An icon of St. Monica by Sr. Hannah of the Holy Assumption Russian Orthodox Monastery in California.

God Running is a place for anyone who wants to love Jesus more deeply, follow Jesus more closely, and love people the way Jesus wants us to.

Romans 8:29-39

For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be 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.

What then shall we say 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 with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 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. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
  we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 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.

From Despair to Hope

In our last post from Romans I shared about how I recently suffered several hours of deep despair. (If you’re interested you can read more here: Groaning in Prayer–Romans 8:26-28. In today’s post we’ll look at the reasons why we have such great immense enormous hope in Jesus.

So yes, I was in a very difficult emotional place last week. And I was ruminating. And I was struggling. It was intense to say the least. And then I began to groan in prayer, and you can refer to that post if you want to learn whether or not I slept that night. But in Romans 8, after Paul writes about our groaning, he goes on to share about our great hope. Below you’ll find four reasons we have enormous hope in Jesus.

4 Reasons We Have HopeAll things work for our good. We looked at this in our last post but to summarize, Paul writes that if we love God, and surrender our lives to Him, and allow ourselves to be called according to His purpose, then all things He allows in each of our lives will work together for good. We may not see how right now. We may not even see how it all comes together in this life at all. But we can take great hope in that our Eternal Lord God the Father always has our best interests in His Mind and Heart. And what He allows He uses for our own ultimate good. (Romans 8:28)
God is for us. God, Who is Love itself, Goodness itself, Wisdom itself, the Great God Who created the universe and all that is in it: He is for us. With His greatness and awesomeness in mind, who can be against us? The truth is, it doesn’t matter who or what might set them self or itself against us. With God on our side, whatever difficulty we might find ourselves in, every situation is overwhelmingly in our favor. (Romans 8:31)
Jesus intercedes for you and for me. Paul writes that Jesus is at the right hand of God the Father interceding for us. I don’t care who you might bring up as a possible intercessor on my behalf; it could be Clarence Darrow or F. Lee Bailey, but no one compares to the Son of God, the one who died, and more than that, who rose and who is at the right hand of God Himself. Jesus is interceding on my behalf, and that gives me great hope and comfort.
We can know these things for sure because of the Cross. One of the beautiful parts of our hope in God and in Christ is how much God sacrificed on our behalf. God gave His only begotten Son, in whom He is well pleased, for you and for me. Now sometimes, I think, we say this and hear this so much that we sort of lose sight of what it means. Jesus wasn’t just killed; He was savagely tortured, to put it lightly. He was beaten, flogged, crowned with a helmet of thorns, and forced to carry the Cross for half a mile before being nailed to it, and He did it willingly. He knew exactly who, throughout all of time, would stay at His side and who would reject and revile Him in the end, and still He chose the Cross, because He knew that it would open the way for all of us to have a chance to be with God forever in Paradise.

So if God went to such an extreme as to not even spare His own Son, knowing full well what that Son would endure and how many would reject Him anyway, then why would He keep anything else from us, as long as it’s for our own good? We can be sure of God’s love for us and His good will toward us because of the way He gave up Jesus for us. (Romans 8:32)

So then, shall we lose hope when tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or the sword come?

No.

Even if for the Lord’s sake and for the sake of His people we’re being killed all day long like sheep being slaughtered, still we have the great hope of Christ.

In all these things we’re more than conquerors through Jesus.

For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 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. (Romans 8:38-39)

Notes:

Image of Saint Monica via Midwest Augustinians (Listed in Google images as Creative Commons)

The Love Like Jesus Book

Available on Amazon, Google Play Books, and Audible!

Love Like Jesus: How Jesus Loved People (and how you can love like Jesus)

In this heartfelt, Scripture-rich journey, Kurt Bennett invites you to study not just the words of Jesus, but His actions—His love, His mercy, His boundaries, and even His naps.

Honest. Practical. Deeply human.

Love Like Jesus begins with the story of how after a life of regular church attendance and Bible study, Bennett was challenged by a pastor to study Jesus. That led to an obsessive seven year deep dive. After pouring over Jesus’ every interaction with another human being, he realized he was doing a much better job of studying Jesus’ words than he was following Jesus’ words and example. The honest and fearless revelations of Bennett’s own moral failures affirm he wrote this book for himself as much as for others. Love Like Jesus examines a variety of stories, examples, and research, including:

Specific examples of how Jesus communicated God’s love to others.How Jesus demonstrated all five of Gary Chapman’s love languages (and how you can too).The story of how Billy Graham extended Christ’s extraordinary love and grace toward a man who misrepresented Jesus to millions.How to respond to critics the way Jesus did.How to love unlovable people the way Jesus did.How to survive a life of loving like Jesus (or how not to become a Christian doormat).How Jesus didn’t love everyone the same (and why you shouldn’t either).How Jesus guarded his heart by taking care of himself–he even napped–and why you should do the same.How Jesus loved his betrayer Judas, even to the very end.

With genuine unfiltered honesty, Love Like Jesus, shows you how to live a life according to God’s definition of success: A life of loving God well, and loving the people around you well too.

A life of loving like Jesus.

(Kindle, hardcover, and paperback now available on Amazon, the ebook is now available on Google Play Books, and the audiobook is available on Audible.)

Now you can take Love Like Jesus with you wherever life happens.
We recently released the audiobook version, beautifully narrated by Jonathan St. John. And it’s available on the following platforms:

AudibleiTunes/Apple BooksAudiobooks.comSpotify

It’s also available on Amazon, Hoopla, Audiobooksnow, Chirp, Libro, Overdrive, and virtually everywhere audiobooks are offered.

You can listen right now!