All Things Work Together for Good
One of the most profound moments I experienced was one of the most terrifying late night calls while I served as chaplain at a Children’s Hospital in Atlanta. The nurses called me out of a late night nap to come up to the ICU to be with these parents who might lose their child. When I rushed upstairs bleary eyed the nurses gave me a quick run down. This child was brought in with a simple illness (much like a cold) that progressed into needing a full heart and lung bypass through this incredible machine. The parents were Episcopal so they had faith and needed the chaplain to be with them. I didn’t walk into a calm room but instead went to the back of the room through a scene that was beyond comparison. Doctors and nurses were surrounding the bed of this toddler pumping her chest and trying to keep her alive. The parents quiet in the back of the room where I planted myself. I was in a “thin place” between life and possible death. Between hope and hopelessness. This was a night filled with the Spirit doing work I couldn’t do on my own. This family needed a person of God to hold their hand and watch, to keep watch on their little girl as they were completely powerless but lived in waiting. Through the longest 20 minutes the doctors were able to stabilize this little girl to put her on full bypass through this machine called Echmo. I spoke with the parents as they were prepared for whatever outcome of their daughter and needed to strategize of ways to tell the child at home if their sister would be coming back with them or not. This family understood a few things, God is in more control than we ever could be, there is hope in hopelessness just maybe not the way we ultimately desire, and there is always an advocate (you don’t have to be alone in anything.)
This brings us to today’s passages from Romans several verses pieced together to bring about these understandings. Many times these pieces are read at funerals to bring about hope for those who remain here on earth but today I hope you are able to hear them fresh knowing that God desires our relationship no matter what grief, loss, or suffering we encounter in our daily lives. Hear now the Word of the Lord.
Romans 8:16-21 26-28, 38-39
16 it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.
18 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
28 We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.
38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We are children of God and creation groans
Paul does a lot in these passages beyond teaching. He is pleading with the people of Rome to look at what God has done, is doing, and will do in their lives. The early church knew about suffering, they were trying to figure out who and whose they were. The people in the early church were working out how they were defined as Christ followers apart from former religion and even apart from their citizenship (which was also in many ways another form of religion). The Jewish Christians identified with being the chosen children of God with stories and traditions that kept them thinking back to the ways in which they understood the God that Jesus grew up with but Jesus then fulfilled in a whole new light. The Gentiles didn’t have identity with God in the same way, being brought in through another way they were defining themselves through their own lens, that of citizenship. So Paul calls on all Christians to find a common definition, heirs of Christ, children of God, all adopted into the kingdom, united not only as people but also with the fullness of Creation. That God doesn’t limit people to their bounds of geography, citizenship, or role but instead God is saying all Creation has been groaning and all creation and humanity together will rejoice one day in and because of Christ. We are to be people of hope, together, not separated from any part of creation. In Christ’s glory it won’t matter what you look like, your economic status, where you came from, how you identify, in Christ’s love we will be glorified.
We will work towards the likeness of Christ, the one who called God “Abba” which is equivalent to the ways in which we would lovingly call our dads, daddy. There is a great love between Christ and God modeled in the Gospels and in this part of Paul’s letter. We are to model our relationship with God much like the ways in which Christ had a relationship with God. Through constant prayer, through loving devotion by means of personal relationship, and through community.
Jesus prayed-- a lot. There are many times Jesus disappeared from the crowd, taught prayers, blessed things and went to God in prayer. Christ was modeling for us the way in which we can have a relationship with God. There was nothing supernatural or unobtainable in these models of prayer that we cannot achieve. We too can remove ourselves from situations and pray, we too can pray aloud, we too can bless food and share it with others. This is how we can know how things are working together for good because of our constant contact with the one who is working these things together.
Both Paul and Jesus teach us about how our relationship with God is both personal and communal. It is the time that we spend time with God alone in prayer, reading and reflection that we can connect with the Creator. But it is stressed here in Romans and throughout the witness of the gospels as well as the early church that we are not meant to walk faith alone. We are meant to be a community. Paul spends a lot of time reflecting on what it looks like to be the body of Christ later in Romans and Jesus surrounds himself with a community of disciples while teaching and healing. When Paul tells us that we are heirs and children of God that means part of a community. We are not separated from each other by any other means than our own doing. There is so much hope in this for how we can view our lives and in turn how we approach others in both our church community and in the encounters out in the world. When we see each other as the children of God who are all suffering and encountering groanings then we can lift off the eyes of judgment and see people who are broken and in need of an uplifting.
Prayer: The Spirit intercedes
Many times we don’t know what to do for someone. We are broken and hurting ourselves and then we see others who are hurting and are at a loss of what to do. Some of us are quick to action; making phone calls, bringing food, or anything else from their love of another person. It doesn’t take much but somehow we always feel like we fall short. How can we help someone through their pain and suffering? How can we be helped through our time of need? This is where Paul comes in with these powerful words of the work of the Spirit. Again, we are never alone. We don’t have to come up with anything profound and we don’t have to ‘fix’ anything. Most times the best thing we can do is show up, the Spirit is already working through someone’s situation and we are called to show up to continue that powerful work of the Spirit for another person. When Paul says the “Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words,” it means that God already knows the things we are feeling and the things we dare not speak but the Spirit will speak them for us. The Spirit works out these things in us to again, work things together for good. It is hard to understand many times in the midst of chaos or deep suffering which is why the Spirit’s work is so holy and important because we can’t see past the present.
God does work together all things for good. Sometimes the way we hope for, sometimes in ways we could never expect or imagine. Remember that little girl in the hospital. In the ICU with parents planning on how to bury their child with uncertain hope. There were so many miracles happening that night. In the persistence and perseverance of the doctors standing over her bed not letting her go. In the incredible technology that could help her stabilize. And then in the miracle that happened to my ears as the weeks went by, another late night call and I was making rounds to the ICU and ran into those parents in the hallway. They were going to be transferred to the children’s hospital across town for rehab. And then the miracle I saw in the charting when I snuck a peek and saw that she had been discharged to go home. God was working out something in them, in the hospital, in the witnesses, and in me through this time. My skepticism in asking the impossible seemed to fade bit by bit through this little girls suffering. The parents drew closer to one another and their extended family. The doctors and nurses on the floor remembered why they entered into their profession and kept on working hard for each child that came through their halls. God was with her in her suffering and did work together things for good beyond healing her body but healing our souls.
The Spirit was moving through the groaning of our souls that night and in the intercessions over the weeks to come. But that didn’t mean that this family had a better connection with God than the ones down the hallway that didn’t get the same miracle. When the deadened silence of loss and separation filled some rooms I entered. The Spirit was working there as well and it was hard to again stand in the gap between God and the grieving family as I prayed for them in the midst of shouts, tears, or grave silence. I didn’t know what to say, but the Spirit spoke through me either by my presence or through words of comfort I spoke that I couldn’t recall if I tried.
Theologian David Bartlett writes in his commentary about Romans 8:28 these things,
“What Paul says is that God is God, and our lives are in God’s hand from birth to death and beyond death.” That in everything God works toward the best in partnership with those who love God. Christians do not need to say that every tragedy or loss is part of God’s plan. We can say that in every tragedy or loss God is still God and still moves in our lives and all of history toward what is good.
The question, Why did God let this happen? Is unanswerable. The questions we may being to answer are, What can God do with evil to help bring about the good? How can we be God’s partners, God’s servants in that work? ...what Paul believes is not that everything turns out all right every minute, but that God has destined good for faithful people and for the whole creation.”
We are working with God to understand the good that comes from our lives no matter the circumstance. God is at work.
Nothing can separate us from God
The last lines of Romans 8 are the ones that we can hang on to for comfort that no matter what, however we handle our grief and pain. No matter what tries to separate us from God; things seen and unseen, things we are tempted by and things that drive us apart. None of these things can separate us from the love of God.
“Paul reminds us that no power in creation can separate us from God’s love in Jesus Christ...We are driven and enticed by forces stronger than ourselves and weaker than God. The power that is greater than anything in creation is the power of the Creator. It is the love of the Creator that we know is Jesus Christ our Lord.” (David Bartlett)
“God works with us, you are the first fruits of God‘s redemption, and join with God spirit for God’s good work.”(verses 35, 38-39 Karen Chakoian)
There is so much hope, for the parent who is concerned about their children straying from God. From the addict who can’t seem to get beyond their struggle, from the overwhelmed and underserved. It does matter how we live our lives but ultimately it is up to God how we are loved and that is seen time and time again throughout scripture. Redemption is always possible. You can try to separate yourself from everything, but God is still going to get at you. God is still going to love you, God is working together all things for good in God’s time.
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