Romans – A Treatise
Chapter Eight
SUFFERING
Scripture Reading: verses 17-18
AND IF CHILDREN, THEN HEIRS; HEIRS OF GOD, AND JOINT-HEIRS WITH CHRIST; IF SO BE THAT WE SUFFER WITH HIM, THAT WE MAY BE ALSO GLORIFIED TOGETHER. FOR I RECKON THAT THE SUFFERINGS OF THIS PRESENT TIME ARE NOT WORTHY TO BE COMPARED WITH THE GLORY WHICH SHALL BE REVEALED IN US.
It is often suggested that the subject of Romans 8 is summed up in the one word “deliverance,” and no doubt there is truth in this. It begins with deliverance from judgment. “There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.” Then it is deliverance from the law of sin and death from which we have been set free by the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. And in this passage it is the final physical deliverance of the fallen creation from the entire burden into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. This must be linked with the Lord Jesus Christ, who gained the mighty victory at Calvary’s Cross, who is risen from the dead, and at whose request the Father has sent forth the Holy Spirit to indwell the hearts of true believers as “the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of His glory” (Ephesians 1:14).
In the few previous verses we have seen the establishment of the fact that they which are led by the Spirit of God are God’s sons, and the same Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are God’s children, giving us the sense in our soul that we are not only under the care of a beneficent God, but we have been adopted into His family, and we stand in eternal relationship with our God and Father. Then the apostle goes step by step upward on the ascending ladder that carries us into the realm of glory itself. If children, then we are heirs. Here the inheritance comes into view. By right of redemption, the Lord Jesus has become heir of the universe. This is not merely His right as Creator, but His right as Redeemer. He has looked on the whole creation, including us, as having been carried captive by the power of Satan, whom we have followed willingly enough, but under whose domination we have been in cruel bondage. By His death on Calvary’s Cross He has borne the penalty of our sin and rebellion, so that this creation which was destined for judgment has now been taken over by the One who has paid its purchase price, even the Lord Jesus Christ. We are not our own, we have been bought with a price, and every Christian has recognized this by accepting the Lord Jesus as Savior. Then we are adopted into God’s family, because in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, His beloved Son, we are brought into the sunshine of His everlasting love. Thus we are constituted sons with God’s Son and as such, under the care of our God and Father – we are His children.
Furthermore, God has written a testament or a will bequeathing the universe first to the Lord Jesus Christ by right of redemption, and secondly to those who are brought into association with Him. If children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ. Thus the mark of destiny is upon every one of God’s people because they are children. This is not calling our conduct in question. It is not discussing whether we are obedient or disobedient children. It is the fact that we are children. That relationship is established when we are born again, receiving the Lord Jesus Christ into our lives.
This is unequivocally stated in the first chapter of John’s Gospel
As many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the children of God, even to them that believe on His name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
The word in that passage is not sons; it is more accurately children. It is the simplest relationship; and this is the only sense in which we can interpret the word children in Romans chapter 8. There is a sense in which God is Father of all His creatures because all are His handiwork and creation. But this passage goes far beyond that. This is the relationship into which we have been brought by grace, by receiving the Lord Jesus Christ and being born again. All true believers are now constituted God’s children by the very fact they have accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, obeyed the Gospel and have been born again. There is no other means whereby we can become one of God’s children. We cannot be educated into it, no matter how important education may be. Becoming a member of an organized, man-made religious body does not constitute us one of God’s children, no matter how important such “church” life may be. According to John 1, we are constituted one of God’s children by the new birth. If we have come by that way, we are an heir of God and a joint-heir with the Lord Jesus Christ.
What is the natural expectation thereafter? It is suffering.1 This may have a strange sound to many of us, because the greatest campaigning Satan is doing at this present time is to take the thought of suffering out of the Christian life. Satan’s endeavor in these last days is to make the Christianity an attractive affair, so attractive that it attracts unregenerate man.
Unfortunately, in an effort to make it as easy as possible to induce people to confess they are Christians, modern evangelism launches its campaign today with shallowness of thought and pageantry of entertainment. Thus we have a large multitude of people who give assent to some man-ordained religious doctrine, make some brief profession of wanting to change from unbelief to faith, and then move forward in a kind of unreal realm – a make-believe world of having a good time. That is not the aspect in which Christianity is presented in the New Testament. The first outlook of a Christian who really accepts the Lord Jesus is that he must become a follower of the One whom he has accepted, and his first expectation should be suffering. Moses chose
rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season; Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt.
Do not think that the acceptation of Christ means life thereafter will be a feather-bed experience of easy living. Being a Christian is a supreme adventure of swimming upstream, breasting the current of man’s opposition, a current that reached its full tide when it put the Lord Jesus on the Cross of Calvary. A current which still sweeps onward as powerfully as ever, bringing persecution and suffering to everyone who will be loyal to Christ. “If so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together.” Is it then a losing battle? No, not at all. “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” The Christian’s day is coming, and the brief episode of a life of suffering here because of Christ isn’t worth comparing to that unspeakable, eternal realm of joy when the Lord Jesus comes into His Kingdom.
