What "All Things Work Together for Good" Actually Means // Romans 8:26-30

Okay, you can open up your Bibles to Romans chapter eight. If you're new, you came on the best Sunday you could come on because here's why. We're in the greatest book in the world, the Bible. We're in the greatest book in the Bible, Romans. We're in the greatest chapter in Romans chapter eight. We're in the best part of Romans eight. We're in the most famous section ever, but the problem is Romans 8, 28, and we'll get there in like, I don't know, 15, 20 minutes. We're gonna start in verse 26. It has become a Christian bumper sticker, right? Some of you, it's okay. Some of you have Romans 8, 28 in your Instagram bio. It's on a coffee mug, it's on a wall in your house, right? Next to live, unfortunately, next to live, laugh, love, okay? Yeah, okay, so this is what's happened. What we've done is we've taken Bible verses completely out of their context. See, Bible reading and real estate have something in common. Location, location, location is what's most important. See, let me show you what happens. So let's take a verse like Philippians 4, 13. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Let's call it the Tim Tebow verse because everyone loves Tim Tebow. He's such a great guy. And remember how he would have the black under his eyes and it would say, Philippians 4, 13. That verse is not about throwing a football.

That verse is not about being a great quarterback, but he knows that too probably. He's just doing that as an application of it. But that verse is about Paul going, guys, I have learned the secret to contentment. And then he said, I've learned how to handle a lot and handle a little. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. You know that verse that says we're two, you've quoted it, you've probably misquoted it. We're two or three are gathered in my name, right? There Jesus is among us, which like gives like guys an excuse to like, you know, two guys get a beer and call it church. It's like, eh, I don't think that's what Jesus meant. That is actually about, hey, after you've confronted someone in their sin and they don't listen, take two or three witnesses and I will be among you. Oh, so it's not about coffee shop church, it's about confrontation of sin. But then my favorite, okay, and don't go to this version because like this verse in your version won't say this, but in 1984, okay, when the NIV, which was like the standard Bible forever, when it came out, this is what Psalm 56 verse one said. Look at this. It said this, be merciful to me, oh God, for men hotly pursue me. Now, this is not a verse about a dating app, okay? This is a verse about King David being in danger,

but you need to read the whole section to get the whole idea. So what we're gonna do today is I'm gonna read you the whole section. I'm gonna read it slow. We're gonna read Romans 8 verses 26 to 30 and just prepare yourself because we are about to, starting this week, get into the deepest section of scripture. We're gonna talk about things that you've never thought of. And the first time you hear about them, they may even scare you a little bit, but we're gonna do this together, okay? So we're gonna look at Romans 8 verses 26 to 30. Here we go, I'll read it. Likewise, in other words, connected to what I just said. That's what Paul's saying from last week. The Spirit, that's the Holy Spirit, helps us in our weaknesses. We're gonna talk about being weak today. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself, this is kind of strange, intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes, so the Spirit helps and the Spirit prays, for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose.

For those whom he foreknew, here it is, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And then here's verse 30, Paul summarizes it all. And those whom he predestined, he also called, and those whom he called, he also justified, and those he justified, he also glorified. We're gonna go back to verse 46 where it says, likewise, the Spirit is groaning, helping us in our weaknesses. Now, let me remind you, this is the great thing about, at least our church, every week you come, you know what I'm gonna talk about, it's just the next verses, okay? And it builds on everything that we just said. So last week, I hope you were here, but last week, we saw that the creation groans. Earthquakes, tornadoes, volcanoes, floods, famines, droughts, I mean, it's just, the earth is groaning in the pains of childbirth. So basically, here's what he says. When you look around you, everything around you is groaning if you can see it. And then he says, hold on, not just the creation, but the church. Christians. He goes, we ourselves. And he goes, and Paul goes, I know it's surprising because like we're God's children and we're waiting for the spirit of adoption but yes in these in our bodies we groan for the redemption of our bodies. And then today he goes, watch this, he's like everything around

you is groaning and you are groaning and God is groaning in you. Which basically here's just what I want. These are basic things but you need to know them. God cares about you, okay? God is not like watchmaker, wind up the world, forget about you, kind of deist God. He's deeply invested and involved in that in some sense God is emotional. Obviously we see this Jesus weeping at Lazarus tomb. We talked about that before. But it's interesting. So there's a phrase, we'll go deep, we're gonna be all over the place with theology. All good stuff. So the first thing is, people talk about the, have you heard this phrase? The impassibility of God. And it sounds like a procedure you're gonna need to get taking place. But it's called the impassibility of God. And it basically has to do with God and emotions. See the problem with you and I is our emotions are all over the place, right? Some of you it's there's a car commercial and at the end of it you're crying. Like I don't, I need a Honda. I mean you're just not sure. And then, but seriously, but then you stand at a funeral and you're like, why do I feel nothing? Like our emotions we don't, it's like our emotions don't even, we're sad when we shouldn't be, we're happy when we should, we can't feel it. When it says God feels emotions it means he feels them correctly and completely. God comes alongside you and it says he comes alongside you for, here's the first reason, you see in verse 26, it says because we're weak. Now if we can be honest we have spent our entire lives trying to act like we're not weak. By the way it's not a sin to be weak. There's a big difference between sins and weaknesses and in marriage you'll spend your whole marriage basically fighting over is this a weakness or is this a sin? You're not good at listening. Well are you purposely not listening to me or are you terrible at listening? One could be a sin, one could be a weakness, you get it. Paul's just going look the entire, he's not insulting you, he's diagnosing you. He's like guys every person who's ever lived is weak and I know you want to get your beach bod to show that you're strong. I know that you want to show us your fake filtered life to act like you're strong. I know you want to save as much money so you have this strength financially but we're all weak guys. We are weak physically. I don't

care how much collagen you put in your coffee, okay? We're all, you're so, I mean think about this, we're born not being able to lift up our heads and most of us will die not being able to lift up our heads and it's humbling, okay? Some of you by the way you know pulled a muscle putting your socks on today. You know you're weak, okay? But like when you realize like wait a second I can miss my caffeine in the morning and I'm like, affects me. I can have one bad night of sleep and I just feel it physically. We feel it emotionally. I already talked about that. We're all over the place. We don't feel the right emotions. Sometimes you're upset at how upset you get and then we're, this is what Paul's talking about today, we're weak spiritually which means we can't do what God wants us to do by ourselves. We can't obey God by ourselves. We can't endure all the suffering by ourselves, you know, and so look what it says. I want to read this to you. I want you to see this. Here's what it says in verse 26. Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weaknesses, all of our weaknesses, okay? For we do not know, by the way watch this, he's gonna first tell us what we don't know and then in verse 28 what we know. For we do not know what to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes with us with groanings too deep for words. So the Holy Spirit comes alongside of us because we don't know what to pray and he comes alongside of us, it says, with groanings too deep for words. Do you understand that there are certain things words can't get at? Which, you know, is not encouraging to me because I deal with words for a living, all right? I get up here and I speak for a living and I believe in the power of articulated speech. I mean, I really do. I've seen it change lives. But what he's saying is there's just certain things like go to the Grand Canyon, then come back and try to explain the Grand Canyon to someone who's never seen it. Or hold your child, your firstborn child, you know, in the hospital and try to explain what you're feeling. Well, that would be the positive version. Or stand at your mom or dad's graveside and realize that the rest of your life on earth you won't see them. And the loss you feel and the closure, you can't, this is, by the way, this is why people read poetry. It's like, can someone try to put this in the word?

This is why you watch movies. This is why you listen to music. This is why people stand and stare at artwork. It's like, why do people do that? Why do people go to Washington, D.C., and just for hours stare at artwork. They're like, I need, words don't get it. I need a picture. Well, he's saying that the Holy Spirit comes and there's this wordless ache when you're suffering and he comes alongside of us. By the way, here's a principle. When somebody is suffering, okay, the deeper the pain, the fewer the words. If somebody is in an immense, you gotta just be like Job's friends. You sit down for seven days and you don't say a word. Job's friends only became the villains once they started speaking. If you're going, if somebody's suffering, here's what you need to think. Bring casseroles, not conversations. They need my presence more than they need some kind of prescription of what to do. Now, here's what he says. He says, here's the problem with you and here's the problem with me. We don't know what to pray. Now, sometimes that's our problem because sometimes we just don't know the Bible well enough. And I told you this before. And I'm not the greatest prayer, okay? But if I have to pray alone, by myself,

it's gonna be hard to pray for a long time. But if I have a Bible open, I can pray for a long time. Because if you read the Bible, for example, even the verses I gave you, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. And then you think, what are some areas in my life where I need Christ to strengthen me? You'll pray for a while. And if you read through one of Paul's letters or some of Jesus' teachings or an Old Testament narrative, it'll give you a bunch of things to pray for. But listen, that's when life's going well, or at least not horrible. That's in the mundane of life. Here's, this is really what we're gonna talk about for a few minutes. What do you do when life is really hard and you don't even know how to pray about it? My first, well, I've had many experiences, but I remember, this was years ago, okay? I went down to go visit and learn from a church. And the pastor of that church said to, there was a group of pastors there that day. And there was like 10 of us. And he goes, hey guys, we're doing a response time. We call it elder prayer. We don't have enough guys tonight. We're gonna have you guys go out and pray for people as well. I'm like, I'm a pastor, I can do this.

So I go, I'm at this church. I've never been to this church. I don't know anyone in this church. I'm standing up there, you know? And they, I remember this young girl comes forward and she's crying and she's with her friend. They gotta be in their 20s. And she's crying and they're coming up to me together. And I get their names and I introduce myself. And I said, how can I pray for you? And she said, I think I have schizophrenia. And that was overwhelming to me. Cause I was like, how do I pray for this? And then she said, and I think it has to do with my relationship with my dad. I don't even remember what I prayed. But like, you know those moments, here, I'll give you, okay. Grandma's in the hospital. Do you pray for healing? Or do you pray for her to go home to heaven? You're single. Do you pray that you'd be like the Apostle Paul? And you're like the most awesome single person for kingdom purposes? And that actually you can say no to marriage and head in that direction with no regrets? Or do you pray for a spouse? Or do you pray for both? How do you, you know, what about infertility?

There's like a bunch of options. What do you pray? Do you pray that God miraculously opens up the womb like he does in, you know, the Old Testament, the New Testament? Do you pray that you would be open to adoption? And maybe that's what God's doing. And God, adoption's at the heart of the gospel, and maybe that's what you should do. Or do you pray, Lord, maybe this is, are you trying to tell us that we're not gonna have any kids in our home? And instead, all of our kids are going to kind of be spiritual children and invest in the church? Do you ever have someone just come up to you, maybe it's a young person, and they've got, you know, some type of cancer, and they're asking you to pray for them. Do you go, do I pray for a miracle? Or do I pray for really good medical treatment? Or do I pray for a miracle? Can I even pray, is it a miracle if it's medical treatment? Maybe what I should pray, right? You're sometimes like, well, I don't wanna, because this is what I'll feel like as a pastor. I don't wanna let them down. I don't wanna pray for something that doesn't happen. So then you add the, and I just pray that they'd be comforted. You know, is that what, maybe the main prayer should be

that you should pray that they have comfort and stability during their cancer and chemotherapy, intense treatment. Do you get what I'm saying? What Paul's like, when we get down on our knees, a lot of times, we don't even know what to pray. Even when we have a Bible in our hand, it's like, there's a lot of different verses I could go to, and I don't know how to pray for this person. I mean, we're tired of praying. How do you keep praying for your, you know, son who's not a believer? You know, it's like, what do you, do you pray that God brings some horrible storm into it? I mean, what do you do? Well, Paul says the Holy Spirit comes alongside of us. And he prays, he knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows the aches of our hearts. And somehow, in some mysterious way, he takes what's going on in our hearts, and it says we don't have the words and we don't know God's will, but he does, and he prays for us. Now that's really good, because when I did college ministry and we had to raise support, they would always tell you, you need to find some great prayer team and some great prayer partners. Well, the Bible says Jesus is praying for us in heaven, and the Bible also says the Holy Spirit prays for us, so we've got a great prayer team. Let me just say that.

And it says what the Holy Spirit does is he helps us. Now, in our language, help is four letters, one syllable, simple word. The Greek word for help here, I'm not even gonna try to pronounce it, because I worked on it, I can't do it. It's just too many syllables, okay? But the whole point is, it's a helpful illustration. The word help, or helps here, means to come alongside and grab the other end. Here's what we're trying to say. Here's what God's saying. There are too many things that are too heavy for you to carry alone. It's like, this is a massive, heavy couch, and I don't care how strong you think you are, you're not carrying a couch alone. And the Holy Spirit says, listen, I'm not gonna leave you. I'm going to grab the other end of the couch, and I'm going to pick it up, and we are going to do this together, which is exactly what you need to know when you're suffering. God cares, God knows, God prays. So that's the beginning, that's the intro to Romans 8.28, the verse that's on everybody's wall. Let me show you this. Here's what it says. Romans 8.28, and we know, did you notice that? I love Paul.

Paul goes, we don't know what to pray. And by the way, Paul put himself in that category, who wrote scripture, saw Jesus, was an apostle. He's like, I don't know what to pray a lot of times. He goes, we don't know what to pray, but verse 28, but here's what we do know. We do know, we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose. And it says, listen, Paul goes, here's what we know. God is working for our good. Now, Paul does not say we, he says we know God's working for our good, and he's doing it in all things. He doesn't say we know how God's working. Because we don't. And that's actually, by the way, that's to keep us humble. You understand how manipulative I could be if I, yeah, I know exactly what God's doing. Come here, let me tell you exactly what God's doing. It's like, there's a humility. None of us know what God is doing, and that's good. And it doesn't even say that you're gonna like what God's doing. You know, it's just saying he's, it doesn't say I will like how God works everything together for my good. It just says, ultimately, God's gonna work everything together for our good. Now, this is important, here's why.

Because life is so tragic, and terrible, and painful, and sorrowful, that every culture has had to have phrases that people hold onto, right? And we don't have any good ones in America. So here's what happens. Here's the best the secular world has to offer. Everything happens for a reason. That's vague, ambiguous, unhelpful, and who is reason. He's doing a lot of work. Here's another one. The universe has a plan. Guys, the universe is floating rocks and burning gas. It's not thinking about you or me. Or karma, right? What comes around, goes around. Everybody gets what they deserve. It's like, our faith is built on the exact opposite. That thank God we don't get what we deserve. We wouldn't want that. Or there is now the self-spirituality of manifesting. In other words, I just need, it's like a small version of name it, claim it. It's like the charismatic movement, but in one person. I will imagine, speak into reality, what I wanna have happen in the future, and that's what's going to have happen. But people believe this. And I'm like, how could anyone believe this? But then, true story. The other day, I'm on Instagram, and it knows my algorithm.

So I got this golf stuff coming up, and this lady is on this real video, and she, you know how they look. They look right at the screen, they point at you. She's like, do you want me to help you with your golf game? So I stopped the video, and I said, yeah. But at first, I checked how many subscribers she had. She had like 30,000 subscribers. Like, she seems legit. So she said, here's what you need to do. You just need to say, when you're on the golf course, I hit every fairway, I hit every green, I make every putt. She's like, you just need to manifest it. You just need to, I was like, this is the dumbest thing ever. Then I was on the first tee, I was like, I hit every fairway. I promise you, I hit every green. It is a lie. It does not, it does not work. But I want you to know that that's how people, like people, they either get very vague or they think they can do it themselves. Let's take this phrase apart because all three parts of it, so all things work together for our good. That's important. So let's talk about all things. What makes this verse difficult is that it said all things. Because I think that it would be easier

for us to embrace if it said good things. It would be easier for us to embrace if it said some things or maybe we can even get there if it said most things. Because then there would be a category of things that we would say not this. The problem with all things is it's universal, it's global, it's all inclusive language. It means that God is somehow going to take all things and work them together for your good. And that would include the diagnosis and or the deliverance. That would mean the promotion or the pink slip. That would mean the wedding or the funeral. And what's so hard, right, when life's going well, you love this verse. Because you're like, I just, I can see it right now. Everything's working together for my good. But when life's very, very hard, you're like, how does this work? Well, here's what I want you to understand. There's a key phrase. All things, here's the phrase, work together. It's not saying that any one thing that happens in your life is ever good. It's not calling cancer good or chronic illness good or death good or divorce good or who knows, any of the betrayal. It's not calling any of that good. And I don't even believe it's saying that you're supposed to look at one thing in your life and go, God's going to take that one thing

and turn it for good. Because that's where people get maddening. It's like, you lost your son at a young age. Yes, God's going to take that one thing and use it for good. It's like, that's not how God works. According to this verse, God takes everything that's happening in your life, including that one horrible thing or the 10, 15 horrible things, and he's going to work it all together. Here's the way I think about it. So my daughter, Addie, she loves to bake. Most nights in the kitchen, she's baking some type of dessert last minute, and I don't even know how it works. Grab the flour, grab the vanilla. I mean, they all taste so good. If it looks like I gained some weight, this is why, okay? But what's interesting is if you think about it, and I'm not a cook or a chef or a baker or whatever, but any ingredient, most ingredients by themselves are horrible. No one's just like sneaking a spoonful of flour, you know? If you ever tried baking soda, you only try it once, okay? Raw eggs, I mean, there's a couple of you that work out and do that, but you shouldn't be eating raw eggs, okay? And so, but what's interesting is, think about this, or vanilla.

I mean, all these things that are like, they're not great. And by themselves, you're like, why am I even putting this in here? And then you put it all together. I don't know what I'm talking about here, but you stir it, and then you put it in a sheet. And here's why it's a great illustration, because then you put it in a baking pan or a sheet, and then you expose it to an enormous amount of heat. And afterwards, you're like, this is the best pie, cake, brownies I've ever had. That's what God's doing, but here's the key thing. You have to believe all things, you by faith, are working together, and you have to take, when I say all things and working together, you're taking the entire globe and all of human history and eternity. So it's like, the problem is our view and vantage point's too small. But then it says this, is working together for our good. I wish it said all things were gonna work together for our comfort. I wish it said for our happiness or our self-fulfillment or our safety, but it says our good. Now, let me show you the good defined. Look, the good defined is in verse 29. Look here. So this is why we read scripture out of context. All things are gonna work together for my good. What is my good?

It's in verse 29. For those he foreknew, he predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son. Our good is circumstantial. God's good is Christ-centered. Here's the good, it's like, this actually works, okay? If you're in the middle of suffering, I know this is hard, but you could take anything in your life and say, you know what? By the grace of God, this could conform me more to the image of Christ. Because there are four purposes for our suffering. The first is to be conformed to the image of Christ. Isn't it true that as a general rule, the godliest people we know have suffered the most. We'd like to be as godly as them, but we wouldn't wanna suffer as much as them. I remember, I'm at Goler, that's our old building, two buildings ago, it was our first building, and we had these sunny. and we had all these young people coming around and we had this young doctor coming, he's a resident, but he was coming around with his wife. And they were a beautiful young couple with a beautiful young family. But there's one thing I noticed about her the first time I saw her, she had one leg. And I had learned enough by being a pastor that you don't say to somebody like that or to somebody that knows them, what happened?

You always say, what's their story? So one of my friends knew her. So eventually I said, what's her story? And she said, oh, she was in a really terrible boating accident when she was a teenager. I said, really? And then this is what I'll never forget. She said, so she knows Jesus better than you and me. And I remember she told me that and I got up and preached and I saw the young lady and I thought, I wonder how many times you've had to wrestle with Jesus about why you have one leg. And why something that happened very quickly on one day is defining your life for the rest of your life. You do know Jesus better than I do. The first purpose in your suffering is to conform you to Christ. The second purpose is to wean you from the world, which is also painful. As soon as you start severely suffering, your perspective will be completely different, right? By the way, every time you lose somebody that you love, more of your heart is in heaven. So when you meet somebody who's very old and all of their friends and all of their family and all of their parents, it's like they've been weaned from this world. The third purpose is to equip you for ministry, right? Here's what I want you to know. Some of you have a story of suffering

that someone in this church needs to hear. Some of you have a story of suffering that someone in this church needs to hear because the darkest chapter of your life that you're now on the other side of is the page of the book they're on. And suffering people wanna be ministered to by people who have suffered and often suffered in the same way. One of our elders went through cancer, probably more than one of our elders, but I'm thinking right now, one of our elders went through cancer. And what's interesting is not only, almost every time someone in this church is diagnosed with cancer, we call him to minister to them, but he wants us to. He will move anything, he will make time for it because he's been through that valley, he knows what it's like and he wants to be on the front lines helping others. But finally, this is the unique Christian, outside of being conformed to Christ, it's to display the greatness and glory of God. Look, how do people see the glory of God in your life? It's very hard, right? It's hard when your life's going well, but when you love God more than what you're losing, it glorifies God.

Because most pain and suffering, actually probably all of it, is connected to loss. And that's what's the most painful for us. So here's what he says. All things are going to work together for your ultimate good, which God defines as being conformed to the image of his son, which will end in a moment with glorification. And then I want you to see with our time left, what is called the golden chain. I'll read it to you and then make some comments. This is what's after verse 28. It starts in verse 29. For those whom he foreknew, he also predestined, we talked about that, to be conformed to the image of his son in order that we may be, that he may be, I'm sorry, the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined, he also called. And those whom he called, he also justified. And those whom he justified, he also glorified. Okay, this is deep. Just get ready. And community group leaders, good luck for the next like six weeks, okay? Because we are, I think I said this at the beginning. We are going into the deepest section of scripture.

We are going to be talking about all of the big scary words starting today. Predestination, election, all, I mean, wait till we get to Romans 9. Romans 11 talks about a partial hardening that's come upon the people of Israel. I mean, we're gonna be talking about things, I promise, most of you have never thought about before. And at first, by the way, I just tell you, this is not, I mean, you can debate, that's fine. You can debate, discuss, and dialogue about all this, but you don't need to divide over it, okay? Part, like what I'm gonna talk to you about, begin to talk to you about right now, okay, is stuff that seminary students, okay, who are single and have too much time, you know, nerd out about until 2 a.m. in the morning. Here's what I want you to know about this. What I'm about to teach you, and what I've been teaching, what we will teach in a few weeks, is it's not really meant for the classroom, but for the hospital room. When you talk about this and it's a classroom setting, it's like everyone thinks, okay, well, hold on, let me find my verses. This is not meant for the, Paul writes this to Christians who are dying and who are persecuted and who are deeply suffering, and it's meant to comfort them. So this is what's called the golden chain.

Maybe here's what you need to notice. Number one, God is the subject, right? Those whom he, right? For new, and then it goes, for new, predestined, called, justified, glorified, okay? So God is the subject, okay, of every verb. You are the basically passive object. By the way, there's one link that's missing. Did you notice that? Sanctification isn't mentioned. That's like super important. Sanctification, the process of becoming progressively and practically more like Christ. Why isn't that mentioned? Because you work together in that one. These are all just the things God does. Okay, so let's unpack each one of these briefly, and then in the weeks to come, Paul gets more into them and we'll get there. The first is it says that God foreknew you. What does that mean? That's like a scary, what does it mean that God foreknew me? Well, you could ask this. Well, at one level, doesn't God know everything about everything and everybody? Isn't that kind of what it means to be God? Like, is it that special for God to foreknow me if he foreknows everybody? And so what some people will say, and you can believe this if you want to,

but I think you're wrong if you do. What some people think this means is God has like, we always like, we personify God. I don't know what that word is. So it's like God's up in heaven and he's got this crystal ball and he looks in the crystal ball into eternity past or eternity future. And he looks and he sees every person who would believe, and then he predestines them. It's like, well, that puts, conveniently, that puts you at the center. God is responding to what you're doing. See, to foreknow literally means to know beforehand or to know in advance. God knows Christians in a way that makes a difference. God knows you in a way that made a difference if you're a Christian. Think about it. To know somebody in the Bible is very intimate. Adam knew Eve, that's intimate knowing, and she conceived and bore him a son. Jesus says, remember those scary words? Jesus says, they come to him. Cast out demons, did we not? And he goes, depart from me, I never knew you. That doesn't mean like he's like talking to the angels. Hey, who's Joe? You know, I don't reckon. It's like, no, he knows everybody.

He's like, I didn't know you in a saving and special way. This will make more sense as we talk about the next word, predestined, okay? Now, I know predestination for certain people is a scary word, but I just have to tell you, I was predestined to talk about this, so I had to, okay? I had a joke about predestination, but I figured you knew it was coming. So let's talk about, so predestination. Here's the interesting thing. Everybody, every Christian, not everybody, every Christian believes in predestination. You have to, it's in the Bible. It's like, I'm a Bible person, and I believe the words of scripture. Then every Christian has to believe in predestination, but it's just, you know, how do you define it, okay? So here's the interesting thing. I actually believe that every Christian, when they're on their knees praying, believes the same things about God. If you've ever prayed and thanked God for your salvation, you believe in predestination. If you've ever gotten on your knees and you've prayed for someone to come to Christ and for God to wake them up, then you believe in predestination. Predestination just being God, God pre-decides, or God, think about it, pre-destination. God sets the destination beforehand.

Think about it this way. Say you go to the airport and you get to the airport, and you know, unfortunately you couldn't fly Delta, so you're flying American, okay? And those of us who fly know the difference. So unfortunately you're not able to fly Delta, you have to fly American. And, but when you get to the counter, they give you the card, say you're going to London, and it says final destination, and you know where you're headed. Here's what the airlines are saying. The airlines are saying, we're going to get you there. Predestination. Now, will you have to, you know, connect through Atlanta or Charlotte? You know, are you going to, you know, are you going to lose your luggage? Are you going to get delayed? Are you going to get a middle seat and the guy next to you is eating a tuna fish sandwich? Maybe, and some of you, that's your life. What God is saying is there will be getting you home to your final destination. There will be a lot of turbulence, but I promise I'm going to get you there. So God says, I knew you in eternity past, and in eternity past, I predestined you, and then this is where we get, he goes from past. to present to future. And then he said, I called you.

Now, what does that mean? Because there are two types of calling in the Bible. There's general calling and effectual calling. So anytime I'm up here and I'm preaching the gospel and I'm telling you to repent and believe and trust Christ, or anytime you're sharing with a friend and you're meeting with your brother at Thanksgiving and you've had the same conversation 14 times and you don't know how to say it any other way, but you say some version late at night of, man, I just really wish you'd consider the claims of Christ and repent and trust in him. That's what's called the general call. Humans make it and it can be rejected. Happens all the time. The effectual call is what this is called. This is the irresistible internal call when God speaks to a person's heart. And I actually get a front row seat of seeing this all the time because I'll be up here, right? And like, you know, preaching and like, there's some people and they're really being moved and God's doing a great work in their life. And then I look over there and there's someone sleeping, which is like, you know, I mean, maybe they took the red eye last night, but it's like, that's the international sign for I don't wanna be here, I'm super bored. And what's interesting is you can think about this

because I've seen this, my entire ministry, two people show up at an event, a conference, a camp, church service, the exact same message goes out. One person goes, I could care less. And the other person says, I wanna give my entire life to this. And we'll get into this in the weeks to come. It's like, what's the difference? Is the one person a better person? That's why they do that. They're just more given to faith. Guys, actually, if you believe this, like the Apostle Paul did, it actually makes you very bold and very brave in sharing the gospel because you go, I don't care how hardened a sinner this guy or gal is, God could speak to their heart, which leads to being justified, which we talked about a lot, guys. So I won't give it a big thing. Once you're called, you're justified. That just means God legally declares you not guilty but righteous because of what Christ has done. But then here's the thing. Your salvation is so secure that God refers to it in the past tense, even things that haven't happened yet. The only one of the four that hasn't happened, if you're a Christian, the only one of the four things that hasn't happened, you were foreknown, predestined, called, justified.

There's no break in the chain. You will be glorified. In other words, here's what God's saying. I am going to not only work everything together for your good, I always finish what I start. Here's what this is about, okay? You cannot lose your salvation, okay? If you could lose your salvation, you would. If it was possible for you to lose your salvation, 100% you would. But it doesn't depend on you in the first place. What Paul's saying here is, listen, God is going to bring you safely home through many trials, tribulations, and yes, death. Most Christians aren't afraid of death but they are afraid of dying and all of the suffering that goes along with it. And Paul's saying, guys, you're going to be glorified. And here's what this means. This is the good that we're ultimately all headed toward. We're all, we will not just be freed from the penalty of sin, but we will fully be freed from the power and the presence of sin. This is what Christians have called for 2,000 years, eternal security. And so here's how I want to end. I want to end with us just, as we always do, singing and praying and responding to this text. For example, in just a few minutes, we're going to begin to sing together.

And some of you, there's an area of your life, if you could just be honest, and it's totally fine to be honest, where you feel weak. And that's okay, by the way, okay? Especially if you're young, you just need to realize everybody is a novice at everything they first try to do. And so we may have some new mom and dads in here and just go, I feel weak. Just want to come down and pray for you. You may have some, you know, you're new in your marriage, you're new at whatever it is. Maybe you feel weak in some struggle with sin. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. And this is just a time to pray together. I mean, one of the main teachings of this section is God is with us, God is for us, and God is praying with us. So since at the Patterson campus here in Winston and at other campuses, since we've had the altars here, what's interesting is I still almost every week get emotional watching what happens down here. And it's not just people coming forward, it's people coming forward and then other people coming forward to pray for them. I remember one of the first weeks we did it, I saw some young man, he was probably in his mid-20s. I recognized who he was and he came down and he prayed right over here. And I knew him a little bit and I was standing back giving him a second to pray.

I thought, I wonder what he's going through. I said, I'm gonna pray. I'm gonna go pray for him. And just as I was about to do that, I saw his dad walk down. So this young man's in our church and his dad's in church. They were sitting in different places. And his dad walks down right next to him and puts his arm around him and just together they pray. And I'm like, guys, that's it. Jesus is praying for us in heaven. The Holy Spirit is praying inside of us. And we've got people here today to pray with you and for you. So whatever you're groaning about, wherever you feel weak or whatever in your mind, you're like, God, I just wanna pray that you would help me to believe that you're going to work this thing along with everything else in my life together for my good. See, Job, the ultimate story on suffering in the Old Testament is the story of Job. And we read it and we know why he's suffering. Because we were able to see it. Okay, he had this conversation. Satan, we could see the whole story. If you read the entire book of Job, Job never knows why he's suffering. He actually never ever gets an answer. The one thing he gets, and it happens in the last four or five chapters,

is he gets a bigger view of God. And so what Paul's been trying to do in all of chapter eight is just give us a bigger view of God that's bigger than our suffering and that's better than our sin. And so that as we head into the future, and who knows what's going to happen there, we have an incredible view of God, a God who foreknew us in eternity past and has promised to glorify us in the future. Let's pray. Lord, across all of our campuses, I just pray that we would respond. Where we would feel weak, it says, come. When I think about the Apostle Paul, some of these get down here and they've got their own thorn in the flesh. And Paul said that there were three different times, and I think that means three different seasons of his life where he asked you to remove it, Lord, and then you said to him, my grace is sufficient for my power is made perfect in weakness, Lord. But would you create a church that has a big view of God? Would you create a church that understands the Holy Spirit is praying? Would you create a church that can even realize, and maybe someone needs to hear this, that you can even take our own sin, which you do not approve of and you do not condone,

but you can even take the most sinful, stupid, foolish things we've done, and you can also make that part of the all things that work together for our good. Would you do it for your glory and our good? We ask this in Jesus' name. Please stand, please come forward.