Let the Shepherd Lead

Originally Proclaimed 07/29/18

Intro:

• On our way back from Dallas this summer, within the first two hours of our trip, the GPS on my phone that was directing us home popped up an alert.
• It told us that there was a faster route. Most of the time when it tells us that, the faster route only saves a few minutes. This time the faster route told us that we would save thirty minutes, so naturally we decided to take it.
• In minutes we were pulling off the interstate that was clearly backed up for miles onto a small country dirt and gravel road.
• The GPS does not often tell the driver of the condition or type of road, and on a number of occasions in my experience I have been taken on journeys into nearly impassable paths because the GPS said that the route was faster.
• So we sat for a few minutes and asked ourselves if we wanted to chance this gravel road. After all with four children, if we became stranded in this part of Texas we had no idea how long it might take us to get help.
• Just before us we saw another van beginning the journey down, so in this instance with the parched dirt road before us in the summer heat of the Texas countryside, we decided to journey onward.
• For about a mile, we slowly rolled down that slightly paved road, avoiding potholes and being careful not to go too fast for the gravel.
• Then as we came to the end of the gravel we were on a well paved, country road.
• Past a number of picturesque Texas “ranches” we met back up with the interstate on the other side of whatever backed the traffic up in the first place.
• Our brief detour, worked out to our ultimate good.

Hook:

• In life we do not always have the voice of the GPS reassuring us that if we just suffer for a little while, rolling over the hardships of life, we will avoid a world of hurt.
• But in life we do have the assurance from our God and Savior through His Word and Spirit that He will not forsake us and that he is the giver of good and perfect gifts according to James 1:17.
• So as we come to those moments where we are faced with miles of traffic ahead or the risk of a rough path ahead, we need to learn to deal with the detours.
• Today it is my hope to encourage you with three specific ways to know how deal with detours.

Message Points:

• As we begin this passage, the first few words introduce us to one of five statements in Romans about facts that Christians know.
  • This word know in Romans 8:28 is a very specific kind of knowledge.
    • It does not refer merely to a head knowledge or something that can be intuitively reasoned out.
    • This is not abstractions, but knowledge gained from experiencing the truth and reality of a information.
    • Think of the knowledge one gains from an internship. The intern comes knowing some important technical and scholastic information. But through the internship the experience of putting that information to practical use provides a much broader and more informed knowledge.
    • When Paul says that we know something as Christians, he is saying that we have experienced a fact in action – whether it be through our own experience, or the experience of the indwelling Holy Spirit testifying to us.
  • Also recognize that Paul has been speaking to us about the suffering in the whole of Creation, including us in verses 8:18-23. He also tells us that in our weakness the Holy Spirit communicates our need to God the Father in verses 8:24-27.
  • So as we come to what Paul reminds us and encourages us that we know in verses 8:28-30, we should assume that this knowledge will help us with the suffering and weaknesses we face in life.
  • That is why on your notes there is the beginning of a sentence that says, “To deal with the detours in life we must know that God’s”. We will fill in the three experiential facts that help us face the reality of our situations.
• As we continue in verse 28 in the NIV we see the very polished translation “that in all things God works for the good”. Older translations say “all things work together for good”. The difference here is in the subject of the word works.
  • The older translations have the subject as “all things”, which either gives the impression that all things that happen to us are good or more likely that all things work in a mechanistic, determined way towards God’s good.
  • Our experience does not teach us that all things are good in this life. Further, we know, just from our own mistakes and sins that all things do not naturally work on their own towards good. This translation does not adequately convey what is intended.
  • Paul want to give us a principle that will help us face the detours of life and to do that, we need to know that our God is not in the background as we face life.
  • That is why the NIV supplies God as the subject. The ESV retaining all things as the subject puts forward the concept that this working together for good is just for those who love God.
  • The impact is similar. Christians know by experience that God does not abandon them, but is working in the midst of their troubles, sufferings, and weaknesses.
• That friends is the first fact that helps us today: To deal with the detours in this life we must know that God’s goal is good. (8:28)
  • Notice that in this verse we do not hear Paul say that all things are good. No he is very clear that if it were not for God there would be many things that would not be good at all.
  • It is helpful here to remember the Old Testament parallel in Genesis 50:20.
    • Joseph after having come through the ordeal of being sold into slavery by his brothers.
    • After having been run out on false charges of his role as the chief slave of Potipher’s household.
    • After being forgotten in an Egyptian prison after correctly interpreting the cupbearer’s dream.
    • And after having been elevated to second in command in the kingdom so that in the famine his brothers and family came to seek provisions and shelter with him.
    • Joseph says to his brothers, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.
  • You might be objecting saying how does this divorce, or being fired, or illness work out to my good.
  • Friend, I understand what you are saying. If I could tell you the good purpose, I would be God. This is the Christian faith, it is believing that in the midst of the horrors of this life, God’s goal is good.
  • Think for a moment of this table that is set before you.
    • It is a celebration intended to help you remember not a victorious acclamation of Christ as King, but to help you remember the cruel cross of Calvary.
    • This table serves to reconnect us to the agony and suffering of our Savior on our behalf.
    • As we celebrate this supper after this message, you will be reminded that in spite of the purpose and end of the cross which was death, God had in mind new life for the resurrected Jesus and for every believer.
    • God’s goal is always good, and though evil may come our way as believers we trust that God has some good reason or purpose for our suffering.
  • Finally friends notice one more aspect of this verse with me. It is almost a catalog of God’s goodness.
    • There are three phrases at the end of the NIV’s translation of verse 28. They are: “those who love him”, “who have been called”, “according to His purpose”.
    • These three phrases describe for us the reciprocal relationship between our God and us. God’s goodness towards us is expressed in an eternal relationship with Him. A great verse that illustrates this relationship is 1 John 4:19 says “we love because he first loved us”.
    • Here in Romans 8:28 Paul says God is at work for those who love Him. As believers we are those who are to love God with our heart, soul, mind, and strength as the Great commandment says.
    • But Paul also is careful to tell us that God has loved us.
      • Notice that those who love Him have been called. This calling is not merely the gospel call of preaching. This is the inward “effectual” call of conversion accomplished by the Holy Spirit.
      • It is that inward tug upon your heart that each believer has felt and responded.
      • Further it tells us that God called us for a purpose. The NIV supplies the word His here, but it is not needed to understand that God’s purpose for us is to have a relationship with us. We can see that throughout Romans 8.
    • This eternal relationship is so important friends, because it means that God does not send us into the fray to mindlessly suffer and be plowed down by life.
      • That which God allows into our lives, He is with us and does not abandon us.
      • He promises us an eternal reward and relationship no matter what we face in life.
      • He also promises that He will bring about good for us and others in this life.
• This relationship leads us to consider the second fact that helps us to navigate the detours of life: for us to deal with life’s detours we must know that God’s plan conforms us to his purpose. (8:29)
  • As we begin to try to understand these next two verses, lets lay our cards on the table. These next two verses are some of the most difficult in all of Scripture to interpret because they deal with the topic of predestination.
  • Rather than be afraid to deal with these verses or be overwhelmed by what others have said, let’s look at them honestly together.
  • First the next two verses are one idea that Paul uses to prove that God is working all things toward the good of those who love him. Whatever these two verses mean, they must reinforce that idea because Paul is trying to prove that point with these verses.
  • Second, notice as you read these two verses that a large portion of the plan of salvation is laid out logically for us. It begins with God’s work in eternity past and ends with God’s work in our future glory.
  • Third, what we see in these verses stretches our minds to understand the depths of God’s mind and work. Whatever understanding we gain into the mind of God will by our nature be limited.
  • Now let’s dig into the details. Verse 29 begins with the phrase “For those God foreknew”.
    • Foreknowledge has been described before as God looking down the corridors of time and knowing who would receive him as Savior and planning to send a Savior for those people.
    • This prescient view of foreknowledge reads too much into this Greek word. The view also makes man, not God the author of salvation because God only acts to save after He knows our response.
    • The other major interpretation of foreknowledge tells us that this is God’s personal and relational knowledge about us. Zodhiates says, “something foreknown is not simply that which God was aware of prior to a certain point. Rather, it is presented as that which God gave prior consent to, that which received his favorable special recognition.”
    • Foreknowledge in this sense is like two parents choosing to love the baby that they will once day conceive and then choosing to allow for its conception.
    • Not to press this point too far, but imagine these same parents thinking about the sleepless nights, the trials of raising and correctly disciplining a child, and the cost of a child; and still they choose to move forward in conceiving this child.
    • God with more perfect knowledge than any parent will ever have, knew beforehand each and every one of us. He knew our fallen, stubborn, and rebellious nature and still chose to love and proceed with our salvation.
  • That leads us to the most controversial word in this entire passage. It is the word predestination.
    • I have shared with you before that predestination is the belief that God selected and implemented the means of salvation.
    • As Christians we believe that God saves sinners.
      • Ask yourself, does God save all sinners? The answer would be no.
      • Now ask yourself, which sinners does God save?
      • Our answer according to the Bible is that God saves sinners who repent and trust in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.
    • Biblical predestination is the belief that God’s choice to save is naturally followed by his designing, implementing, and offering the means to salvation, namely through Jesus Christ.
      • Predestination means God chose the plan of salvation so that he could offer that salvation plainly and clearly as available only through Jesus Christ.
      • Because predestination follows God’s foreknowing, we can also say that while every person must repent and trust Christ for salvation, God personally pursues and offers salvation to each believer.
      • There is no testimony of a believer that is exactly the same, though each testimony will by necessity involve faith in Christ as Lord.
    • In this sense predestination can only be connected to God’s plan to save people, not God’s plan on judgment day to condemn people.
      • God predestines people to salvation, he does not predestine anyone to be lost and condemned unto Hell.
      • When God chooses and plans for salvation, he also allows for individuals to reject His plan. Thus salvation passes over them and they are allowed to suffer the consequences.
      • Back to our couple, imagine that they discovered that they could not conceive a child but still loved and chose to have a child through adoption. While they might want to adopt all the children in the world, they must choose the process and agency by which they will adopt their child. That naturally limits who they can adopt.
      • In the same way, God predetermined, or planned which process he would use to adopt by salvation people into his family. Only those who would respond to His offer of salvation could be saved.
    • Now notice with me in verse 29 that it tells us the predestination is very specific.
      • It is so that believers will be “conformed to the image of his Son” and so that Jesus “might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.”
      • Friends this helps us to see how biblical predestination is about God’s plan to connect and conform us to Jesus Christ.
        • That is God’s purpose. God chooses to saved only those who want to turn away from sin and become more and more like Jesus.
        • That is the means God utilizes for salvation.
        • When the detours of suffering, weakness, and so much else comes into our lives, God wants us to become more like Jesus who as Hebrews 12:2 says “for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despised the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
        • God’ purpose is to help us to remember, by conforming us to Christ that we have an eternal home in Heaven that we are headed towards.
        • Friends this means that when we are tempted to gripe or complain about our condition, we recognize there is more joy in testifying to all who will listen as Christ did, that it is our eternal relationships that makes every trial of life worthwhile.
      • Friends Paul’s description of biblical predestination does not end there. Look at how it also says that his purpose was to make Jesus “the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.”
        • God’s purpose is not to exclude people from his family. If that were true, he could have stopped at Jesus.
        • God’s purpose chooses to limit the people who would be adopted into his family to those who would receive Jesus as His firstborn son.
        • Jesus is and has always been God’s only son, and He is well pleased with him.
        • But God’s purpose is to expand his family, so that Jesus is the firstborn with many adopted brothers and sisters.
        • As firstborn, Jesus has the special right to act on behalf of his Father. He alone inherits the role of the King who will lead through all eternity.
        • If we are conformed to God’s purpose then we will not be satisfied friends with those who gather in this room or in our classrooms for Sunday School.
        • No, we will be actively seeking to add to our family of faith here at Morningside all those who will repent of their sin and follow Christ as their eternal King.
• Finally, then we need to know this third fact to deal with the detours in this life: God’s saving grace never abandons us. (8:30)
  • Just look at the contents of verse thirty. Some have called this the golden chain of salvation.
  • Daniel Wallace who wrote a textbook about Greek Grammar says about the pronoun “those” in this verse that “the idea is that the very ones whom God predestined, called and justified are also glorified. The compounding of pronouns thus has a dramatic effect; no one is lost between the eternal decree and the eternal state.”
  • While we could discuss each of these steps in detail, let’s just look at their basics.
    • We pick back up with predestination, God’s choosing of the means to save each believer.
    • Those whom God had the means to save, He then called unto salvation. Remember from verse 28 that this is not the gospel call of preachers, but the effectual call of the Holy Spirit. This is that tug of God that we cannot long resist.
    • Those who respond to that effectual call it says that God justifies. This is not God ignoring sin, but declaring our sin debt paid. He says, because of Jesus it is “just as if you had never sinned.” This justification extends not just to our past sins, but to every sin from our profession of faith onward. 1 John 1:9 says each time we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive and cleanse us.
    • Finally then this passage concludes by telling us that those God justified, he also glorified.
      • This word is used in this sense for our eternal home, but curiously it is an aorist or past tense verb. An aorist is used for a completed action.
      • Friends this is very important to realize because it is telling us that no matter what we might face in this life – no matter how hard the trial or how weak we might be – for believers there is victory in Jesus!
      • Our glorification is already complete because Jesus has already been seated at the right hand of the Father in Heaven. If we are to be conformed to Him, His current position is our certain destination.

Conclusion:

• Friends as we come to our time of response, perhaps you are here this morning and you are in the midst of a detour in your life.
• Let me ask you this question. Do you KNOW Jesus as your Savior?
  • I cannot promise you that all of life will be good, but I can promise if you know Him, He will work in your life for good.
  • I cannot promise you that His plan will always make sense, but I can promise you that He will conform you to His purpose which is eternity with Christ.
  • I cannot promise you that you will not feel at times like you are alone, but I can promise you that your Savior and His grace will never abandon you.
• Today, I encourage you to turn away for sin and self and choose to follow and know Jesus.