Chapter # 8 Paragraph # 5 Study # 5
August 20, 2017
Humble, Texas
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1769 Translation:
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? [shall] tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
39 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.
1901 ASV Translation:
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 Even as it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; We were accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,
39 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.
- I. The Third Step in the Development of the "Who Against Us?" Thesis.
- A. The questions: who shall separate us from the love of the Christ? and the list of possibilities as roots for that separation.
- 1. The word "separate" is used geographically (they departed from Rome), covenantally (what God has joined let no man separate, and various divorce texts in 1 Corinthians 7) and characteristically (Christ was "separate from sinners": Hebrews 7:26). The concept is that of having some kind of wedge driven between two so that they are no longer united even if there is little geographical space between them.
- 2. The main issue is whether, or not, a person will benefit from "the Love of the Christ". The goal of the adversaries is to drive a wedge between Christ's love and the objects of that love.
- a. The main "tools" in use to defeat the benefit are all instruments of suffering by those loved by Him.
- b. This clearly indicates that it is not so much His love that is the focus as it is the believers' perception of that Love. A great deal of the effort is aimed at getting those beloved to forsake their confidence in that Love by reason of the argument that "if He so loves, why is He allowing, or even instigating, such torments to me?".
- 1. Tribulation: significant, distressing pressure. Both Matthew 13:21 and Mark 4:17 say that "tribulation" and "persecution" can squelch the "faith" of the seed sown upon the rocky ground and Luke 8:13 attributes this to "temptation" so that "belief" only lasts "for a while".
- 2. Distress: the direct result of the tightening of the freedom to live.
- 3. Persecution: the method of building the pressure.
- 4. Famine: the elimination of sufficiency for the body.
- 5. Nakedness: the embarrassment of the spirit.
- 6. Peril: 2 Corinthians 11:26 lists eight kinds of "perils".
- 7. Sword: Romans 13:4 uses this as a metaphor of governmental authority.
- 3. At issue is the only effective "separator".
- a. None of the listed possibilities are the real issue.
- b. All of the listed possibilities mean that the real issue is whether, or not, faith in His love is at the root of all of our responses.
- 1. "Separation" requires someone to "walk away" from some kind of commitment.
- 2. The One Who makes promises never walks away from His side of the Promise commitment.
- 3. There are two issues involved in the possibility of "separation".
- a. There is the issue of whether "separation" between the One Who Promises and those who "have believed" is ever possible in any final sense.
- b. Then there is the issue of whether a failure of faith can produce the positive benefits of "love". At issue is whether one who does not believe can experience the benefits of "faith" (How can unbelief produce the benefits of faith?).
- 4. The Point: Paul is really asking if our responses to our circumstances can be used as a basis for God's withdrawal of Himself and His promises. This is the bottom line: Can the way we respond to our circumstances separate us from The Love of The Christ? Since Jesus is interceding for us at the right hand of God, and since Jesus told Peter that He had prayed that Peter's "faith fail not", all we can conclude is that Paul's assumed answer was "No".