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§20 The Invincible Love of God (Rom. 8:31–39)

In a rhapsody of grace Paul brings the first half of Romans to a climactic conclusion. In an unrestrained volley of rhetorical questions, dramatic repetitions, and contrasting universals, Paul is borne by a thermal current of assurance that “God is for us.” At least six of his eleven sentences are rhetorical questions (the exact number is debatable since ancient manuscripts normally contained no punctuation). We can imagine the effect such rhythmic questions must have had as they were first read aloud in Rome, moving Christians joyously to praise God for his faithfulness. The certainty of that faithfulness is celebrated in brisk repetition, like a sixteen-gun salute, with sixteen references to God or Christ in only nine verses. The scope of God’s faithfulness is heralded in seraphic universals: there is no condemnation for Christians, no power against them, no one to bring charges against them, nothing that can separate them from the love of Christ; for all is given to them, all things work for them, and in all things they are more than conquerors in Christ. “The gate of heaven is thrown open,” in this triumphant conclusion, says Bengel (Gnomon, vol. 3, p. 111).

There is, to be sure, deliberate crafting here, as there has been throughout Romans. The first strophe (vv. 31–32) celebrates omnipotent grace; the second (vv. 33–34), vindicating grace; the third (vv. 35–37), overcoming grace in the face of physical dangers; and the final strophe (vv. 38–39) heralds victorious grace in the face of cosmic dangers. In tone and theme the section is strongly reminiscent of 5:1–11, though its hymnic language exceeds the former in grandeur. Grace is not an escape from this world and its dangers. Rather, grace stands before the yawning abyss and stark terror and confesses that they are no match for the invincible love of God. God’s love cannot be defeated, nor will it let us go.

8:31–32 / At decisive stages in the epistle Paul sums up the argument with a rhetorical question, What, then, shall we say in response to this (v. 31; also 3:5; 4:1; 6:1; 7:7; 9:14, 30). This is the most summary transition so far, concluding the argument at least back to chapter 5, and perhaps back to the foundational 1:17, “He who through faith is righteous shall live” (RSV). Paul hastens now to conclude. No further diatribes, digressions, qualifications, typologies, or exacting expositions. The homestretch is before him, the tape is in sight, every effort and exertion must purchase the only thing that matters—the essence of the gospel. Its final articulation, like all great truths (though this is the truth by which all truths will be measured), is disarmingly simple—God is for us.

In many religions God is unknowable, indifferent to human need, and sometimes beyond good and evil. In others God is largely a personified moral order. In still others God is a distant and often impersonal first cause, a remote high god of endless and lesser manifestations. In such religions “god” is largely an abstraction capable of description only in varying degrees. But Paul’s God, the God revealed to Abraham and by Jesus, is qualitatively different. This God is both higher (“nor anything else in all creation,” v. 39), and nearer (“we cry, ‘Abba, Father,’ ” v. 15). God is for us reverberates throughout the finale of Romans 8 (vv. 31, 32, 34). Here is another summary of the gospel in four words (cf. 5:8), the most concise definition of grace in the Bible. God is for us is not a conceptual statement of God’s gracious disposition; it is a historical statement testifying to God’s action on our behalf. The preposition, for, hyper in Greek, means “on behalf of,” and here expresses God’s love in the vicarious sacrifice of his Son Jesus. God did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all. God is for us is a reality which is verified in the person of Jesus Christ who died, was raised to life, and is now at the right hand of God, and is interceding for us (v. 34).

It is easy to miss the significance of God is for us, seeing in it some sort of vague benevolence, analogous perhaps to a congressperson who is “for” his or her constituents, though none of them may be known personally. Its meaning is appreciated only when one realizes the extent to which God went to demonstrate its truth. Recounting the stubbornness of humanity in chapter 1, Paul three times said that “God gave them over” (Gk. paradidōmi) to their “sinful desires” (1:24), “shameful lusts” (1:26), and “depraved mind” (1:28). Here in verse 32 he uses the same word for the sacrifice of Jesus: He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up (Gk. paradidōmi) for us all. God delivered his Son to the same depravity to which he consigned defiant humanity, in order to redeem humanity. “He was delivered over (Gk. paradidōmi!) to death for our sins” (4:25). “Christ died for the ungodly” (5:6). “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (5:8). God manifests his love not in a Japanese tea garden, but in the hammer blows of Skull Hill. The love of God is the cross of Jesus, a verdict on human sin and a vindication of God’s righteousness. God is for us means “Christ died for us” (5:8).

To illustrate God’s love Paul alludes to two OT images in verse 32. He who did not spare his own Son echoes Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac (“you … have not withheld your son, your only son,” Gen. 22:16). The linguistic similarities between these two passages, particularly in the original languages, are unmistakable. Abraham’s love for and sacrifice of his only son became a foreshadowing of God’s sacrifice of his only Son—but with the significant difference that whereas Isaac was spared, Jesus was not!

The following phrase, God gave him up for us all, recalls the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 (“the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all,” vv. 6, 11, 12). Isaiah 53 is the only passage in all the OT that speaks of vicarious human suffering. The scapegoat (Lev. 16:21–22), to be sure, relates vicarious suffering to animal sacrifice, and the lament psalms are replete with references to unjust human suffering. But nowhere except in Isaiah 53 are sins acquitted by the suffering of an innocent human (“by his wounds we are healed,” Isa. 53:5). This is why Isaiah 53 plays such a significant role in the accounts of Jesus’ passion, for only vicarious suffering discloses the meaning of the cross. The first part of verse 32 (He who did not spare his own Son) thus testifies to God’s love. But that alone is not an adequate testimony to the cross, for the crucifixion is more than an expression of agapē. The full effect of the cross becomes clear only in the following statement, God gave him up for us all. The cross was the means by which Christ became a sin offering, “bore the sin of many” (Isa. 53:12), and reconciled sinners to God.

If the cross represents both God’s love and Christ’s atoning sacrifice, can God’s favor be doubted? How will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? (v. 32). The logic (as was also true of 5:9–10) is irrefutable: if God paid the highest price, why would he quibble about anything less? The cross is the assurance that God is for us in all things necessary for salvation both now and in the world to come.

8:33–34 / Grace is also the vindication of God’s chosen. Verses 33–34 begin by asking, Who will bring a charge against believers? If the Almighty has declared them righteous, who can reopen the case against them? This thought echoes Isaiah 50:8–9, where God is proclaimed the vindicator of his servants. Perhaps Paul is thinking of Satan’s accusing of God’s elect (Job 1–2; Zech. 3:1ff.), but Satan is no match for Christ. True, believers are sinners, but Christ died for sinners; who then will be found to condemn them? Only God or Christ is left to condemn them, but God has pledged at the cost of the Son’s life to preserve believers, not destroy them.

The nucleus of 8:31–39 is verse 34: Christ Jesus … died …—was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. This chain of statements was hammered out on the anvil of eternal providence. The one who died redeemed humankind from sin and judgment. The one who was raised guarantees victory over death and assurance of eternal life. The one who is at the right hand of God (a quotation from Psalm 110:1—a passage more frequently applied to Christ than any other OT passage!) attests that Jesus is the enthroned Lord, reigning in power and honor. And the one who is interceding for us repeats what was said of the Spirit (v. 27), that the enthroned Lord employs his might on behalf of us. “He always lives to intercede for [believers]” (Heb. 7:25; also 1 John 2:1). Every statement in the chain is spoken of Jesus Christ. Jesus assures us that God is for us, not only in his sacrificial love on the cross, but even now in his sustaining love as resurrected Lord.

In referring to believers as those whom God has chosen, Paul transfers the name and honor of Israel to the church (1 Chron. 16:13; Ps. 105:6, 43). This is highly significant, for in speaking of the church as the chosen or “elect” (16:13; Col. 3:12) NT writers were testifying that the church of Jesus Christ, like Israel, was “called according to [God’s] purpose” (v. 28). The church is not a stop gap remedy when God’s earlier plan with Israel went awry, but the culmination of salvation history.

8:35–37 / Now to the third part of this concluding doxology. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? Each noun refers to dangers to faith from physical adversities. The list shares much in common with Job’s adversities in the OT, but still more in common with Paul’s hardships as recorded in 2 Corinthians 11:23–29. These terms likely stem from Paul’s recent and painful memory. Apart from two notes they need no explanation. The word for persecution, diōgmos, refers primarily to religious persecution in early Christian literature. And sword, which more likely refers to execution than to war, is a fitting final term, for the sword is the one peril that no one can survive. In Paul’s case it takes on added significance if, as tradition records, he perished by the sword in the city to which this epistle was addressed.

Paul’s concern in verses 35–37 is not to argue theodicy, i.e., why suffering exists in a world made by a good and omnipotent creator. His concern is less theoretical and more practical, for within a decade of Paul’s writing to Rome believers would have to undergo Nero’s horrors. How can Christians consider themselves saved and yet continue to suffer misfortune? Does that not deny their salvation, or God’s existence, or both? It is an ancient problem. Jewish rabbis agreed that adversity has always been the lot of those who dedicate themselves to God. This is the point of quoting Psalm 44:22 in verse 36. The psalm does not refer to misfortune, but to persecution which arises because of faith: “For your (God’s) sake we face death all day long.” This psalm was applied to martyrs in Israel during the Maccabean persecutions (2nd cent. B.C., 2 Macc. 7; 4 Macc. 13) and under Hadrian’s persecutions (early second century A.D.). Violent death has always been the lot of the faithful. More mystifying yet, the Psalm testifies that our daily dying is for God’s sake, which means that such suffering is a sign not of failure but of God’s will.

Come what may, answers Paul, no adversity shall separate us from the love of Christ. Victory takes place through suffering, not apart from it. Our tribulations and sufferings serve God’s purpose when they are surrendered to him (For your sake). We are more than conquerors through him who loved us (v. 37). More than conquerors, itself a militant expression, means that God works through harsh realities (v. 28), and the present tense in Greek means that he does not do so once (in a while) but always. The victory comes not by escaping suffering, nor even in courage in the face of suffering, but in God’s love in the midst of suffering. If human works cannot earn salvation, then neither can the human will sustain faith during persecution. It is not our hold on Christ which sees us through, but his hold on us. The victory is God’s love “that will not let me go”—in life or death.

8:38–39 / The physical threats to faith in verse 35 are now heightened to cosmic and supernatural powers which are paired in global antitheses: death / life, angels / demons, present/future, height / depth; only powers and creation disrupt the contrasting parallelism (see 1 Cor. 3:22). It may be possible, as Bengel thought, to relate the list to verse 34:

Neither death shall hurt us,	for Christ died;
nor life,	Christ was raised to life;
nor angels, nor demons, nor the present nor future	Christ is at the right hand of God;
nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation (Gnomon, vol. 3, p. 114).	Christ is interceding for us.

Paul believed that there were both malevolent and benevolent powers at work in the universe. He begins with death perhaps because he ended with the “sword” in verse 35. Nor can the seductive impulses of life inhibit God’s love. Angels, demons, and powers refer to orders of superhuman beings. Height and depth are astrological terms denoting a star’s closest or farthest point from its zenith, and hence personified sidereal powers.

But as the dangers heighten, so does the apostle’s confidence in God’s love, transporting him to an ecstatic doxology. I am convinced (a perfect passive indicative in Greek) means an utterly unshakable conviction based on past experience. The source of confidence is the career of Christ summarized in verse 34: our hope began at Christ’s victory at Calvary and is as invincible as Christ’s reign in heaven.

These powers, however mysterious and menacing, cannot overwhelm God’s love. The cross of Christ was the decisive defeat of all mutinous authorities (Col. 2:15; Eph. 1:21; 1 Pet. 3:22). Though the universe is bent in hostile and savage rebellion, Paul asseverates that nothing in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. In this chapter, as we have seen from chapter 5 onward, the lordship of Jesus Christ is the final word (5:21; 6:23; 7:25; 8:39)! “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).