Hey, Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee, Cabel, and I'm your host for The Bible Recap.

Today.

Opens with one of the most powerful, dense chapters in the whole Bible, Romans 8. This is a crowd favorite. It opens by saying, There is therefore now no condemnation for those who were in Christ Jesus. So, of course, we love it already. One important thing to do anytime you see a connecting word in your Bible is to see what it's connecting you to. Words like, so, because, since, therefore, these words point us to cause and meaning and motive. For instance, this verse has the word, therefore, right at the beginning, which means it's connecting us back to the end of chapter seven, where Paul was talking about Jesus delivering us from ourselves. The way this connects is, Jesus delivers us from ourselves, therefore, there is no condemnation for anyone who is in Christ. Even though the individual sentences make total sense on their own, context and connection can really help us see more of the big picture. Paul revisits themes from yesterday, the juxtaposition of the Spirit and the flesh and how Christ traded His life for hours. He tells us to set our minds on the things of the Spirit. Paul encourages us to choose wisely what we think about because our thoughts will become our actions.

He says, We have the power to do this because we have the Spirit, whereas the lost are helpless to fight sin with anything other than another type of sin. For instance, they might fight Gluttony with vanity or fear with control, but either way, sin still wins. That is not victory and it is not freedom. Whereas those who have the Spirit, which is all believers according to verse 9, the Spirit is the one empowering their lives. That's what it looks like to be children of God. The Spirit is the sign of our adoption into God's family. His presence in us is the whole reason we can call God our Father. And we're not only God's children, we're co-heirs with Jesus. What? That position and relationship will involve suffering, but ultimately, glory, which means all the suffering will be worth it. In the meantime, we live in a broken world that longs for redemption, and even we wait for our redemption to be complete in real time. And as we wait, the Spirit helps us. He prays for us. Did you catch that? God prays for you. The Spirit prays to the Father on your behalf, and he always prays for things that align with the Father's will.

So his prayers for you will always be granted. Ultimately, everything that happens is in God's hands and he's working all those things together, good, bad, and ugly, like only he can to glorify himself and to do good to you. But that promise is only true for those who love God. For those who don't love God, all things are not being worked together for their good. That may seem harsh, but the verses that follow tell us the process of how we became believers and how we came to inherit such great kindness from God. He foreknew us. He predestined us to be his kids. He called us, he justified us, and he glorified us. And because God has done such a great work in our lives, literally nothing and no one can stand against that. As a matter of fact, Jesus, the one who died for us, who is currently seated at the right-hand of the Father, he's praying for us, too. So God, the Spirit, is praying for us, and God, the Son, is praying for us. And you cannot beat that tag team. In him, we are more than conquerors against distress and persecution and danger.

How do you do more than conquer? You turn your enemies into your servants. You make what tried to kill you, serve you, which is exactly what God says he does for us in 8:28. He works it all together for our good. Nothing can separate God's kids from God's love, not even our sins, not even ourselves. In chapter 9, Paul says he really wishes that everyone knew this freedom and love. He aches for the Jews who don't believe in Jesus. He wants this for them so much that he says he wishes he could trade places with them all. It's hard to believe they can't see it. They have everything that points them to Jesus, the covenants, the patriarchs, the law. But despite having all that, they can't see it. They can't believe it. As Scripture keeps telling us, being an ethnic Jew isn't the same thing as being a child of Abraham. This is probably a hard concept for his Jewish readers to grasp, so he compares it to two other stories they're familiar with. First, the story of Abraham and Isaac. Abraham had another son first, Ishmael. But God's promise landed on his second son, Isaac.

Then Paul references Jacob and Esau, the twins. Remember them? Esau was born first, so he should have had the inheritance. But through a series of events, everything is handed over to Jacob, the secondborn. Paul points out that God's promise hasn't failed. It just got distributed differently than people expected. And just like with salvation, Paul says none of this is based on anything they did. God declared this plan before they were even born. He anticipates this will be hard for his readers, so he says, Look, I know this sounds like God is being mean or unfair, but he's not. He's incapable of injustice. We have to stay humble here. While we may not understand God's actions, the reality is we're the potter and He's the potter. He can do whatever he wants with us. He made us. None of us deserve anything from him except punishment, death and separation. The fact that He chooses to adopt any of us into his family is astonishing. That displays his great mercy and kindness. For those who aren't adopted into his family, his wrath and power are displayed. God seems to delight in doing the unexpected, calling people into his family who are outcaste, calling them beloved.

I know all of this can be really tough to stomach. This is one of the more challenging chapters in scripture back to back with the crowd favorite. If this is hard for you and you want something to help you process it a little more, there's a sermon in the show notes that might be helpful. Paul says it's ironic that some of the Gentiles who didn't even have the law have been adopted into God's family, while Jews who spent their lives trying to live up to it perfectly have not been. But it's because they missed the crucial factor, the heart factor. They were obeying the law to attain self-righteousness, which never works. But Paul reminds them of God's promise through the Prophet Isaiah. He'll preserve a remnant from among Israel who will love and follow Jesus, not the law. Paul longs for them to know God, not just know about God. He says they're super zealous, just like he was back in his terrorist days, but that their zeal isn't based on knowing God. Zeal without knowledge is dangerous. He wants them to realize that salvation is based on knowing and trusting God, fully relying on what Christ has done, and that is available to anyone of any ethnicity.

Anyone who believes and confesses the truth of Christ will be saved. Anyone. Because of this, Paul implores them to go spread the knowledge of God. This was my God shop for today. Paul says to tell people the gospel because there are people out there who God is going to adopt into his family, so they have to hear the news. They need access to the knowledge of who God is. Paul says, Go, share, tell. And he has modeled this well for them, going from country to country, enduring persecution, writing letters to people who love him and people who disagree with him, all to spread the knowledge of God and the hope of the gospel. Surely God will give some people ears to hear it, so we must be the mouths to speak it. Spread the word that he's where the joy is. Okay Bible readers, it's time for our weekly check-in. Look, I know Paul's letters can be challenging. Peter even says this later in one of his own letters. He basically says, So I hear you've been reading Paul's letters. Yeah, those are work. Good job. I'm sure if Peter were here with us today, he'd congratulate you on your progress.

But since he's not, I'll do it on his behalf. Way to go, you guys. We'll see you back here again tomorrow. Music is a great way to get into the Christmas spirit. You can listen in as Natalie Grant, Phil Joel, Tasha Leighton, and more of your favorite Christian artists perform their favorite Christian songs in Hope Nation's newest songs from a mug video. Click the link in the show notes to check it out.