Read: Romans 8:31-39 - STEP Bible, Bible Gateway
This passage brings to an end the first half of St Paul’s letter, and this final paragraph is a great crescendo to finish it off. With the full force of his supercharged rhetorical art, Paul praises God for all that God has done for those he calls his children, acclaims all that he will do for them, and rounds out with a great chorus of the power of the love of Christ.
Mid-way through Lent it’s a good thing for us to do the same: to stop, praise God for his inestimable grace, for his power, his might, his cunning, his self-sacrifice in Christ; and to rejoice that we are his and he is ours through Christ.
But it’s also worth reminding ourselves what it is that Paul is trying to achieve with his letter to the Romans. He’s been trying to explain to the Roman Christians that, because faith is all that matters now, God loves all sorts of Christian equally and looks on them with equal favour. And yet not once has Paul tried to convince his readers of this fact by asking them to overlook their differences, or by telling them they’re not really all that different from one another. Instead, he has drawn their eyes upwards, to what God has done for all of us – different Christians – in the one Jesus. And it has captivated his vision, and, very likely, theirs as well.
In our own day there are all sorts of divisions in the church, and all sorts of different Christians. We’ll never be united by pretending that we’re not different. We’ll never be united if we keep our eyes purely on one another, even if we can convince ourselves of our similarities. We’ll only be united if we draw one another’s eyes upwards to look up at the same God, to focus our praises on the one God who has poured out his grace upon each and every one of us – in all our differences.
These devotions were originally written for the parish of All Saints, Ascot and we are grateful for permission to republish them on Fulcrum.
Patrick is curate of All Saints’, Ascot in Berkshire. A musicologist by training, he is married to Lydia, a university lecturer, and dad to Madeleine. He writes (sporadically) at benedixisti.wordpress.com and tweets (even more sporadically) as @patrickgilday.