[0:00] Please remain standing just for a few verses from Romans chapter 8, verse 28. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
[0:15] For those God foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called.
[0:28] Those he called, he also justified. Those he justified, he also glorified. What then shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?
[0:42] 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?
[0:53] Amen. Please be seated. Let's hear the preaching of God's word. Well, for some several months now, we've been working our way through Romans chapter 8.
[1:14] The Apostle Paul has just been piling up one assurance after another to make the believer who is in Christ absolutely certain of his arrival in heaven.
[1:25] We come now to a new section. It's the final stretch. And it begins in verse 31 and goes to the end of the chapter, where Paul sums up and he further drives home, as it were, with seven hammer blows, the truth of the believer's certainty of salvation.
[1:48] He does so by a series of seven questions. Questions make us think.
[1:59] Don't you think so? They make us think. And Paul is the master of the question. And so having said all of this before us, he now pauses, he takes a breath, and he calls for a response to be made to all that's been gone before, a conclusion that can wrap it all up.
[2:26] And here it is. What then shall we say in response to this? How can we sum it all up? Well, here's one way.
[2:39] If God is for us, who can be against us? So Paul answers his question with another question, doesn't he?
[2:50] I told you he's the master of the question. A couple introductory remarks. This if, if God is for us, is no if of uncertainty or doubt whatsoever about whether God is for us.
[3:07] He's talking to those who are in Christ. Of course he's for us. And this if is more if as I have shown. If as God is indeed for us, then who can be against us?
[3:20] It carries the idea of since God is for us, who can be against us? So that's the first thing that we need to get out of our mind. In this chapter of absolute certainties, Paul's not now retrogressing to some uncertainty.
[3:34] An iffy thing. Secondly, the question, who can be against us, does not imply in the slightest that we have no enemies. That we have no one who is against us.
[3:48] If God's for us, well, who could be against us? There's none. Nothing is further from the truth. The Christian has great enemies and has them precisely because they are in Christ.
[4:01] They're against us. And the rest of this chapter will mention not a few of them. Consider three of them briefly. First of all, Satan is against us.
[4:16] He's a real person. He's a real being. We used to be his slaves. Used to be our master and we did his will. Which was to sin against God.
[4:28] But we were set free from his dominion of darkness. We renounced him and we now gladly serve a new master. Even Jesus. Whom he hates even more than us.
[4:42] And that means all of Satan's hatred and spite is against us. All of his power and cunning and skill and experience with temptation.
[4:53] All of his demons are arrayed against us. We have the target on our chest that Satan is aiming for. Indeed, as Paul reminds us, our battle is not against flesh and blood, mere people.
[5:09] But it's against spiritual wickedness in high places. All the forces of hell are aroused to keep us out of heaven. Secondly, the world is against us.
[5:21] The world of unbelievers of which Satan is said to be the ruler. The God of this age. And so this world stands united in its hatred against Christ and its people.
[5:34] Jesus said in John 15, If you belonged to the world, or if you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is though, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.
[5:50] That is why the world hates you. So we once were one of them, but through grace, we have now been saved out from them.
[6:01] We've renounced the world, its ways, its values, its pleasures, its thoughts, and its friendship. For whoever would be the friend of this world is the enemy of God.
[6:13] So we're now outsiders to the world. We don't belong. We're out of step. And we're standing in the way of their progress to every man doing what is right in his own eyes and everyone else applauding and approving of what they're doing in their own eyes.
[6:33] And we resist. And we say no. And we will not approve. And we will not applaud. We will not take part. And our very lives of Christ-likeness and holiness and commitment to divine commandments are a point of conviction and rebuke of their wickedness.
[6:57] Yes, the world is against us and the gloves are coming off. And then there's our own indwelling sin. Indwelling meaning living in us. That too is against us.
[7:09] We have a traitor within. A traitor who agrees with everything that the devil and the world is offering to us. And it opposes every step of progress in Christ-likeness that we would make.
[7:27] So, with then, this powerful trinity of evil that is against us, the world, the flesh, and the devil, it's nothing short of a wonder that any of us make it safely home to heaven.
[7:38] The reason has nothing to do with some dream that there's none who are against us. It has everything to do with who is for us.
[7:49] So, in saying if God is for us, who can be against us? Our text is not doubting whether God is for us, neither is it doubting whether anyone is against us.
[8:00] Rather, what it is saying is that it doesn't really matter who is against us so long as God is for us. And as long as He's for us, then come hell and high water, we are secure in Him.
[8:19] So, a group of second grade boys are on the basketball court at recess, and they're picking up, choosing up sides, and the teacher's included, and his name happens to be Michael Jordan in his prime.
[8:32] So, I'm one of those second graders, and the certainty of victory for our team rests on one fact.
[8:45] If Michael is for us, if he's on our side and for us, then it doesn't matter who's against us. You can throw in all the second graders, the third, fourth, fifth, all of the whole school, if Michael's for us, it doesn't matter who is against us.
[9:07] We're going to win. Game over. That's the kind of thing that is being said here. The all-important thing is having the true and living God for us, and if He is, then the opposition is a non-issue.
[9:22] However, many may be arrayed against us. Now, that's the certain conclusion, then, that Paul uses to recap everything that he said up to this point.
[9:35] If God is for us, who can be against us? Now, all of biblical history bears out this conclusion, because with God for us, suddenly impossibilities become possibilities, indeed realities.
[9:52] So, Abraham was promised to be the father of many nations, but he's got a few things going against him. Resisting that promise from ever being fulfilled, he's facing the fact that his own body is as good as dead since he's about 100 years old, and also that Sarah, barren Sarah's womb is also dead.
[10:17] But what is old age and barrenness when God is for us? The God who gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were.
[10:33] And so, though it was impossible with man, a son was born to them, from whom came the Savior. And the whole generation of nations who, through Christ, have become a part of the people of God.
[10:58] There's the teenage boy David with his slingshot, and against him is this giant, seasoned warrior, Goliath, armed to the teeth. And if ever there was a formidable foe, someone against another, it was Goliath.
[11:14] To humanize, it was suicide for David that day. But David knew something that the rest of the two armies in Goliath failed to see. You come against me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, whom you have defied.
[11:31] This day the Lord will hand you over to me, and I'll strike you down and cut off your head. And all those gathered here will know that it's not by sword or spear that the Lord saves, for the battle is the Lord's, and he will give all of you into our hands.
[11:46] And the rest is history and confirmation of Romans 8.31, that if God is for us, it doesn't matter who is against us. We heard it last Sunday from this pulpit, didn't we?
[11:59] The brutal and undefeated Assyrian army that was on a roll and just put notches in their belt. One nation after another comes to the doorstep of Judah, and they're ready to put another notch in their belt.
[12:12] And there was everything in their experience and numbers to say, yes, this is going to go like the last nations went. But for one thing, and that is who was for Israel?
[12:26] Israel. It was God. The God who holds in his hands the life and breath of every human being. And so in one night, he just withheld the breath of 185,000 Assyrian soldiers.
[12:46] And when the army woke up in the morning and found all of them dead, they ran back home with their tail between their legs. Again, if God is for us, who can be against us?
[13:00] There are dozens of such historical accounts in the Bible. Indeed, the Bible can be said to just be an illustration of our text this morning. Think of Gideon's 300 against the Midianite hordes.
[13:15] They were outmanned 1 to 450. I think we get 330 in here is probably what we'll get during the General Assembly if everybody's packed tight.
[13:27] But put another 120 people in here and then you be responsible to kill all of them without yourself being killed. 1 to 450. But that is what happened, wasn't it?
[13:41] Because the Lord was for Gideon and his 300. You see, the lesson is simple. If God is for you, you can't lose.
[13:52] But if he's against you, you can't win. There were times when God killed more of Israel's enemies with hailstones that he threw down on them than the Israelites did with their swords.
[14:05] You see, he has all creation at his beck and call. How was it that Pharaoh's great chariot core who was destroyed by a bunch of Israelite slaves just recently released?
[14:22] It was water that God controls and opened up and then swallowed his enemies. You see, if he's for you, then who can be against you?
[14:36] When God is for you, five loaves and two fishes can feed 5,000 men plus women and children. What's the odds of a virgin giving birth to a son as a virgin?
[14:49] There was a whole lot of science against the Virgin Mary. All things were against her ever bearing a son. But with God, with you, all things are possible.
[15:04] There was Christ hating Saul of Tarsus, breathing out slaughter against the church. He's got the blood of Stephen at his feet, as it were, and he's going out to get more. Oh, no. We've got the powerhouse working against us.
[15:18] We're just a few people. This church, this infant church, what's going to happen? But the Lord was with them and for them. And he says, well, I'll just save this Saul of Tarsus and make him a master builder in my church.
[15:34] If God is for you, who can be against you? So these examples from history are just underscoring this truth, you see.
[15:45] He, the Lord, who is for you, is the great difference maker. So what does it mean then to have God for you? Well, it means he's no longer against you.
[15:57] You're no longer his enemy. He is now for you. You're reconciled to him. It means he's your friend and not your foe.
[16:10] It means he seeks your good and not your ill. He's out to help you, not to harm you. He's determined to bless you and not to curse you. He's on your side.
[16:21] He's in your corner. He's got your back. He's for you. He's for you in life. He's for you in death. He's for you in every circumstance you can ever find yourself in in time and eternity.
[16:37] He's for you in joy. He's for you in sorrow. He's for you in gain. He's for you in loss. He's for you in health. He's for you in disease. He's for you in strength.
[16:48] He's for you in sickness. He's for you in temptation. He's for you in your failures and your sins. I say it's a heaven on earth to know that in every situation that we find ourselves in, that the living and true God is for us.
[17:09] He's for us. He's on our side. What then shall we say in response to this? In response to what? What all does the this refer to?
[17:21] And here commentators disagree and some say, well, it's verse 28 to 30, the passage that was read for us. That in response to that, what shall we say?
[17:32] Some would say, no, you need to go all the way back to Romans 8 verse 1. And what shall we say in response to all that Paul has said in verse 8 or chapter 8? Others say, oh, you're not going back far enough.
[17:43] You need to go all the way back to Romans 1, 1. And all that God has said through Paul in the whole book of Romans so far. Well, I don't have a quarrel with any of it, but let's at least unpack the immediate context.
[17:59] What shall we say in response to this? This that has just been said in verse 28 to 30. Verse 28 shows us, we're asking just how much is God for us?
[18:15] We say God is for us. How much is he for us? Verse 28 says that he's for us in his providence. Now, if he's overruling all that ever happens to us so that he makes it work together for our good, then it doesn't really matter who or what is against us, does it?
[18:37] He's able to spin gold out of straw. Kids, you know what I mean? You've heard of the story of Rumpelstiltskin, that funny little man.
[18:50] He had a whole pile of straw in the room, and every night he was able to spin that straw into gold. God does one better.
[19:02] He can spin good out of evil. He can spin good out of bad. He can spin good out of sin. Indeed, he works all things together for good to them that love God, to them that are called according to his purpose.
[19:21] So, believer, all the wheels of providence are turning for you. None of it is working against you. Oh, it looks like it's coming around to squish me.
[19:32] No, it's all working for you. The God of providence is on your side. Who or what can be against you? Secondly, verse 29 goes on to say, this God is for us in his foreknowledge.
[19:47] That is, if God has chosen to set his love upon you before time began, if he's chosen to enter into a relationship with you where he knows you and you know him, he's your God, you're his child.
[20:05] If he's for us in his love, then it doesn't matter who is against us. And we go on, if God is for us in his predestination, if he's predestined you to be conformed to the image of his Son, if that's your glorious destiny, to which you'll assuredly arrive one day, if God Almighty has set your destiny, who can be against you?
[20:35] It's the same God who's for us in his calling, if he's effectually called us to Jesus Christ, he's enabled us to come, drawn us to come to him, so that we actually answered the call, come to me, and came and rested our soul's salvation on this Jesus, and we're joined to him by faith, then what does it matter who is against us?
[21:01] He who began the good work in us, when he called us, will finish it, complete it until the day of Christ Jesus. And then if God is for us in his justification, if our sins have all been paid for by Christ's atoning death, and all his righteousness has been credited to my account, so that the judge of heaven brings down the gavel and announces the verdict, there's no more any condemnation for him, I declare him righteous in the sight of God, in the sight of my law, then who can be against us?
[21:38] Indeed, that's what he's going to say later in verses 33 and 34, who can raise a charge against those whom God has justified, and Christ has died for, and if God is for us in glorification, for salvation is not complete until I am home in heaven with Christ in a state of glory, seeing and sharing in the glory of Christ, made sinless at last, then who can ever be against me and stopping me from getting there?
[22:15] More happy but not more secure, the glorified spirits in heaven, because no one or nothing can keep me from being glorified too. So the whole argument has been this, if God has called us according to his purpose, verse 28, and his good purpose for us is to get us all the way home to heaven, glorified at last, then who can frustrate that purpose?
[22:46] Who can thwart that plan? Who can there possibly be to overthrow what our omnipotent God is determined to do? Just how for us is he?
[23:01] Well, he's for us in his foreknowledge, in his predestination, in his calling, in his justification, in his glorification. Who then can be against us? But there's even more to unpack in this sense of, what does it mean for God to be for us?
[23:21] It means that he's for us in all his attributes. In the entirety of his being, all that he is, is for us, in all that we need.
[23:34] A perfect match. All that he is, for me, who is so needy of him. So he's for us in his wisdom. I was born yesterday, I don't know my way through this world.
[23:46] I don't know what's best for me. But he who has perfect knowledge, infinite wisdom, who knows what is best for me, and has chosen the way that is best for me.
[24:03] That's working for me. His wisdom works for me. And his power to bring about that which he, in wisdom, knows his best for me.
[24:13] It's not like he just knows what's best, but doesn't have any power to bring it about. No, he has almighty power, and that power is at work to bring about his best plan for me.
[24:26] He's God most high, and therefore he will fulfill his purpose for me. Who is there to thwart him? There's none equal to him, there's none even close to him, who just speaks, and things that exist not come into existence.
[24:44] He's for us in his faithfulness. He's for us in his love and goodness. His righteousness, his holiness, his justice, it's all for us.
[24:57] His grace and mercy and sympathy, all working for us. That is for us who are in Christ, there is absolutely nothing in God that is against us. All that he is, is working for us.
[25:12] Then who can be against us? But there's more. We could also say that all three persons of this one God are for us. If God is for us, it means that the Father is for us.
[25:30] We're going to see in the next verse, next week, Lord willing, that he's so for us, that when we needed a Savior, he did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us.
[25:43] For us. He's for us. And Calvary screams, John, he's for you. He screams your name. He's for you.
[25:54] He gave his Son for you. He put our sins on his own Son and poured out his wrath on him that he might have mercy on us. He condemned sin in the flesh of Jesus that he might pronounce the verdict of no condemnation for those of us who are in Christ Jesus.
[26:14] He's adopted us into his family. He cares for us as the perfect Father. He's made us heirs of a whole new universe without the curse, a new heaven and a new earth.
[26:27] He's so for us that our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the things, the glory that we will share in. Well, if the Father's for us, it doesn't matter who's against us.
[26:42] But it's not just the Father, it's also the Son of God is for us. He became man for us. What a stoop that the eternal God would actually take upon his deity, our humanity.
[26:57] What a stoop. It's a greater stoop than you becoming a flea, becoming a spider mite. He became man for us.
[27:08] And then he obeyed the law of God for us. And then he took the curse that our sins deserved and became sin for us and became a curse for us and suffered the wrath of God that was upon us that it might be turned away from us.
[27:28] And then he rose again for us and he ever lives for us. And he ascended into heaven where he now appears for us and now prays for us.
[27:40] And he feels for us in our weakness and sends us mercy, grace to help us. And he's coming again for us that we might be with him where he is and see his glory and share in it.
[27:53] He's the King of kings and Lord of lords. And if he's for us, who can be against us? The Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, is for us.
[28:07] He's the one who found us dead and quickened us to life when we were dead in trespasses and sins. One moment, as dead as a stick, severed from the tree.
[28:19] The next moment, alive. That was the Holy Spirit. He was for you that day, wasn't he? He made you alive unto God. He changed your heart, took out the enmity that refused to submit to God's law and he put in a new heart that wants to please him.
[28:39] That submits to his way instead of your way. He's the one who lives in you to maintain the life of God in the soul of man. He's the one who set us free from the law of sin and death.
[28:54] Verse 2, he's the one who enables us to live according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh. He powerfully leads us to put to death the misdeeds of the body that we might live.
[29:05] Verse 13, who bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God and sheds abroad this love of God in our hearts. He helps us in our weaknesses, even in our praying when we don't know what to say.
[29:19] And if this very spirit who raised up Christ from the dead dwells in us, then who can be against us? So with the ever-blessed Trinity working for us to see us saved and home with him at last, what does it matter who is against us?
[29:40] Do you see, dear Christian, just how much God is for you? And I want to emphasize this this morning because there's a lie that's been around since Genesis 3 that he is not so for you as you thought.
[30:02] He's not concerned for you at all, Eve. He's just concerned for himself and he really doesn't want you to be like him. And that lie is continuing to be sounded in our ears.
[30:21] So you need to hear, God is for us. All three persons of the Trinity, all their attributes, all that he is, all that he does, is for us.
[30:40] Glory to God. Now, let me seek to apply it and we're done. Now, if God is for us, and he is, then he wants us living like it.
[30:52] Living up to this great privilege. So I have to ask you, how real is this to you that God is for you? Do you wake up to a new day savoring the fact that God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are for me today?
[31:08] Or is this reality blotted out by the dark clouds of all that is hanging over your head and all your duties and all that's wrong? No small part of the discouragement in the Christian life is due to just this point of living aloof to the fact that God is for us.
[31:29] He's all in for you, brother. All that he is is for you, dear sister. Today, every day, all day.
[31:44] And if this is true, and it is, then we must refuse to see or think of anything that is against us without at once rejoicing in our God who is for us.
[31:58] Let me say that again. If it is true that God is for us and it is, then we must refuse to look at anything or even to think of anything that is against us without at once turning and rejoicing in the God who is for us.
[32:16] Do you know how to pivot? It's a skill critical to the Christian life. I've got some basketball players here. I've got some basketball players here. I've been taught to pivot, I'll bet.
[32:28] I still remember our eighth grade basketball coach in practice taking the ball out of one boy's hand and saying, now you guard me. I'm going to teach you how to pivot.
[32:41] So there's the basket and here's the defender behind the coach and he's got the ball and when you've got the ball you can't walk around. They'll take the ball away and give it to the other team. You've got to stay put or it's travel.
[32:51] You can move as long as you keep your pivot foot in the same place. And so he's teaching us how to pivot. So he takes the ball and he says, you ready? Yeah, ready coach.
[33:02] And he goes like this. He's got his pivot foot here and then he quickly pivots back around and he lays it up for two points while this guy's over here guarding thin air, you see.
[33:16] It was a sudden change of direction, a pivot from here to here so quickly that it threw off the defense. And there is such a thing as pivoting in the Christian life.
[33:29] We need to learn the spiritual pivot of faith. When we're facing everything that is against us and we look it in the eye and we see all that is against us but then we pivot.
[33:44] We pivot to who is for us and that pivot makes all the difference. So there's Jeremiah. A wonderful pivot in Lamentations 3. You're familiar with it.
[33:55] Jerusalem is under Babylonian siege. They've cut off all inflow of water and food and there's no food coming in and there's no end to the siege.
[34:09] Starving people, dead bodies piled up in the streets of Jerusalem. Everywhere Jeremiah looks, he sees devastation and death and the stench of death.
[34:22] And here's what he says. I've been deprived of peace. I've forgotten what prosperity is. My splendor is gone and all that I had hoped for from the Lord.
[34:37] I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them and my soul is downcast. Yet, yet, this I call to remembrance and therefore I have hope that we are not destroyed.
[35:02] The great love of the Lord, His compassions never fail. They're new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. You see the pivot from what it was against Him to who was for Him.
[35:16] This God of great love and faithfulness and compassion. New mercies every day. There's Habakkuk. He also had a few things going against Him. Though the fig tree does not bud and there's no grapes on the vine.
[35:36] Though the olive crop fails. and the fields produce no food. Though there are no sheep in the pan and no cattle in the stall. Yet, I will rejoice in the Lord.
[35:48] Yet, I will be joyful in God my Savior. The sovereign Lord is my strength. He makes my feet like the feet of a deer so I can go on the heights.
[36:01] He goes from the depths of despair as He looks at all that's against Him. but the pivot of faith takes Him from who is against Him to who's for Him.
[36:12] And what a difference a pivot makes. You're meant to pivot from what and who is against you to who is for you. You're meant to live the Christian life with our Heavenly Father who is for us, the Lord Jesus, the Holy Spirit who is for us.
[36:30] and we're sadly the poor for not doing so. Nobody pivots perfectly.
[36:43] Not Jeremiah, not Habakkuk, and certainly not Jacob. You remember Jacob. He's got 12 sons. There's famine in the land and they're running out of food.
[36:57] He's already lost his favorite son, Joseph. To a wild animal. And so he thinks. And he's keeping his youngest son, Benjamin, by his side, overprotecting him, you see.
[37:09] He's already sent his other 10 sons to go get grain in Egypt so they can stay alive during the famine. But the man in charge of selling the grain in Egypt thinks they're spies.
[37:21] And he so plies them with questions one after another that they somehow release to him the fact that one of their brothers is no more and the other one's home with father.
[37:32] And it would break his heart and make him go to the grave in mourning if anything happened to little Benjamin. Of course, that man was Joseph, their brother, but they didn't recognize him.
[37:50] And so he binds and keeps Simeon, one of the brothers, there with him and says, you go back and you bring back little Benjamin and if he comes with you, I will know you're not lying to me, that you're not spies.
[38:05] But if you don't come back, you don't get Simeon and you don't get grain. And so they return home and they tell their father, Jacob, the man there that's selling the grain told us we can't buy anymore unless we bring Benjamin back with us.
[38:22] And Jacob was at his wit's end and he said to his sons, he's over here now, you see, he's looking at what's against him. You have deprived me of my children.
[38:38] Joseph is no more. Simeon is no more. And now you want to take Benjamin. Everything is against me.
[38:53] Aren't you glad that's in the Bible? Because some of you, even this morning, might be feeling everything is against me.
[39:05] You're not alone. We've all felt that way at different points. And poor Jacob, he's stuck there, you see. We don't see the pivot.
[39:18] Everything seems to be... No, you and I, the reader, as we're reading Genesis 42, want to shout to him, oh, Jacob, it's not at all what it seems. It's not at all what it looks like, Jacob.
[39:31] Behind this frowning providence, God is hiding a smiling face, Jacob, and he's smiling because of all the good that he's fixing to do for you.
[39:46] He's smiling because he knows just how close you are to getting Simeon back and, yes, Joseph back and enough provision back to make it through the whole famine.
[40:00] Poor, poor Jacob. Everything against him, failing to pivot to the ever-present reality that God was for him and even then was working everything for his good.
[40:15] Oh, what peace we often forfeit. Oh, what needless pain we bear. Yes, when we forget that God is always and ever for us.
[40:29] Some of you have had a difficult year. You have had a lot of bad stuff thrown your way this year. Hard things, difficult things.
[40:41] and you may be feeling that everything is against you. I want to say, child of God, it's your birthright. It belongs to you.
[40:53] It was bought with blood. It was bought by a father who gave up his son that you might wake up every morning and say that the God who created the universe and upholds every atom of it is for me.
[41:11] today. Everything about him, every atom, not a thing in him is against me but for me.
[41:23] He's pulling for me. He's helping me. He's on my side. So, who and what can be against me? Why is it that the things that are against us seem to hide and overshadow the one who is for us?
[41:40] Isn't that strange that that seems to happen? Why isn't it that we just don't find ourselves naturally bubbling over about who's for us such that we forget about who's against us? Why is it the other way?
[41:51] Well, for one thing, what's against us is seen and felt. They're not pretended. They're real problems. And the Bible faces them head on.
[42:03] We don't live with our head in the sand. Whereas the God who is for us is unseen. So, this is by sight and this is by faith and that's why this so often seems to blind us to who's for us.
[42:20] And so, we need to learn the pivot of faith from sight to faith from what we see is against us to what we by faith know and who by faith we know is for us.
[42:33] The boy David did it so well didn't he? All the other soldiers in the army of Israel what did they do?
[42:44] They saw who was against them. He was a giant. He was dreadful. He was fierce. He was a couple feet taller than any of them. And so, they ran for dread and fear.
[43:01] Why didn't David run? He was looking at the same giant. He heard the same threats of the giant that the other Israelite soldiers heard.
[43:13] But David saw something that shrunk Goliath and brought him down way down. What was it? It was by faith in the one who was for him.
[43:26] He knew that God that was for him. He had tested that God. He had seen that God work for him. When a bear came and stole away one of his little lambs, he went after him and killed the bear.
[43:43] And another time a lion and David knows that the God who helped me kill the bear and the lion, this giant is nothing to him.
[43:55] So, we pivot it from sight to faith. We refuse to see anything in this world that's against us without factoring in the unseen God.
[44:09] But then secondly, realize that your comfort, your peace, your joy, that God is for you will rise no higher than your knowledge of that God. Who is the one that's for you?
[44:23] Well, if you have a little bit of knowledge of him, you might get a little bit of joy and peace and comfort from knowing that he's with you. Oh, but if you know that he's infinite, eternal, unchangeable, omniscient, omnipotent, everywhere, present, all wise, good, faithful, well, then having him for you will mean a whole lot more.
[44:53] So you see, our enjoyment of the God who's for us depends on how well we know him. Oh, let's meditate on his attributes. Let's personalize them.
[45:04] Let's praise him for all that he is for us. That he's the God of unthwartable purposes for you. He's the God who loved you before time, predestined you for glory, called you to his son, justified and declared you righteous and is going to glorify you so that you can say, I know, not I think, I hope so, I know that in all things he's working for my good.
[45:41] The better you know him who is for you, the less moved you will be by all that is against you. So meet with him. Meet with him here. We heard it in Sunday school. There is the special presence of God in the gathered assembly where two or three are met together as the church.
[46:01] church. There I am in a special way. It's here that we see his greatness. We see his attributes. We sing praise to him for who he is and what he's done.
[46:12] And then run to his word daily in your homes and get to know him better and pour out your heart to him and enter into personal dealings with God all day long.
[46:25] You know, nothing of what is against you changes anything about the one who is for you. So get to know him and this stuff will be treated as it ought to be.
[46:41] If God is for me, who can be against me? Before I close, I must ask you, do you know for sure that God is for you and not against you?
[46:55] You were born into this world at enmity with God and you show it by not submitting yourself to his commandments. Children, hear me.
[47:13] Your parents may be for you. Your friends may be for you. Everybody in this church may be for you. But that will mean nothing to you in the day when you stand alone before your maker and God the judge.
[47:32] The all-important question will be, is he for you? You see, if God before you is for you, then it doesn't matter who's against you.
[47:44] But the converse is also true. If God is against you, it doesn't matter who is for you. That was seen on the battlefields of the Old Testament.
[48:00] That will one day again be seen in the day of judgment. If God is against you, if your sins have not been washed away in the blood of Jesus, if they remain against him, he is against you.
[48:15] All of his justice is against you. All of his omniscience and knowing everything is against you. His power, his wrath, his righteousness, it's all against you.
[48:29] Now, here's the wonderful thing about our God, that though he is against you, he loves you and invites you to come to Jesus Christ and become his friend instead of his foe.
[48:46] He urges you to be reconciled to him. Stop fighting against me. Put down your weapons. Surrender in faith and repentance.
[48:58] Renounce your old way of living for yourself. Ignore Christ no longer. Come to him and he will receive you. And he will be for you.
[49:09] And you will know the joy of living every day. Knowing that God is for you. that his wrath and justice was poured out on his son that he might now be for you.
[49:25] Have you come to him? Are you sure that you are in Christ? Then what a way to live and what a God to live that life with. A God who is with you.
[49:37] A God who is for you. We're going to sing in closing that this God is more than enough for me. And I want you who are lost to hear that for you.
[49:52] There is everything in Jesus that you need. Come to him and enjoy it. Come to him and cry for his mercy and he'll save you. And believers as we sing this song I want you to bring all that is against you to this God that we're singing of.
[50:07] And to realize that whatever is against you there is more than enough in him who is for us. Well let's sing it.
[50:19] Let's stand. It's more than enough for me. We'll sing it through twice. Let's thank you.
[50:38] Amen.