered poverty. You conquered being threadbare. You conquered being chased and hated by men. In fact, you are more than that. You are more than conquerors are. Whatever conquerors are, you’re more than that. You are right now more than that. Praise the Lord. Why? Because He is for you. He loves you. And He works all things together for good to you.

And now, listen to the old man. He stands up on his feet. He himself has been through it all. I am utterly convinced that death cannot separate me from the love of God, for death has been put away. Or life – and that’s speaking of human life. And that’s speaking of being down in the dumps and under stress and being disliked and being broke and hungry and being threadbare and being threatened by men—that none of that can separate you from the love of God.

Now let me ask you a question. Are you going to get down in the dumps again? Will it affect your relationship to Jesus Christ? Will you be under stress again? Will it do anything to your relationship to God? Will you be persecuted and disliked by people? Absolutely. Are you going to be poor again? You’re going to be “broker than Job’s turkey.” You can bet on it. Will this in any way reflect on God’s opinion of you or your relationship to Him? Well then, stop acting that way. Let not circumstances dictate to you your own feeling about how God feels about you. It is not true.

Are you going to be in peril? I don’t know, but there is nothing in the contents of life on this earth that can separate you from all the riches that we have seen tonight, given to you by a God who is for you. Utterly. And shall angels separate you from the love of God? Shall Satan? No, for he is already damned. And the good angels—the elect angels—they minister for your sake. What about the principalities? They have had their weapons taken away from them.

“But Gene, isn’t there anything that you might have overlooked that could affect me? Because sometimes I feel pretty bad.” And so, Paul of Tarsus makes a clean sweep of it. There is absolutely nothing going on in the present time – there is nothing happening in the present, on this earth or anywhere else in this created universe where time ticks – that will separate you or lower your standard in the eyes of God. There is nothing in the future that is going to affect you in your relationship to God, no matter how low you get. And there is also no present, no future, and no power that is either now or then. There is no power. And boy, that includes the power of your own soul. There is no power. There is no power. There is no strength, no energy, no known force—yours or anyone else’s—that can break from you all the riches of God in Christ Jesus, given to you even before you were born.

Is there anything that could possibly be overlooked? And now Paul takes it all in. I’m in verse 39. Neither the first dimension, are you with me? Nor the second dimension, nor the third, nor the fourth dimension. There is nothing in the first dimension, the second dimension, the third dimension, or the fourth dimension that can separate you from the love of God.