“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose”
(Romans 8:28)
This is the true optimism. We hear the words optimist and pessimist often, and see them in the newspaper. The one believes this to be the best possible world and the other that it is the worst possible. There are those who do not accept God’s word, and they look upon the disappointments and hardships about them and become pessimists. There are others who look upon the bright side, participate in the pleasures of life and see only its good side; they believe things are getting better and better — that it will all come out right, they are optimists. There have always been these two classes in society: the Greeks had their weeping and their laughing prophet.
The text is the basis of true optimism. “Whatever is, is right,” is true only in a limited sense. It is not true that the thing is right in itself. The text, you observe, does not stop with the affirmation, “all things work together for good.” Some people in quoting stop there; but the sentence is not complete without the words which follow “to them that love God.” The individual thing may be harmful, and if it stood by itself would bring harm and harm only but the truth of the text is in the “all things” taken together.
If you had your way, you would have no wants ungratified; life would be all pleasure; no rude winds should blow, and no chilling blasts should touch the cheek of those you love. Life is very complex; all things, the pleasant, the sad, the helpful and the severe — all things are working together for good to those that love God.
Some say, do not deal with things so far away; give us thoughts that touch our everyday life. Don’t these thoughts touch everyday life? The clouds some days look far away, but they come down to us in gentle showers, else all nature would become sere and brown, withered and dead. So these high, heavenly things must come down and influence our everyday lives.
The apostle says “we know that all things work together for good.” How do we know? We understand scripture by taking it in its connection. Compare scripture with scripture. This text stands as the climax of that which went before. The apostle has been arguing concerning justification by the law, justification by faith, and sanctification, showing what the law can do towards making a man holy, and what is done under grace: “For, as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God” “if children then heirs, joint heirs with Christ, if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together.” Observe the thought: “Joint heirs, joint sufferers, if so be we may be also glorified together.” This, then, is a reason why God leaves his children here to suffer. Paul accounts for the fact that they are left to suffer until they be united with Christ in glory. You will never be successful in winning your child to the new life; you will never bring your Sunday school class to Jesus until you suffer; until you are deeply in earnest “for we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together” “and not only they, but ourselves also,” “the Spirit itself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.” But says Paul “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
The first point is consolation, in the assurance of future glory; the second point, we live in a suffering world, in earnest expectation, “waiting for the time when we shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption,” and rejoice in the glorious liberty of the children of God. Mrs. Browning in the “Drama of Exile” takes Adam and Eve where Milton left them, exiles from Eden. Dimmer and dimmer sound the heavenly harmonies, and wailing and lament become more and more loud. Wild shriek the hawks, fierce howl the wolves.
The heart of earth, once calm, is trembling like
The ragged foam along the ocean waves:
The restless earthquakes rock against each other.
The elements move ’round me and I wail, I wail.
The golden age of the Greeks was in the past; the golden age of the Bible is in the future. This world is not a purgatory, neither is it a paradise. “All things,” some pleasant, some sad, joy — sorrow, waiting for the redemption, which shall come.
The third point: we are saved by hope. Hope is something future, “if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”
Fourth: the Spirit helps with our infirmities, helps us bear the ills and trials of life.
How does the Spirit help? Among the Greeks and Romans the advocate had a two-fold function. He not only appeared for the client, but he prepared the address which the client would deliver — prepared for him his plea. The Spirit not only makes intercession for us, appears before the throne as our advocate, but teaches us what to say, gives right thoughts, works in us deep desire and strong purpose, indites our heart’s petition, a prayer blessing and acceptable to God: For “we know not what we should pray for as we ought.” Now comes the text, as a climax: Why this suffering, why this intercession, why this hope? that we may know that all things work together for good: the suffering as important as the enjoyment.
How do we know these things? He tells in the words which follow: “All things work together for good, to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose,” for the reason, “Whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate.” According to the eternal purpose of God, this constitutes a series of things sure to be; the last as important as the first link in the chain. These things are sure to those who love God.
So strange that we get hold of some passages of Scripture, and twist them and turn them to our own discomfort and hurt. We hear about that terrible doctrine of predestination. To the apostle this doctrine was the greatest consolation. It was the reason which assured him that all things shall work together for good. If the doctrine is a terrible one, it is because it is looked upon from a different point of view from that of the apostle. What is salvation worth if you save yourself? A salvation worth anything is that planned and perfected by Omnipotent, Almighty God. If one says “Well, if I’m predestinated to be saved I shall be. There is no use of my doing anything.” If you say this, and thus, refuse to do, it is sure evidence that you are not a child of God. Jonathan Edwards said, “Perseverance to the end is the only infallible proof of being in a state of grace.”
“The doctrine,” says one, “is liable to perversion.” Everything can be perverted. Salvation based upon God’s eternal wish and purpose is not a doctrine to be afraid of — rather something for which to be profoundly grateful. If a man wants to love God, what is there to prevent it? If he doesn’t wish to love God, why does he find fault about it? Everything will look kinky, and crooked, and wrong — from the standpoint of observation. Here is the foundation of our hope: “If God be for us who can be against us?” There are people and forces which may try to oppose and hinder, but “He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things.”
In the last days of the war, the good President spent much of his time hearing appeals of wives, mothers and sisters in behalf of husbands, sons and brothers. Military law was strict and severe, but the word of the President set it all aside. No matter for military law if the President signed a pardon. O, man, if God is for us, who can be against us? “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him freely give us all things?” such a priceless gift is assurance of every other gift.
“Who is he that condemns? It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is ever at the right hand of God, who makes intercession for us,” and so all things must, shall work together for good. “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifies.” “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Not separate from our love to him, but from Christ’s love to us? “Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or peril, or sword?” These things seem 10,000 miles away from us at this day, but they were very near when Paul wrote these words. “Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.”
O, human heart, bowed down with grief and perplexity, trust in his love and submit with heart devotion, and bear in quiet, steady patience, all tribulation and trial, for we know that all these things “work together for good to them that love God.”
We cannot fully understand now, but when we stand upon the heights of glory, we shall look back with joy on the things we suffered, for we shall know then that our severest trials were a part of the “all things” which worked together for our eternal good.
(John A. Broadus)
