Against The Grain // It’s Not About You, It’s All About Jesus
“What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
‘For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.’
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
1. “If God is for us, who can be against us?”
“He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?”
2. “Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen?”
“Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:
‘Now have come the salvation and the power
and the kingdom of our God,
and the authority of his Messiah.
For the accuser of our brothers and sisters,
who accuses them before our God day and night,
has been hurled down.’”
1 John 2:1-2 (NLT)
“My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous. He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world.”
3. “Who then is the one who condemns?”
Romans 8:1 (NIV)
“there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”
”For Christ died once for all the righteous for the unrighteous to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit."
Isaiah 53:5 (NIV)
“But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed.”
"Whoever believes in him is not condemned"
4. “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?”
"Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?”