Romans 8:19–22 with its references to the creation’s present bondage to corruption and its future liberation is virtually unique in Paul’s letters. To understand the apostle’s teaching about this matter a number of issues need clarification: (i) Do the OT and other Jewish literature contain references to creation’s subjection to bondage? (ii) What does Paul mean by ‘the creation’? (iii) Who is responsible for subjecting the creation to bondage? (iv) What is the nature of its bondage to corruption? (v) Do the OT and other Jewish literature contain references to the liberation of creation? (vi) When will the creation experience its liberation and what will be the nature of that liberation? (vii) What do other NT documents say about the matter? These issues are discussed in turn below.
Do the OT and Other Jewish Literature Refer to the Creation’s Subjection to Bondage?
A possible reference to the creation’s subjection to bondage is found in Genesis 3:17–18, where, because of Adam’s transgression, God curses the earth: ‘To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it’, “Cursed is the ground because of you.… It will produce thorns and thistles for you” ’. (Cf. Gen. 5:29: ‘He named him Noah and said, “He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the LORD has cursed” ’.) There are other traditions in Jewish literature of which Paul may have known, in particular 4 Ezra 7:11–12: ‘And when Adam transgressed my statutes, what has been made was judged. And so the entrances of this world were made narrow and sorrowful and toilsome; they are few and evil, full of dangers and involved in great hardships’.
What Does Paul Mean by ‘the Creation’?
A variety of interpretations of ‘the creation’ have been offered, including the human and subhuman creation as well as angels and the stars; the subhuman creation and the angels; the subhuman creation alone; humans alone, and angels alone. Of these, the main alternatives are the subhuman creation, and the human as well as the subhuman creation. Of these two the former is to be preferred in the light of 8:21, where the creation itself is distinguished from humanity and where it is said that creation itself is going to be brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
Who Is Responsible for Subjecting the Creation to Bondage?
If, as seems most likely, Paul is alluding to Genesis 3:17–18 when he speaks of creation being subjected to the bondage of corruption, then the one who subjected it is God himself when he pronounced the curse upon it following the primeval couple’s disobedience. It is very unlikely that evil angels are responsible, as Christoffersson has suggested.359
What Is the Nature of the Creation’s Bondage to Corruption?
As Hahne correctly observes, creation’s fallen state is not the same as that of humanity, which is the result of disobedience to God’s command. The natural world is a victim of humanity’s disobedience, now subject to futility and unable to fulfill the purpose for which it was created. It brings forth weeds more easily than useful crops. Fitzmyer says: ‘The world, created for humanity and the service of it, was drawn into Adam’s ruin; the blessing given to him (fertility of the soil, fecundity of trees, brilliance of stars, friendliness of animals, limitation of insects) were all lost, because Eve gave Adam (= humanity) to eat of the forbidden fruit. Paul is tributary to such Jewish thinking. He realizes that through Adam come not only sin and death (5:12–14), but “bondage to decay” and the “slavery of corruption”, which affect all material creation, even apart from humanity (8:19–23)’.
Do the OT and Other Jewish Literature Contain References to the Liberation of the Creation?
There are such references in this literature. Fitzmyer draws attention to the promises in the OT about a new heaven and a new earth and to the apocalyptic promises in Trito-Isaiah (Isa 65:17; 66:22). He notes also that ‘in the intertestamental literature such promises were transferred to the messianic age: 1 Enoch 45:4–5 (the earth will be transformed for the upright along with the Chosen One); Jub. 4:26; 2 Apoc. Bar. 31:5–32:6; 4 Ezra 7:11, 30–32, 75’.
When Will the Creation Experience Its Liberation and What Will Be the Nature of That Liberation?
Paul makes clear that the creation’s liberation from corruption is tied to the destiny of redeemed humanity. As its submission to corruption and futility resulted from humanity’s fall, so its liberation is tied to the final redemption of the children of God—when they enter upon their glorious freedom. Paul does not explain the nature of the creation’s liberation. Cranfield offers the following suggestion: ‘We may, however, assume that the liberty proper to the creation is indeed the possession of its own proper glory—that is, of the freedom fully and perfectly to fulfil its Creator’s purpose for it, that freedom which it does not have, so long as man, its lord (Gen. 1:26, 28; Ps 8:6), is in disgrace’.
What Do Other NT Documents Say about the Matter?
Outside the Pauline corpus there are two brief references to a new heaven and a new earth. In 2 Peter 3:13 we find: ‘In keeping with his [God’s] promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells’, and in Revelation 21:1–2 we read: ‘Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth”, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband’.
b. The Groaning and Redemption of Believers, 8:23–25
In these verses Paul makes it clear that it is not only the subhuman creation that groans in the present time. This, too, is the lot of believers as they long for their redemption.
Paul writes: Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. The way Paul begins here, ‘not only so, but we ourselves’, distinguishes believers from the subhuman creation of the previous verse, confirming the interpretation of the creation adopted above.
Paul describes believers as those who have the ‘firstfruits of the Spirit’. He employs the expression ‘firstfruits’, an agricultural image, in a number of ways in his letters. He uses it to refer to the first converts in a particular area (16:5; 1 Cor. 16:15; 2 Thess. 2:13), and to refer Christ’s resurrection as the ‘firstfruits’ of those who have died and will likewise be raised (1 Cor. 15:20, 23). Here in 8:23 he likens the firstfruits of the crop and the subsequent full harvest to believers’ present experience of the Spirit and their subsequent adoption as God’s children, including the redemption of their bodies respectively. The expression, ‘firstfruits of the Spirit’, has been read in two different ways: (i) construing the genitive ‘of the Spirit’ as epexegetical, yielding a translation, ‘firstfruits which is the Spirit’;365 (ii) construing the genitive ‘of the Spirit’ as appositional, referring to the Spirit’s work in us. The first option is preferable in the light of Paul’s references to the Spirit himself being given to believers and living in them (5:5; 8:9, 11) and particularly his parallel depiction of the Spirit himself given to believers as the ‘down payment’ or ‘deposit’ guaranteeing their future inheritance (cf. 2 Cor. 1:22; 5:5; Eph 1:13–14).
As those who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, Paul says, ‘we … groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship’. This inward groaning is probably to be understood as the nonverbal sighs of believers as they experience the tensions of the present time, what Dunn describes as ‘the inward sense of frustration of individual believers (as a whole) at the eschatological tension of living in the overlap of the ages’. The groaning of believers here in 8:23 recalls the groaning of creation in 8:22.
The ‘adoption’ for which believers eagerly await is their final salvation, standing in juxtaposition as it does with the ‘redemption’ of their bodies, that is, their resurrection. While they eagerly wait for this, they groan inwardly. The apostle expresses himself in similar vein in 2 Corinthians 5:2–4 when he speaks of groaning as we long ‘to be clothed instead … with our heavenly dwelling … so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life’, that is, our final redemption, including the resurrection of our bodies.
Continuing this line of thought, Paul says: For in this hope we were saved, that is, in hope of our adoption, the redemption of the body. This is a hope for something yet to be realized. The very nature of hope is anticipation of the yet unseen but nevertheless certain realities (see ‘Additional Note: Hope in the Pauline Corpus’, 365). So the apostle explains: But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? (cf. 2 Cor. 5:7: ‘We live by faith, not by sight’). Hope in the NT is always future oriented, and unseen in the sense that the object of hope is yet to be revealed. Yet hope is not wishful thinking, but what the writer to the Hebrews describes as both ‘sure’ and ‘certain’ (Heb 11:1). This being the case, Paul adds: But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. The NIV’s ‘patiently’ translates an expression that denotes, not a passive waiting—killing time, as it were—until what is hoped for arrives, but rather a strenuous holding onto hope and doing good despite suffering and difficulties (cf. 2:7; 5:3–4; 15:4–5; 2 Cor. 1:6; 6:4; Col 1:11; 1 Thess. 1:3–4; 1 Tim. 6:11; 2 Tim. 3:10; Tit 2:2). Wright notes that here again we encounter the characteristic ‘now and not yet’ that is so pervasive in Paul’s letters: we have already received ‘the spirit of adoption’ (8:15); we are already ‘children of God’ (8:16–17); and ‘yet there is a form of this “sonship/adoption” for which we still eagerly long. The link between present and future is made, again as usual, by the Spirit, who is the “first fruits” ’.
c. The Groaning of the Holy Spirit as He Intercedes for Believers, 8:26–27
Caught in the tension of living in the overlap of the ages, the period of the ‘now and not yet’, believers experience weakness, but in the midst of this weakness the Holy Spirit helps them through his intercession on their behalf, particularly when they do not know how to pray.
8:26 While believers hold on in hope, enduring the sufferings of this present age, they are not left alone. Paul goes on: In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. ‘In the same way’ seems on first reading to connect the groaning of the Spirit’s intercession for believers with their own experience of groaning as they hold on in hope, awaiting their final redemption. However, what the text says is that likewise the Spirit ‘helps’, not likewise the Spirit ‘groans’. ‘Likewise’ then refers back to some antecedent activity of the Spirit, not to the groaning of believers. Smith argues that ‘likewise’ is best understood to link the active work of the Spirit in intercession here in 8:26 right back to the active work of the Spirit confirming believers’ sonship in 8:16 despite the amount of material separating the two statements. He sums up his view: ‘Paul is saying: “Just as the Spirit is at work within our hearts to confirm to us our adoption (8:16), so in the same way also the Spirit is at work within our hearts to bear up our weakness (8:26)” ’.
The verb ‘to help’ used here is found only twice in the NT, here and in Luke. 10:40 (‘But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!” ’—italics added), where it clearly means to ‘lend assistance’. Here in 8:26 Paul maintains that the Holy Spirit ‘helps us in our weakness’. While the Spirit undoubtedly helps believers generally in their weakness, the particular weakness in which the Spirit helps them is their not knowing ‘what we ought to pray for’. This is surprising, for elsewhere Paul gives many instances of what people ought to pray for and the things for which he himself prays. Nevertheless, it is clear that the apostle is aware that there are times when he and others just do not know what to pray for—perhaps in times of suffering and persecution. When this is the case, he assures his audience that the Spirit lends us assistance.
The assistance the Spirit gives is that he himself ‘intercedes for us’. The idea of the Spirit interceding for people is found only here in the NT, and is not found in the OT or pre-Christian Jewish literature.376 Some have suggested that Paul is referring to believers’ prayers in tongues inspired by the Spirit, but this seems unlikely because: (i) the apostle is speaking of the Spirit’s intercession for us, not his inspiration of prayer in tongues by us; (ii) Paul says that the Spirit’s intercession is ‘through wordless groans’ (lit. ‘unspoken groans’),379 which suggests that the intercession is silent and not oral as is speaking in tongues.
While there is clearly a verbal connection between the groaning of creation, the groaning of believers, and the groaning of the Spirit, the Spirit’s groaning is clearly of a different order. In the former cases groaning emanates from frustration or suffering, whereas in the case of the Spirit this is certainly not so—his groaning is associated with intercession for believers.
8:27 In this verse Paul explains further the Spirit’s intercession, in particular the basis of its efficacy: And he who searches our hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. In the OT God is regularly depicted as the one who knows or searches the hearts of human beings (1 Sam 16:7; 1 Kgs 8:39; 1 Chr 28:9; 29:17; 2 Chr 6:30; Pss 44:21; 139:23; Prov 24:12; Jer 12:3; 17:9–10). In Revelation 2:23 the risen Christ says: ‘I am he who searches hearts and minds, and I will repay each of you according to your deeds’.
Only here does Paul speak about God knowing the mind of the Spirit, but in 1 Corinthians 2:10–11 he discloses that the Spirit knows the mind of God: ‘The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God’. Clearly there is a deep mutual understanding between ‘God’ and ‘the Spirit of God’. Two things inherent in this mutual understanding guarantee the efficacy of the Spirit’s intercession for believers: (i) God knows what is the mind of the Spirit, and (ii) the Spirit intercedes for believers ‘in accordance with the will of God’.
d. God Works All Things Together for Good for Those Who Love Him, 8:28–30
Here the apostle encourages his audience by reminding them of another of those things ‘we’ know; in this case ‘we know’ that God works all things together for the good of believers whom he has called according to his purpose, those whom he has predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.
8:28 Having encouraged his audience with the fact that the Spirit intercedes on their behalf, and that God knows the mind of the Spirit, Paul now encourages them with something that we know: 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. This is one of five occasions in Romans where the apostle says that ‘we know’ something.383 What ‘we know’ in 8:28 is that ‘in all things God works for the good of those who love him’. This text could also be translated: ‘for those who love God all things work together for good’ (construing ‘all things’ as the subject of the verb ‘work’) or possibly, ‘for those who love God he works all things together for good’ (construing ‘he’ as the implied subject of the verb ‘works’), yielding the same sense as that provided by the NIV. There is a textual variant that makes this latter sense explicit: ‘for those who love God, God works all things for good’).384 While this variant reading is generally regarded by scholars as the result of scribal emendation to make explicit what the scribe thought was implicit, Rodgers has argued that, for the sake of stylistic improvement, a scribe may have omitted an original second reference to God. In addition, he suggests that there may be an echo here of Genesis 50:20, which reads: ‘You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives’. Gignilliat, noting that synergei (‘work with’) denotes a collaboration, argues that this rules out ‘all things’ as the subject of this verb, and this is further supported by the fact that the verb ‘work’ in Paul’s letters ‘takes a personal subject, not an impersonal one’ such as ‘all things’.
If God is the implied subject of the verb ‘to work’ here, with whom or what does he work together? As Gignilliat notes, Paul has already suggested a synergistic collaboration between God and the Spirit in the matter of intercession for believers in 8:26–27. This idea of synergistic collaboration is then carried forward into 8:28, where God and the Spirit work together for the good of believers. The context suggests that the ‘all things’ that God works together with the Spirit to promote the good of believers includes their suffering (8:18) and weakness (8:26), though the ‘all things’ here should probably not be restricted to sufferings but include all the circumstances of their lives. In 8:35–39 the apostle insists that nothing that believers encounter will be able to separate them from the love of God.
Paul describes the people for whom God works all things together for good as ‘those who love him [God]’. Many times Paul speaks of God’s love for believers, but much less frequently of believers’ love for God, as he does here. Nevertheless, it is an important mark of true believers. The expression is a common designation for the faithful in Israel (cf., e.g., Exod 20:6; Deut 5:10; 7:9; Ps 145:20 [LXX 144:20]; Neh 1:5; Dan 9:4; Sir 1:10; 2:15, 16; Pss. Sol. 4:25; 10:3; 14:1), one that the apostle now applies to believers, both Jews and Gentiles.
Paul further describes those for whom God works all things together for good as people ‘who have been called according to his purpose’ (lit. ‘those who are called ones according to [his] purpose’). He uses the substantive ‘called ones’ several times elsewhere to describe believers,391 as he does here. This calling is according to his (God’s) ‘purpose’. When the apostle uses the word ‘purpose’, he does so usually to emphasize that things occur by the sovereign will of God, for example, his choice of Jacob rather than Esau (9:11), his choice before the foundation of the world of those to be adopted as his children and to receive the promised inheritance (Eph 1:11), and his eternal purpose hidden for ages to make known the rich variety of his wisdom to rulers and authorities through the church (Eph 3:9–11). In the following verses (8:29–30) it becomes clear that the aspect of God’s purpose Paul has in mind is conforming believers to the likeness of his Son, and having called and justified them to bring them to glory.
8:29 What Paul has in mind regarding the good towards which God makes all things work is then made clear: For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. In this world where believers groan inwardly as they await their adoption they may experience suffering and persecution, but God in his sovereign power makes even these things serve the end of their conformity to Christ. This is what God has ‘predestined’ for those whom he ‘foreknew’, each and every individual believer. Paul uses the verb ‘to predestine’ when speaking of matters that God has predetermined. In Ephesians he says that God predestined believers to be adopted as his children (Eph 1:5) and to live for his praise and glory (Eph 1:11–12). Here in 8:29 Paul points out that God predestined believers ‘to be conformed to the image of his Son’.
For believers to be conformed to the image of Christ will involve transformation. When Paul speaks of transformation elsewhere, it can involve moral transformation that takes place in the present: ‘And we … are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit’ (2 Cor. 3:18); ‘you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator’ (Col 3:9–10). In other places he speaks of an eschatological transformation: ‘And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man’ (1 Cor. 15:49); ‘the Lord Jesus Christ … will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body’ (Phil 3:20–21). We may say, then, that God has predestined believers to be conformed to the image of his Son, both through moral transformation in the present and finally by resurrection on the last day. In the present context, where those who are predestined, called, and justified are also to be glorified, Paul probably has in mind the final eschatological conforming of believers to the image of Christ through resurrection (cf. 1 Cor. 15:49; Phil 3:21; 1 John. 3:2).
God’s purpose in conforming believers to the image of his Son is ‘that he [Christ] might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters’. The word ‘firstborn’ itself can be understood either literally as the firstborn child in a family (Luke. 2:7; Heb 11:28), or metaphorically to denote preeminent status (Col 1:15; Heb 1:6), or to denote the first to experience resurrection from the dead (Col 1:18; Rev 1:5). The concept of Christ being the firstborn among many brothers and sisters here in 8:29 probably refers to his preeminence among his ‘many brothers and sisters’, those who bear the family likeness through transformation and will share his glory. It is noteworthy that the writer to the Hebrews says that to bring his brothers and sisters to glory Christ had to be made perfect through suffering to become the author of their salvation:
In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what he suffered. Both the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters. He says, ‘I will declare your name to my brothers and sisters; in the assembly I will sing your praises’. (Heb 2:10–12, italics added)
8:30 Concluding his thought in this section (8:28–30), Paul says: And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified. In this verse the apostle describes succinctly the broad sweep of God’s gracious dealings with believers, aspects of which are found scattered throughout his letters. They were ‘predestined’ before the world began ‘for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ’ (Eph 1:4–5). Then they were ‘called’ by God according to his purpose (8:28) through the preaching of the gospel (2 Thess. 2:14) to belong to and be in fellowship with Jesus Christ (1:6; 1 Cor. 1:9) and to enter his kingdom and glory (1 Thess. 2:12). Being predestined and called, they were justified through faith in Jesus Christ (5:1; Gal. 2:16) and by the blood of Christ (5:9) (see ‘Additional Note: Justification for the Doers’, 142–44). Finally, those whom God predestined, called, and justified, Paul says, he also glorified’. This is an unusual statement, for he uses the aorist tense as he does when speaking of their predestination, calling, and justification, suggesting that their glorification may also be understood as something that has already occurred. Clearly this is not the apostle’s understanding, for it runs counter to everything else he says about believers’ glorification. Normally he speaks of it as a hope for the future. Just a few verses earlier in 8:18 he asserts that ‘our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us’ (italics added).
Three ways of handling this problem have been suggested. One is to say that Paul uses the aorist tense in respect to believers’ glorification because he wants to depict it as something that is absolutely certain, as certain as their predestination, calling, and justification that have already occurred. A second way is to recognize that in 2 Corinthians 3:18 Paul speaks of glorification as a process already begun (‘we … are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit’), and this process is to be consummated at the Lord’s return (see ‘Additional Note: The Glory in Store for Believers’, 228–29.). A third way is to note that the aorist tense does not necessarily refer to past events, but may be used to describe a complete action, whether in the past, present, or future—in this case the future.399 Each of these three suggestions has value, but to decide which of them the apostle had in mind when he wrote is impossible to say with any certainty.
While what Paul says in 8:28–30 has implications for an understanding of the doctrine of predestination, it was not the apostle’s intention to formulate such a doctrine in these verses. His primary purpose was to provide comfort and encouragement for vulnerable believers caught in the overlap of the ages and exposed to suffering and persecution (cf. 8:18, 31–39). They are to know that the Holy Spirit comes to their assistance by his intercession on their behalf, and that God works with the Spirit to make all things work for their ultimate good. They are to know also that, as those whom God foreknew and predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, having been called and justified, they will also certainly be glorified.
8. The Emotive Climax—If God Be for Us, Who Can Be against Us? 8:31–39
In the previous section (8:18–30) Paul described the predicament in which believers and the creation find themselves during the overlap of the ages. He showed how the creation groans with frustration while it awaits its liberation along with that of believers (8:19–22) and how believers groan while they await their final redemption (8:23–25). He also revealed how the Holy Spirit intercedes for them ‘with groans that words cannot express’ (8:26–27), and how God works all things for the good of those who love him, those who are called according to his purpose (8:28–30). The following section, 8:31–39, constitutes an emotive climax to Paul’s exposition and defense of his gospel so far. In it he makes extensive use of the first person plural and by so doing associates himself with his audience in affirming what they together hold to be true: that God is for us (8:31), that having given up his own Son for us, he will freely give us all things with him (8:32), that God justifies us (8:33), that Christ died for us and, being now raised from the dead, intercedes for us (8:34), and that nothing whatever can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord (8:35–39).
This passage constitutes a peroration, the function of which, according to classical rhetorical theory, was to move the audience to accept the case made already in the speech, of which the peroration formed the climax. If, as seems likely, this is what Paul is seeking to achieve in 8:31–39, the passage forms an important transition between his response to objections that his gospel undermines moral standards and the status of the law on the one hand (6:1–8:13), and to charges that his gospel does away with Israel’s special place in the purposes of God on the other (9:1–11:36). In other words, Paul is seeking to gain his audience’s agreement to what he has argued so far, and to carry them along with him into the argument he is about to mount in 9:1–11:36.
The peroration, containing seven questions, is reminiscent of the style of the diatribe, but it is employed here not to confront but to encourage the audience. Four of the questions provide the basic structure of the passage (8:31: ‘What, then, shall we say in response to these things?’; 8:33: ‘Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen?’; 8:34: ‘Who is the one who condemns?’; 8:35: ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?’); each of which provides a cue for positive statements about God’s love and grace that follow.
8:31–32 Paul commences his peroration with the first of the basic questions: What, then, shall we say in response to these things? ‘These things’ refers back to Paul’s exposition and defense of the gospel so far in 1:18–8:30. What ‘we’ have to say is expressed in the first instance with another question: If God is for us, who can be against us? The expected answer is, of course, ‘No one!’ Paul then adds: 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? In the reference to God as the one ‘who did not spare his own Son’ there is, very probably, an allusion to Abraham’s ‘sacrifice’ of Isaac. When Abraham was tested by God, he was willing to sacrifice his own son, but in the end Isaac was spared. However, when God acted for the salvation of sinful human beings, he ‘did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all’. When Paul says that he ‘gave him up’ for us, he means that God ‘handed him over to death’ for us (cf. 4:25), so that Christ became the atoning sacrifice for our sins (3:25). While there may be an allusion here to Abraham’s son being spared (whereas God did not spare his own Son), it is doubtful that notions of vicarious sacrifice were ever associated with the ‘sacrifice’ of Isaac, or that he was regarded as a prototype of the Messiah.
The expected response to the question, ‘how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?’ is that, having given the greatest thing of all, his beloved Son, he will indeed graciously give us all things along with him. The ‘all things’ to which Paul refers in 8:32 refers probably to the blessings of salvation and includes the inheritance promised to believers (cf. 4:13; 8:17). We might add that God will also supply all believers’ other needs so that they will be able to be generous in their support of those who, like Paul, labor in the preaching of the gospel (cf. Phil 4:14–19).
8:33–34 In these verses, where Paul introduces his second basic question, he picks up again the theme of God as judge, and humanity appearing before him in his law court. In 2:1–16 he spoke of God’s impartial judgment and said he ‘[would] give to each person according to what he [had] done’. In 3:19–20 he spoke of the whole world being held accountable to God, and insisted that no human being would be justified in his sight by deeds prescribed by the law. Here in 8:33–34 he again speaks of God as judge. This time it is believers who stand in his law court, but in their case, Paul says, God will entertain no accusations brought against them, for he has already justified them (5:1). Already Christ has died for them, and he now intercedes on their behalf.
8:33 The second basic question is: Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? The verb translated ‘bring a charge’ is found only here in Paul’s letters, but used frequently in Acts where Luke speaks of Paul’s opponents pressing charges against him (Acts. 19:38, 40; 23:28–29; 26:2, 7). The charges that Paul has in mind in 8:33 are accusations that could be brought against believers before God the judge of all. Though not stated, Paul probably has in mind the charges brought against God’s people by Satan, the accuser of the brethren, charges that would have substance, for they are all guilty of sin against God. In Revelation 12:10 we read: ‘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” ’.
Believers are described as ‘those whom God has chosen’ (lit. ‘God’s elect ones’), a term found frequently in the OT. In its singular form it can refer to an individual (Ps 89:3; Sir 47:22) or to the nation Israel (Isa 42:1; 43:20; 45:4), while in its plural form it can refer to the nation of Israel (1 Chr 16:13; Ps 105:6; Isa 65:9; Sir 46:1) or to a number of individual Israelites (Wis 3:9; 4:15). Here in 8:33 in its plural form it refers to believers.
The expected answer to Paul’s second basic question is that no one will be able to bring charges against God’s elect because it is God who justifies. When responding to the question in this way, the apostle may have in mind Isaiah 50:8: ‘He who vindicates me is near. Who then will bring charges against me? Let us face each other! Who is my accuser? Let him confront me!’ When God himself vindicates his people, no charges against them can stand.
8:34 The third basic question is: Who then is the one who that condemns? The verb ‘to condemn’ that Paul uses here means to pronounce a sentence upon a person after determination of guilt. The answer to the question is No one, and for this very important reason: 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. In 8:26 we are told that the Spirit intercedes for us because of our weakness and not knowing what to pray for. Here we are told that the crucified and now risen Christ intercedes for us in the light of our possible condemnation. He acts as our advocate with God, at whose right hand he sits and pleads the efficacy of his atoning sacrifice so that there is now no condemnation for those who believe in him.
8:35 This verse opens with the fourth basic question: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? The expected answer is ‘no one’. However, Paul is aware that this does not mean that believers will be exempt from suffering, so he continues: Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ‘Trouble’ in Paul’s case was the ongoing and nearly ever-present reality of his life, this was often the case also in the lives of his converts, and he mentions these things no fewer than twenty-one times. ‘Hardship’ also features several times in Paul’s characterization of the life and ministry of both himself and other servants of God (2:9; 8:35; 2 Cor. 6:4; 12:10), as do ‘persecution’ (8:35; 2 Cor. 12:10; 1 Thess. 1:4; 2 Tim. 3:11), and less often ‘famine’ and ‘nakedness’ (8:35; 2 Cor. 11:27), ‘danger’ (8:35; 1 Cor. 11:26), and the ‘sword’, that is, death by execution (8:35).
8:36 All of these trials, Paul believes, are foreshadowed in Scripture: As it is written: ‘For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered’. The quotation is from Psalm 44, where the psalmist laments the fact that God has apparently rejected and humbled his people, something he could understand if they had not been faithful. Because the psalmist believes they had been faithful, he thinks their suffering has been for God’s sake, and so calls upon God to rise up and redeem them:
17All this came upon us,
though we had not forgotten you;
we had not been false to your covenant.
18Our hearts had not turned back;
our feet had not strayed from your path.
19But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals;
you covered us over with deep darkness.
20If we had forgotten the name of our God
or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
21would not God have discovered it,
since he knows the secrets of the heart?
22Yet for your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.
23Awake, O Lord! Why do you sleep?
Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever.
24Why do you hide your face
and forget our misery and oppression?
25We are brought down to the dust;
our bodies cling to the ground.
26Rise up and help us;
redeem us because of your unfailing love.
(Ps 44:17–26, italics added).
Parlier argues that it is not by chance that Paul quotes a passage from Psalm 44 in which the psalmist complains that God’s people are suffering though they remain faithful to the covenant, and calls upon God to redeem them in his ‘unfailing love’. It is as if Paul is responding to the psalmist’s complaint by asserting that no suffering is able to separate believers from the love of God in Christ. Jewett, on the other hand, suggests that Paul incorporated the quotation to adduce scriptural support to show that suffering is not a disqualifying mark for those claiming to be true disciples. He had to do this to silence criticisms of his apostleship along these lines.414 The apostle certainly had to defend himself in this way in 2 Corinthians 11:22–33, but whether this is the case here in Romans 8 is debatable.
8:37 The followers of Christ may be ‘considered as sheep to be slaughtered’, but even this cannot separate them from the love of Christ. On the contrary, he says: No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ‘We are more than conquerors’ (lit. ‘we are completely victorious’) translates a verb found only here in the NT, and is a heightened form of the more common verb ‘to overcome’, which is found twenty-eight times in the NT.415 The two predominant NT uses of ‘to overcome’ are (i) in relation to believers being victorious over pressure from those who would lead them astray doctrinally (1 John. 2:13, 14; 4:4; 5:4, 5), and (ii) in relation to believers being victorious in face of trouble and persecution by not denying their faith in Christ even in the face of death (Rev. 2:7, 11, 17; 3:12; 12:11). The latter seems to be the meaning of being ‘more than conquerors’ in 8:37. Believers are ‘more than conquerors’ when they refuse to deny their Lord even when they are ‘considered as sheep to be slaughtered’. Their victory is achieved ‘through him who loved us’, that is, through the Lord Jesus Christ, who stands beside his followers and strengthens them when they face persecution for his name’s sake (cf. Acts. 18:9–11; 2 Tim. 4:16–18).
8:38–39 These verses constitute the triumphant conclusion to Paul’s response to the fifth question, ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?’ (8:35a), and in fact to the whole emotive climax to his gospel presentation and defense so far. In 8:35b Paul listed earthly trials as those things that conceivably separate us from the love of Christ, while here in 8:38–39 he lists supernatural powers that may conceivably do so. However, he insists that neither earthly trials nor the hostility of supernatural powers ‘will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord’.
Paul declares: 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. The apostle’s list includes the pairs death and life (cf. 1 Cor. 3:22; Phil 1:20), angels and demons (lit. ‘angels nor authorities’), the present and the future (cf. 1 Cor. 3:22), and height and depth. Each of these represents some power or reality that, together with other ‘powers’ and ‘anything else in all creation’ (lit. ‘any creature’), could conceivably separate believers from the love of Christ. He lists all these things only to deny emphatically that any or all of them could possibly separate believers from ‘the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord’. It is significant that the fifth question was, ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?’ and the final triumphant declaration is that nothing ‘will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord’. The love of Christ is none other than the love of God that is in Christ, something Paul makes clear in 5:8: ‘But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us’, and 2 Corinthians 5:19: ‘God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them’.
Commenting on the fact that nothing can separate believers from the love of God in Christ, Barrett says: ‘Of course not; for Christ Jesus is—the Lord. He is Lord over all spiritual powers, for he has triumphed over them in the Cross (Col. 2:15); he is Lord over life and death, for he was crucified, and raised from the dead; he is Lord over things present and things to come, for it was in him that God elected us in love, and it is with him that we shall enter into God’s glory beyond history. In Christ Jesus, God is for us; and it is in Christ Jesus that we know him and trust him’.
Kruse, C. G. (2012). Paul’s Letter to the Romans. (D. A. Carson, Ed.) (pp. 346–365). Cambridge, U.K.; Nottingham, England; Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company; Apollos.