An Afternoon with a Beloved Professor

Painting by Charles Rennie Mackintosh

I attended a luncheon recently that featured Dr. Sinclair Ferguson as its keynote speaker.  Dr. Ferguson was my Systematic Theology professor back in the day.  I had him for the Intro class, Doctrine of God, Doctrine of Man, and even Doctrine of the Church.  What a privilege it was to study under him. He is a God-fearing, brilliant theologian with a big warm pastoral heart.  A rare combination!  It was a joy to see him that afternoon, to sit once again, even for so short a time, under his profound tutelage.

His message that afternoon gave me much to ponder, as do many of his teachings. He taught out of Romans 8:29-29, a very familiar passage on the surface yet packed with nuggets of truth that would take a long time to mine.  It is a passage ever so crucial to our Christian walk.

Here are some nuggets that stood out to me this time.  I am weaving some of my own reflection into Dr. Ferguson's teaching, so not all that I am about to write is what he said at the lecture.

In v. 31, the Apostle Paul asked "What then shall we say to these things?"  This first interrogative pronoun What is then followed by a string of the interrogative pronoun Who.  Who can be against us? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?  Who is to condemn? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?  I don't know about you, but I had not given the Who much thought before, concentrating more on the list of terrible circumstances like tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, sword.

Who then is the Who?  Satan is the obvious answer.  Because we are so entrenched in our material world, it is easy to forget that there are forces in the invisible world hard at work to bring about either good and evil.  I think if we were more mindful of how much is going on in the invisible realm, we would be more grateful for the good that surrounds us, and less taken by surprise by the evil that confronts us.  In this passage, we are reminded that we have an enemy who is perniciously out to  destroy the enjoyment and assurance of our life in Christ.  He will throw at us distressful and painful circumstances to try to undermine our assurance of Christ's love.  But we are to remember that in all our trials and sorrows, we are more than conquerors through our Lord Jesus who loves us immensely as to die for us.  Our ability to triumph over our sorrows and hardships does not come from our own inner strength but through Him who loves us.  Nothing, absolutely nothing, can ever separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.  Instead, all things, even the wiles of Satan, are being worked  together for the good of those who love God and are called by him for his purpose (v 28).  And the "good" according to Dr. Ferguson is that we are being transformed to be like our Lord Jesus.

I have often taken the phrase "all things work together for good" in v. 28 to mean that God will work  all things out for good in the end, maybe not in my lifetime, but in the life to come or when Jesus returns.  For instance, all injustices will be put right in the end. I am currently working on a short story exploring that concept.  I certainly believe there is much truth in that.  It certainly gives us hope when we see evil triumphing.  However, to think of  all things working out for good  as first and foremost being transformed to be like Jesus is a new take to the verse for me. But if you really think about it,  it makes good sense.  Isn't to be molded like Jesus the ultimate "good" for all believers?  All else pales and appears temporal in light of our being changed to be like our wonderful Big Brother (the firstborn among many brothers/sisters).

I leave you now with this important question:  Do you, do I, really want to be transformed to be like our Lord Jesus?  Let us seriously think about that and not be satisfied with the expected surface  answer.

Romans 8:31-39

³¹ What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? ³³ Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. ³⁴ Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. ³⁵ Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? ³⁶ As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
    we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

³⁷ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ³⁸ For I am sure 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.