Romans 8:28

Verse 28. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God] To understand this verse aright, let us observe:

1. That the persons in whose behalf all things work for good are they who love God, and, consequently, who live in the spirit of obedience.

2. It is not said that all things shall work for good, but that συνεργει, they work now in the behalf of him who loveth now, αγαπωσι; for both verbs are in the present tense.

3. All these things work together; while they are working, God's providence is working, his Spirit is working, and they are working TOGETHER with him. And whatever troubles, or afflictions, or persecutions may arise, God presses them into their service; and they make a part of the general working, and are caused to contribute to the general good of the person who now loves God, and who is working by faith and love under the influence and operation of the Holy Ghost. They who say sin works for good to them that love God speak blasphemous nonsense. A man who now loves God is not now sinning against God; and the promise belongs only to the present time: and as love is the true incentive to obedience, the man who is entitled to the promise can never, while thus entitled, (loving God,) be found in the commission of sin. But though this be a good general sense for these words, yet the all things mentioned here by the apostle seem more particularly to mean those things mentioned in Ro 8:28-30.

To them who are the called according to his purpose.] Dr. Taylor translates τοις κλητοις, the invited; and observes that it is a metaphor taken from inviting guests, or making them welcome to a feast. As if he had said: Certainly all things work together for their good; for this reason, because they are called, invited, or made welcome to the blessings of the covenant, (which is ratified in eating of the covenant sacrifice,) according to God's original purpose first declared to Abraham, Ge 17:4: Thou shalt be a father of many nations-and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him, Ge 18:18. Thus this clause is to be understood; and thus it is an argument to prove that all things, how afflictive soever, shall work for our good while we continue to love God. Our being called or invited, according to God's purpose, proves that all things work for our good, on the supposition that we love God, and not otherwise. For our loving God, or making a due improvement of our calling, is evidently inserted by the apostle to make good his argument. He does not pretend to prove that all things shall concur to the everlasting happiness of all that are called; but only to those of the called who love God. Our calling, thus qualified is the ground of his argument, which he prosecutes and completes in the two next verses. Our calling he takes for granted, as a thing evident and unquestionable among all Christians. But you will say: How is it evident and unquestionable that we are called? I answer: From our being in the visible Church, and professing the faith of the Gospel. For always, in the apostolic writings, all that are in the visible Church, and profess the faith of the Gospel, are numbered among the called or invited; i.e. among the persons who are invited to feast on the covenant sacrifice, and who thus, in reference to themselves, confirm and ratify the covenant. As for what is termed effectual calling, as distinguished from the general invitations of the Gospel, it is a distinction which divines have invented without any warrant from the sacred writings. Our calling, therefore, is considered by the apostle in the nature of a self-evident proposition, which nobody doubts or denies; or which, indeed, no Christian ought to doubt, or can call in question, Taylor's notes.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Rom_8:28

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God.

All things work together for good to them that love God

I. It is abundantly obvious of many a single adversity--that a great and permanent good may come out of it. This is often verified, as when the disease brought on by intemperance has germinated; and the loss by a daring speculation has checked the adventurer, and turned him into the way of safe though moderate prosperity. Apart from Christianity, man has often found that it was good for him to have been afflicted--that, under the severe but salutary discipline, wisdom has been increased, and character strengthened, and the rough independence of human wilfulness tamed, and many asperities of temper have been worn away. And so of many an infliction on the man who is a candidate for the world above. The overthrow of his fortune has given him a strong practical set for eternity; the death of his child has weaned him from all idolatry; the tempests of life have fastened him more steadfastly to the hold of religious principle. He is made perfect by sufferings.

II. These adverse visitations do not always come singly. The apostle supposes the concurrence of two or more events, all verging towards the good of him to whom they have befallen. It has often been said that misfortunes seldom come by themselves; and it is the compounding of one evil thing with another that aggravates so much the distress of each of them. And when we are lost in the bewilderments of a history that we cannot scan, and entangled among the mazes of a labyrinth that we cannot unravel, it is well to be told that all is ordered and that all worketh for good.

III. Important consequences emanate from one event which in itself is insignificant, insomuch that the colour and direction of your whole futurity have turned on what, apart from this mighty bearing, would have been the veriest trifle in the world. It is thus that the great drama of a nations politics may hinge on the veriest bagatelle. The pursuers of Mahomet were turned away from the mouth of the cave in which he had the moment before taken shelter by the flight of a bird from one of the shrubs that grew at its entry. This bird changed the destiny of the world. And therefore it is well that all things are under the control of God who maketh all things work together for good unto those who love Him. Is not the fact that what is most minute often gives rise to what is most momentous, an argument for the doctrine of a providence that reaches even to the least? Should God let go one small ligament in the vast and complicated machinery of the world, it might all run into utter divergency from the purpose of the mind that formed it.

IV. How am i to be assured of my interest in the declaration of the text?

1. The promise here is not unto all in the general, but to those who love God. Now I may not be sure that I love Him. I may desire to love Him; but to desire is one thing and to do is another. Now it does not follow that you are altogether destitute of love to God because it stirs so languidly within you that you are not able very distinctly or decidedly to recognise it. Your very desire to love Him is a good symptom; your very grief that you love Him not bodes favourably for you. Where there is an honest wish for affection, there is in fact the embryo of affection itself, struggling for a growth and an establishment in the aspiring bosom. Meanwhile it is most desirable that the germ should expand. And the question is, How shall this be brought about? Never by looking to oneself, but by looking unto the Saviour.

2. They who love God are described by another characteristic. They are the called--i.e., those who have felt the power of the call upon their hearts, and have complied with it accordingly. It is only upon our entertaining the call of the gospel and consenting thereunto that there ensues a transition of the heart to the love of God. Anterior to this, the thought of God stood associated with feelings of jealousy and insecurity and alarm. A sense of guilt has alienated us from God. It is this which stands as a wall of iron between heaven and earth. And the only way by which this else impregnable barrier can be scaled, and we can draw nigh in affection to the Father, is by accepting the only authentic offer that He ever held out to us of reconciliation. It is by beholding Him in the face of Christ. (T. Chalmers, D.D.)

All things work together for good to them that love God

I. The end to be accomplished The good here spoken of does not apply to our health, ease, or fortune, but to our eternal interest. Who does not see that afflictions have a beneficial tendency? They bring us to reflection; they quicken prayer; they wean us from the world, etc. But even spiritual good is not the highest reference. Good looks to heaven and points to eternity (2Co_4:17).

II. The means which are to accomplish this end. All things, as the subject-matter in hand, and by the context. The apostle is here speaking of afflictions: and of those that will ultimately be beneficial are--

1. The trials of those who are called to bear the cross for Christs sake. Those losses that you may now be called to endure for the sake of religious principle will inevitably enrich the inheritance which grace has prepared for you above all things. If you suffer with Christ, you shall reign with Him.

2. The ordinary calamities which we are all more or less called to endure. The painful sickness, borne with unmurmuring resignation; the loss of property, submitted to with the knowledge that we have a higher treasure the departure of friends, whom we have given up without rebellion to the will of Him who had a better right to them than ourselves--all the trials of life enter within the compass of this delightful expression.

3. But observe the words, work together. The believers history is not an unconnected series of events; they form a perfect scheme. His life, death, infancy, old age, all enter into the one grand scheme which Providence is causing to produce his spiritual benefit. How many influences strive, even in reference to our temporal comforts, to promote our enjoyment in this world. The sun, the moon, the stars, the elements; food, raiment, habitation, etc. And so it is with respect to our spiritual welfare. How many aids, instruments, influences, are perpetually provided to promote our spiritual welfare? The Deity--Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; angels, patriarchs, etc.; the Bible, the Sabbath, the fellowship of the saints--all concurring to promote our spiritual welfare. The believer, looking at the scheme of providence, is not unlike an individual surveying some complicated piece of machinery, where the manufacturer himself stands by holding in his hand the articles which this mechanism has produced, and saying to the spectator, See these apparently contradictory movements; hear this noise and confusion: you cannot tell the design, perhaps, of one of the wheels, much less enter into the combination of the whole; but I can, and here are the results of these various movements. So does God speak to His people, surveying the mechanism of providence, the wheels of which are so varied, and in some of its movements so apparently contradictory.

III. The certainty with which we may calculate upon the production of this end by these means. We know. It is not a mere conjecture; an opinion; it is a declaration of absolute certainty. We have the promise of a God that cannot lie; and we have the power of a God who can do all things that He wills to accomplish His promise.

IV. The inferences from this subject.

1. What is true in reference to the individual Christian must, of course, be true in reference to the Church at large. Christ is exalted to be head over all things to His Church. The rise and fall of empires, the setting up and the pulling down of monarchies, the progress of arms, of commerce, of arts, the collision of human passions and human interests that is perpetually going forward--all these things are working together for good to the Church.

2. The unspeakable value of that sacred volume which contains such a discovery as this. Who could have made it but God Himself? Who that looks abroad upon the chequered scene of human affairs can presume to tell whether good or evil preponderates? And even if they could advance so far as to pronounce a decision, that good now preponderates, yet who, without some infallible oracle to determine the question, can declare whether ultimately good or evil will prevail? But the Bible comes in, and sets the matter at rest, and tells us that all things work together for good, etc. Nay, without the Bible who can tell us what good is, or how it is to be obtained?

3. The necessity of faith, to rise to the standard of our privileges, and receive that abundance of consolation which God has provided for us. (J. Angell James.)

All things working together for good to them that love God

I. The explanation of the text.

1. The nature of the privilege.

(1) The extent--All things, as limited by the context, which speaketh of the afflictions of the saints.

(a) All manner of trials for righteousness sake. Stripes are painful to flesh, but occasion greater joy to the soul (Act_16:1-40.). Spoiling of goods stirreth up serious reflections on a more enduring substance (Heb_10:34). So banishment; every place is alike near to heaven, and the whole earth is the Lords (Rev_1:9). Death doth but hasten our glory (2Co_5:1).

(b) Ordinary afflictions. Many times we are best when we are weakest, and the pains of the body invigorate the inward man (2Co_4:16). In heaven you shall have everlasting ease.

(c) Though prosperity be not formally expressed in this place, yet it is virtually included. For God keepeth off, or bringeth on the cross as it worketh for our good (Son_4:6). It is a threatening to them that do not love God that their prosperity tendeth to their hurt (Psa_69:22). The sanctifying of their prosperity is included in a Christians charter (1Co_3:21-23).

(2) The manner of bringing it about--They work together. Take anything single and apart, and it seemeth to be against us. We cannot understand Gods providence till He hath done His work; He is an impatient spectator that cannot tarry till the last act, wherein all errors are reconciled (Joh_13:6-7). God knoweth what He is a-doing with you, when you know not (Jer_29:11). When we apprehend nothing but ruin, God may be designing to us the choicest mercies (Psa_31:22).

(3) The end and issue--For good.

(a) Sometimes to good temporal, or our better preservation during our service (Gen_50:20). Many of us, whose hearts are set upon some worldly thing, have cause to say we had suffered more if we had suffered less. In the story of Joseph there is a notable scheme of Providence.

(b) Spiritual good. So all affliction is made up and recompensed to the soul; it afflicts the body, but bettereth the heart (Psa_119:71). We lose nothing but our rust by scouring.

(c) Eternal good. Heaven will make us complete amends for all that we suffer here (2Co_4:17).

2. The certainty of this--We know. Not by an uncertain and fallible conjecture, but upon sure grounds. What are they?

(1) The promise of God, by which He hath secured the salvation of His people, notwithstanding their troubles (Heb_6:17-18).

(2) The experiences of the saints, who have found it so (Psa_119:67; Php_1:19).

(3) From the nature of the thing. Two considerations enforce it--

(a) All things are at Gods disposal, and force to serve Him.

(b) His special care over His people (Isa_49:15; Zec_2:8; 1Co_10:13).

II. A more general state of the case.

1. This good is not to be determined by our fancies and conceits, but by the wisdom of God; for God knoweth what is better for us than we do for ourselves. Should the shepherd or the sheep choose his pastures? the child be governed by his own fancy or the fathers discretion? the sick man by his own appetite or the physicians skill? It is necessary sometimes that God should displease His people for their advantage (Joh_16:6-7). Peter said, Master, it is good for us to be here; but little thought what work God had to do by him elsewhere.

2. Good is to be determined by its respect to the chief good or true happiness which consists not in outward comforts, but our acceptance with God; other things are but appendages to our felicity (Mat_6:33).

3. This good is not always the good of the body, or of outward prosperity; and therefore our condition is not to be determined by the interest of the flesh, but the welfare of our soul.

4. It is not good presently enjoyed and felt, but waited for; and therefore our condition must not be determined by sense, but faith (Heb_12:11).

5. A particular good must give way to a general good, and our personal benefit to the glory of God and the advancement of Christs kingdom (Php_1:24).

6. In bringing about this good we must not be idle spectators, but assist under God.

7. If it be true of particular persons, it is much more true of the Church; all is for good (Psa_76:10). (T. Manton, D.D.)

The co-working of Providence

We begin with the first of these parts, viz., the proposition itself, All things work together for good, etc., wherein again we have two branches more. For the first, the subject, it is all things ; all things whatsoever they be, they do work together for the good of Gods people. All things indefinitely. It is a very large and comprehensive word, and so makes for the greater comfort and encouragement of all believers. First, all things in an universality of subsistence, and within the compass of being. Theres nothing which can be said to be, but what it is it is one way or other advantageous to those which are Gods people. First, for God Himself, who is the Being of beings, the uncreated being. There is nothing of Him but it makes for the good of His children. All the attributes of God, all the offices of Christ, all the gifts and graces of the Spirit, they still make for the good of them that belong to Him. Secondly, for created being, that is all of it for our good likewise. There is not any of all the creatures but they are in their several kinds and capacities subservient to the good of the Church and of every member of it. But secondly, all things in an universality of dispensation and under the notion of working. All occurrences, and events, and stations, and conditions, whether good, or bad, or indifferent, whatever is done and disposed in the world. The second branch of the proposition is the predicate or consequent in these words, Work together for good to them that love God. Wherein, again, we have three particulars more. For the first, the improvement itself, it is this: that they work together. Where there are two things distinctly and separately considerable of us--first, their simple operation. Secondly, their additional co-operation. First, I say, here is their operation: all things, whatsoever they be, they do work for the good of Gods children. It is not said, That all things are good, for they are not. Besides many sins and temptations, there are many crosses and afflictions which Gods children are sometimes exercised withal, that in their own nature are evil, and so to be accounted. But work to good that they do. And there is good which comes out of them, even then where there is not good in them, as immediate unto them. No affliction is joyous, but grievous, etc. (Heb_12:11). Again, they work for good here is a farther note of their activity: it had been well if it had been said, They turn to good, they are ordered and disposed to good, and the like. But the Holy Ghost does not content Himself with so narrow an expression as that is, but carries it a little further. If He had said, They prove to be good, that had been a word of casualty, and might have seemed to make it a mere accident and matter of chance. If He had said they are wrought to good: that had been a word of compulsion, and might have implied some kind of enforcement and constraint hereunto. But now He says rather they work to good, which is an expression of freeness, and forwardness and spontaneity and does denote that particular aptitude and disposition and inclination which is to be found in every creature as subordinate to the good of the Church. The second is their additional conjunction and co-operation--they work together. And here again there are three things especially observable. First, their efficacy in working: things which work together, they work with a great deal of strength; and that which is defective in one, it is supplied and made up by the other. Weak things, when they are joined together, they are enabled to do great matters. The second is their unity in working: things that work together they work with a great deal of cheerfulness and alacrity and agreement in their performance. Co-operation, it implies conspiration. The third is their concomitancy and connection, and subordination in working. And this again, it may be taken three manner of ways. There is a threefold co-operation or working together of all things for the good of Gods children, which is here pertinently considerable of us--First, they work together with God. Secondly, they work together with us. Thirdly, they work together one with another. This is done especially according to these following observations--First, by labouring for a clear and upright conscience. Secondly, by prayer and calling upon God (1Ti_4:4; 2Co_1:11). Thirdly, by studying the providence of God and observing Him in all His dealings with us, we should take notice of the things themselves, and take notice of our own hearts in them, how far forth they are affected with them, that so we may receive good and benefit from them. God has made to such and such conditions; this will suck and draw virtue out of them, and make a happy improvement of them; and all things work together for us so they work together with us. And thats the second co-operation. Thirdly, they work together; that is, they work together one with another. If we take any passage of Providence singly and alone by itself, perhaps we may not so easily see how it does indeed work for our good. But take it now in its complication and connection with many more, and then we shall see it abundantly. The second is the effect or end of this improvement, and that is here expressed to be for good. Here is no good set down, so as to declare what it is, only indefinitely and in the general. First, for temporal good; God sometimes does His servants good in this, by those things which at the first appearance seem opposite and contrary hereunto. As Joseph when his brethren sold him into Egypt. Secondly, for spiritual good, so all things work for good to them however. Every passage of providence to those who are the children of God, it serves to draw them nearer to God, and to perfect their communion with Him. Thirdly, for eternal good which is the main good of all. Thats the second thing here considerable, to wit, the end or effect of this improvement, and that is good, The third and last is the persons who are more especially interested in it, and they are the children of God, who are here described from a double qualification. The one of their Christian affection, to them that love God, and the other of their effectual vocation, to them which are the called according to His purpose. And so there is this in it, that Gods children, and they alone, have all things working to them for their good. There is none that have interest in the privilege but those only that do partake of the condition. As for other people, they are so far from having all things to work for their good as that they rather work the quite contrary, for their greatest evil. God Himself being an enemy to them, everything else is an enemy with Him, and all the creatures are ready to rise up in arms against them. The Word of God is a savour of death to them, the sacraments they are occasions of judgment. Prayer it becomes an abomination; there is a snare, and a trap, and a stumbling-block in all their comforts. Everything is the worse for them, and they for it. The second is the manner of enunciation, or declaration of this proposition in these words, we know it, which is an expression of great confirmation; it is not a matter of guess only, or conjecture, but of certainty and assurance. This knowledge of a believer, it may be reduced to a threefold head of conveyance--first, we know it by revelation. Secondly, we know it by reason; and thirdly, we know it by experience. There is very great reason for it. First, that which we have here in the text, the eternal purpose of God Himself. Whatsoever is done in the world, it is subservient to Gods decree, and tends to the filling of that. Now, this is that which God hath purposed, and ordained, and appointed aforehand, even to bring His children to perfect happiness and salvation at last. Secondly, Gods affection and the love which He bears to believers, this makes for it also. Especially, if we shall further add His omnipotence and almighty power, that He does whatsoever He pleases both in heaven and earth. Thirdly, the covenant of grace, that does likewise make much for this purpose. Fourthly, the mystical union which is betwixt Christ and every true believer. And now for the improvement and application of all this to ourselves. First, heres ground of patience and contentment in every condition. Again, as this makes for patience in the present condition, so also for hope for time to come. Again further, we may carry on this truth not only to the comfort of such and such Christians in particular, but also of the whole Church in general, by taking the words in the text, not distributively only, but collectively. But secondly, it may serve further to rectify us and to set us right in our judgments and opinions, and that especially in three particulars--First, of God Himself. Secondly, of the children of God. Thirdly, of religion and Christianity. First, it may teach us to have good conceits of God Himself, and to think rightly and soberly of Him. Whilst God has good thoughts for us, we should have good thoughts of Him, and justify Him in His proceedings in the world. There are certain intricacies and perplexities in providence which are not presently discerned or apprehended; there are the wheels moving within the wheels, as it is in Ezekiel, and we must be content to stay Gods leisure for the opening and unfolding of them to us. Secondly, to have good thoughts also of the children of God, and to think rightly of them; here is that which may make us in love with the state of Gods people, and to set a high price upon them: Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord (Deu_33:29). Thirdly, it should make us to think well of religion and Christianity itself, which does carry so much comfort and consolation in the bowels of it, and more than any other mystery or profession whatsoever besides; there is no such sweetness to be found anywhere as in the principles of Christianity improved and lived up to in the power of them. (Thomas Horton, D.D.)

All things working together for good to them that love God

A lighted taper inserted into a phial of one kind of gas will burn with the utmost brilliancy and beauty; in another phial, charged with a different kind of gas, that same taper will become extinguished in offensive smoke, and in a third it would produce an instantaneous and violent explosion. So the same calamity--sickness, bereavement, commercial disaster--will awaken in one man a slumbering conscience, will drive another to distraction, and a third it will draw nearer to God than ever; so that, whilst it is literally and undeniably true that the same calamities come alike upon the good and evil, it is a transparent fallacy to infer that the same ulterior results will follow in both cases. It is a fallacy to maintain that a curse may not remain a curse, or be transformed into a blessing, according as it is accepted as a salutary discipline or rebelled against as an arbitrary infliction. It is on the temper of the recipient that the result depends, and whether or not all things, good or ill, concur to his advantage. Does it not depend upon the use you make of anything, whether it becomes to you a blessing or a curse? Beneath the petals of a graceful and familiar flower is secreted a sedative poison, of such quality that it will frequently steep a man in such a slumber as only the last trumpet can awake him from. This you at once recognise as opium. You cannot cause water to boil for the most ordinary culinary purpose, but you disengage an element most formidable, the most irresistible power of expansion. This is steam. No summer passes over you, but you see the lightning tear the sky across as if it were a scroll of paper. This is electricity. These three agents, electricity, steam, and poison, to the mind of an untutored savage, are nothing but instruments of death. But a man of science in that deadly narcotic detects the principle of morphine; he compounds it with suitable ingredients, and converts it into one of the most inestimable and indispensable preparations in the pharmacopoeia. From death he extracts life. In steam he snatches, as it were, from the hand of Nature one of her most gigantic powers, and compels it to become the most obedient and the most versatile of his servants. Nay, the very lightning he enlists and disciplines into an obedient recruit. And in such wise is all this true of all these forces and many more, that while to the uncultured savage they are agents of death and objects of terror, they are working together for the comfort and benefit of him who has learned how to use them. Such is a faint illustration of the way in which the same occurrence may act with diametrically opposite results upon the practical Christian and upon the man who lives without God in the world. In the godless exciting rebellion and hardness of heart, and in the Christian pointing to filial submission, confiding holiness, and life eternal; forasmuch as all things--all things--work together for the good of them that are true to God. (W. H. Brookfield, M.A.)

The affection and vocation of the godly

We begin with the first of these branches, viz., of that description which is here made of the children of God, as taken from their Christian affection, of those that love God. In these, and many like places, are Gods children described by this character of their special love and affection to God. The reason of it is this--First, because this is the most excellent qualification of all others. It is that which the Scripture prefers above all other graces; though they all have their dignity in them, yet love it goes beyond them all, being such as shall last and continue, whilst the other ceases in regard of the exercise and authority of them. Secondly, it is an affection of the greatest influence and extent. It is that which, wherever it is, sets the wheels of the soul ageing for the doing of other things. He that loves God, he will stick at nothing else which God commands or requires at his hands (1Jn_5:3). Thirdly, it is that also whereby we most resemble God Himself and become likest to Him. This the apostle John signifies in 1Jn_4:16. Lastly, it is that which is most proper to all those relations wherein the faithful stand unto God as the friends of Christ, as the members of Christ, as the spouse of Christ. For the better opening of this point it may not be amiss for us to consider wherein this our love of God does consist, and what is the nature and working of it. Now for this it does especially consist in these three particulars--First, in our estimation of Him, a high prizing and valuing of those excellencies and perfections which are in Him. And this prizing and esteeming of Him, it does show itself farther in such effects as flow from it. First, in parting with anything for Him; love, it is a self-denying affection. Secondly, in zeal for Him, and maintaining and defending of Him upon all occasions. Love it is a vindictive affection, and is ready upon all occasions to take the part of the party beloved. Thirdly, this prizing of God as a testimony of our love to Him will show itself in a proportionable estimation both of ourselves and of every one else in reference to Him. Secondly, in a special longing and desire of soul after Him: love it is a desire of union. Thirdly, in special delight and complacency, and contentment in Him; where there is love, this is a great deal of satisfaction from the company and fellowship and society one of another (Psa_73:25). Seeing Gods children are thus described from their loving of God, we see what cause we all of us have to make good this character in ourselves, and to be provoked to this heavenly affection. First, as to arguments for it take notice of these--First, goodness, that is one incentive to love; it is the ground of all that love which we bear to the creature because we apprehend some special good and excellency in it. Secondly, beauty, that is another thing in the object of love. It must have some kind of attractiveness and enticing with it, now this is also in God. Thirdly, propinquity and nearness of relation, that also calls for love. It is so betwixt man and man, or at least should be so. Lastly, His love to us; love it begets love again (Psa_116:1; Psa_18:1-2). Now further, for the directions and helps to it, take notice of these--First, to beg it of God, there is none that can love God truly but such persons as He enables to do so. Secondly, get our hearts weaned from a loving and admiring of the world. Thirdly, labour to be like God, and to have His image stamped upon us; love, it is founded in likeness, there is somewhat suitable which draws the affection. And so now I have done with the first branch of the description of Gods children, and of such persons as have an interest in the privilege above mentioned, of all things working to their good, as taken from their Christian affection in these words, To them that love God. The second is from their effectual vocation, in these words, To them that are the called according to His purpose. Wherein again we have two branches more. We begin with the first, their condition, such as are called--those who are Gods children are such persons as are effectually called, take notice of that. First, for the calling itself to show you what it is. Now this it may be briefly thus described and declared unto us: calling, it is a work of Gods Spirit, whereby, in the use of the means, He does effectually draw the elect from ignorance and unbelief, to true knowledge and faith in Christ, this is the calling which is here spoken of. There is a double calling which is mentioned in Scripture: the one is general in the publishing of the gospel; the other is special, which belongs only to the elect. And this latter is that which we have here in this text, which are called according to His purpose. First, as to the former, the parts whereof this special and peculiar calling does consist, they are again twofold--First, Gods invitation. And secondly, mans acceptation. The second thing considerable to this calling is (as the parts whereof it consists so) the terms from which and to which it does proceed. And these according to the language of Scripture are sin and grace: from that miserable and wretched condition in which all men are by nature to the happy estate and condition of the children of God (Act_26:18). The consideration of this point is thus far useful to us, as it serves to set forth the excellency and all-sufficiency of the grace of God in conversion. And so as an argument of greater power, so also of greater favour and goodness in God towards us. The second is the person calling, and that is God Himself; it is He to whom this work does properly and principally belong. No man cometh unto Me, says Christ, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him (Joh_6:44; so Act_2:39). This it serves, first of all to inform us, that religion is not mere imagination, or a business of mans devising. No, but that it is such as God Himself has invited and called us to. It is also very comfortable as to the perfection and consummation of grace in us, that He who hath begun a good work in us will perfect it, etc., as it is in Php_1:6. Lastly, seeing it is God that calls us, we should therefore be careful to lead a godly and holy life and conversation, answerable to the nature of Him who hath thus called us. The third is the manner, and means, and time of calling, both how and when it is performed. First, for the manner how, or the means by which, this is in an ordinary course by the preaching and publishing of the gospel (Rom_10:17). Therefore this teaches us accordingly to honour this ordinance of God and to set highly by it. Another thing considerable as to this calling is the time and season of it when it is that men are made partakers of this blessing; now for this we find it to be a thing unlimited and undetermined, there is no set or appointed time for it, but some are called at one time, and some are called at another, as it pleases God in His providence to dispose it. Beloved, it is a dangerous thing to neglect the present seasons of grace and effectual vocation, because if we do so we know not whether we may ever enjoy them again. The fourth and last thing here considerable is the persons who are the subjects of this call. Therefore let none either engross this mercy or despair of it. Let none engross it to themselves as if it belonged to none but unto them; nor let none despair of it for themselves as if it did not belong to them at all. Those who are themselves effectually called they will have a high esteem and account both of their calling itself, as also of all other persons who are partakers of the same calling with them. The second is the ground of this condition, as also of the privilege annexed unto it, and that is the purpose and good pleasure and decree of God according to His purpose. First, this calling here spoken of it is absolute and independent. It is according to Gods purpose, not according to our desert, thus 2Ti_1:9. This must needs be so; because we see by plain experience that those who might be thought most of all to deserve it are many times excluded from it, whilst others are taken in. The publicans and harlots went into the kingdom of heaven before the Pharisees (Mat_21:31). Therefore let us from hence learn to abhor all doctrine of merit. Let us give God the whole glory of all. Our calling is absolute. Secondly, it is also unchangeable as the purpose itself, from whence it proceeds; the gifts and calling of God are without repentance. Lastly, we see here the ground of the universal happiness of Gods children, and in particular the certainty of the privilege above mentioned of all things working to their good. (Thomas Horton, D.D.)

All things work together for good

1. With what ease the writers of the Bible give expression to the mightiest and most astonishing statements! Not, however, because the apparent impossibilities--which stand in the very teeth of their verification--are either ignored or overlooked. The sufferings of this present time; the subjection of the creature to the bondage of corruption; the groaning and travailing in pain of the whole creation; the anguish of mans inner and deeper experience; are all painfully vivid to the apostles eye. Nevertheless, in the midst of tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, and sword, he is bold to assert, We know that all things work together for good to them that love God.

2. Who of us can join in this language in the face of the worlds sin and woe? Some there may be who are able contentedly to meet the dark mysteries of Providence with whatever is best--a conviction, perhaps, that grew up out of the reverent trust and experience of their childhood. But this is seldom left undisturbed; and, once disturbed, we may regain confidence; but it will be as different from our early confidence as Josephs, when he stood before his brethren in Egypt, was different from that he enjoyed when he wore his coat of many colours.

3. This certitude of the apostle was the rational conviction, confirmed by an ample experience, established by a faith in the Christian verities, and made immovable by the visions of a heart disciplined by trial, and purified by affliction? And this is a certitude open to us all, if we seek it. Let us contemplate the source of its light, that our reason be not confounded at the confidence of our heart.

I. All things are at work, and subject to constant change. Our hedges and fields retain not their beauty, and our summers light and heat decline. The very earth grows old, and the heavens are not what they were. And among the sons of men there is no one abiding. And what are the records of history but the chronicle of the successive ages of the worlds experience. And within the little sphere of our own existence, incessant change allows no rest to either thought, affection, or will. And what an air of sadness all this gives to our life! It begets our earliest sorrows. And, as years wear on, a feeling of insecurity steals over us which denies us peace. But the heart refuses life without hope, and this ceaseless change arouses the mind to the discovery of some other ground of confidence. And our text speaks of this restless action, not only as a constant working, but as a working together. Let us see what difference this makes.

II. All things work together. The addition of this one word alters everything. It introduces design where all seemed aimless; order where all seemed chaos. For instance, winter is seen to have a necessary place and work in relation to summer; night to day; deserts to fruitful fields; the mountains to the valleys. In short, the earth is one, and made up of contradictory elements. The year is one, and requires all the seasons. The day is one, and composed of morning, noon, and evening. In like manner, the course of history is made up of all the forms of human life and every variety of experience, so that conflicting events, and the most incongruous elements, are made to work together in subordination to the one purpose. And so with the little circle of our personal experience. And these three--nature, history, and individual experience--are one. They are but spheres of co-operative agencies carrying out the one purpose which runs through all ages.

III. To what purpose, to what end do all things work together? For good. This is a necessary deduction. If all things work together, then good must be the result. Evil elements cannot be combined; they are antagonistic to each other. When wicked men combine, it is found necessary to set up the principles of goodness. There must be honesty among thieves, truth among liars, or their devices have no chance. The principles recognised among them as necessary for their co-operation are antagonistic to the ends for which they combine. The light by which they go astray is light from heaven. And it is the power of this admitted but opposed light which explodes every plot and makes it simply impossible for a course of combined wickedness to perpetuate itself. But the working together of all things implies nothing less than the presence of infinite goodness, in the very elements of things as well as in their embodied purpose; wisdom, which, as the eye of goodness, sees the end from the beginning and knows how to reach it; and power, the moral energy of both goodness and wisdom, which subordinates everything to the one purpose. This preordained purpose will only be fully revealed in the end; in the way there will be much of human arbitrariness, which will tend to hide it. The way, however, of goodness carries its security, for the attainment of its end, in its own moral power. This co-operation of all things for Gods purpose is a Divine chemistry. For as in a mixture of chemical elements, while the process of combination is going on, you may be utterly at a loss to know what the result will be, until, the last element being added, it is made manifest; so is it with the providence of God. Let us habituate ourselves, however, to regard providence as carried on by the personal power of Gods presence, a power, therefore, of quickening as well as of combining elements; of intensifying as well as of moderating their action; a power of new beginnings as well as of terminating forces and agencies long in exercise. It is what, and more than what, the will of man is to his whole body as well as to every separate part. God is not an exhausted Deity, neither is He under bondage to the forces which He has conferred upon His creatures. With Him there ever remains an infinite reserve of ways and means by which to do according to His will.

IV. But, if all things work together for good, then also for the best. Gods mind can only purpose the best in relation to the creature concerned. And to reach His end, He has but one way, and that is the best. That one absolutely perfect, highest, and best end is seen in His only-begotten Son, who is at once Son of man and Son of God; of whom, through whom, and to whom, are all things, and for whose central glory mans redemption was purposed from eternity, but reserved for accomplishment till, the fulness of time, that He might gather up all things in One, and in that One for ever unite His glory and our salvation.

V. But for whom will this co-operation of all things work out its highest good? For those who love God, The highest good can only be received by rightly directed affections. As it proceeds from the love of the Creator, it can only be received by the love of the creature. For, just as a piece of mechanism, cunningly devised to weave a pattern of marvellous beauty, may require a thread of a given quality and texture to receive its design, so the highest purpose of the Divine love, to be wrought out by the co-operation of all things, can only be taken up by, and embodied in, the affections of His children. For, as His purpose is spiritual, it requires spiritual embodiment; as it is holy, it requires holiness; as it is free, it requires to be chosen; as it is merciful, it requires vessels of mercy; as it is personal, it requires personality; as it is social, it requires a society of individuals; as it is not only from, but of God, it requires godliness; and, as it is an all-embracing unity--a rich, full, and lasting oneness of Being--to which God freely gives Himself, it requires in those who partake of it the exercise of the love. (W. Pulsford, D.D.)

All things working together for good

I. all things. For there is a sense in which a human being is related to everything. He is related supremely to God, and by that relationship he touches the whole universe. But, probably, the all things here meant are those which more nearly and constantly affect men. Now there is a very great difference in the number, variety, and importance of these things in different individual cases. All things that can enter into an infants little life are few and simple compared with those of a man. The affairs of a savage are few compared with those of a civilised man.

II. All things work. All things are full of labour. The ceaseless movement of all things, from stars to atoms, would, if we could really see it all, be perfectly appalling. On the stillest day, and in the most sequestered scene, streams of life are rushing on through their courses. Not only the earth, the waters, the air, but the very rocks are alive. What is thus true in nature is just as true in human life; not only when mans thought is busy about them, and his own hand upon them, but often almost as much when the man rests and sleeps. We speak of busy time. It is not time that is busy. Tis men who live, and move, and have being. Tis things that work. Thought, and impulse, and act, and habit, and plan, and purpose--these are the great working powers. They all work: and always. We divide life into active and passive, into busy and quiet. But things are working as rapidly, and to effects as certain in the one time as the other. Things are troubled and perplexed at night: you can make nothing of them. You go to sleep, and in the morning they are clearer. It is just the same as if you had been thinking of them, and unravelling them all the night. They have been working while you have been sleeping. The same kind of process takes place through a series of days sometimes. Gradually a dark prospect clears, or a bright one darkens. The crooked becomes straight, or the straight becomes crooked. Nor can you tell any sufficient reason for the change.

III. All things work together. That explains the changes that take place, and the progress that is sometimes made very quickly. You have seen horses pulling a heavy load up a hill, and suddenly brought to a stand, and then moving on again, simply by the addition of an animal to the team. So a man is overmatched sometimes by the weight and pressure of the things he has to do, when--a new circumstance, a new thing is born, and as it were instantly yokes itself into harness with the rest, and the object is attained. But the working together of things is yet more than this. In some chemical experiments it happens that each separate substance becomes something else, and all a compound--a new thing, which has mysteriously composed itself out of the whole. The bosom of Providence is the great moral crucible in which things work together. The innumerable things that mingle in that crucible, if taken separately, would be seen working to diverse results; but the one master-influence now rules the whole process, and so combines the specific elements as to perpetuate and increase its own sway. All things work together, not in an aimless and capricious manner, as though a stream should one day flow seawards, and the next back towards its fountain, but in one volume, along one channel, in one direction, towards one end. This gives life an awful character. The sum of the influences tend to good, or to evil. Life in some instances may seem an equipoise, but it is not. Only a practised eye can tell which way a sluggish stream in a meadow is flowing, yet no one who has seen the stream enter the meadow, or leave it, can doubt that it is in motion there. Not for long does any human life flow as through meadow land.

IV. Now, the greatest question is this, Of what character is the supreme influence of all the things that work together in my life? The question is not difficult to answer, if only the right method be taken. Must, then, a man analyse, weigh, and describe all the things which hake for him the one grand life-influence! Must he search the bosom of Providence? How utterly vain were the effort! But, happily, there is no need to make it. The true test is far simpler and easier. It is this, Is there love to God? All things work together for good to them that love God. The question is not, Am I strong enough to vanquish the forces of life? because no man will ever be. To all there is at last the grand defeat. Nor is it, Am I wise and politic enough to foresee and prepare? because every man is overmatched, at one time or other, bier, of course, Am I good enough to change everything into good?--for, still, alas! when He who alone is good looks down, there is but the old sad case, that none doeth good. But the question is this and none other, Do I love God, whose whole delight is to overcome evil with good? What, or rather whom we love, and how much, will tell far more regarding our real character than anything else; will, therefore, also tell what moral position we occupy in relation to all outward things. If we love God, all things work together for our good. Quite clearly, then, the one grand solicitude with us should be the cultivation of this Divine affection of love to God. If this be in perpetual action, how need we give place and time and thought to other cares? All is well. Those working things, the strength and pressure of which we never could resist, the mystery of which we never could fathom--let them work together and enter into all possible combinations, they can produce nothing but good to us. Does the storm blow? Love Him who maketh the storm a calm, and who, in storm and calm alike, will keep you safely within the sure haven of His care. Is it night? Love Him to whom the darkness and the light are both alike, but who, knowing well that they are not alike to us, has promised that weeping and night shall pass away together, and that joy shall come in the morning. Are you in pain? Love Him who, although He is the ever-blessed God, suffered once for us, and still has the touch of all our pain on the nerve of His own infinite sympathy, and who writes over the portals of the happy gates, There shall be no more pain. Are you poor? Love Him who, to sanctify poverty, was born among the beasts, lived with the poor. Can you go up and stand beside Him, and complain that He has left you poor? (A. Raleigh, D.D.)

All things working for good

I. The believers character.

1. Love to God is his grand distinctive feature. The creeds of Christians may differ in minor shades, their ecclesiastical relations may vary--yet in this one particular there is an essential unity. They love one God and Father; and this truth--like those sundered rays of light returning to the sun, approximate to each other--forms the great assimilating principle by which all harmonise. The regeneration through which they have passed has effected this great change. Once they were at enmity with God. But now they love Him.

(1) As revealed in Christ. Who, as he has realised the preciousness of the Saviour, has not felt the kindling of a fervent love to Him who, when He had no greater gift, commended His love to us by the gift of His dear Son?

(2) In His paternal character. The Spirit of adoption takes captive their hearts, and they love God with a childs fervent, adoring, confiding affection.

(3) For all His conduct, for the wisdom, faithfulness, holiness of His procedure--for what He withholds as for what He grants. Of the source of this feeling let us not lose sight, We love Him because He first loved us.

2. Who are the called according to His purpose (Rom_1:6-7). What a glorious vocation is this! To have heard the Holy Spirits voice, to have felt the Saviours love, to have listened to a Fathers persuasive assurance, called to be Gods holy ones--sons; this were a vocation worthy indeed of God, and demanding in return our supremest, deepest affection! The principle upon which this call proceeds is said to be, according to His purpose. It excludes all idea of merit on the part of the called (2Ti_1:9). Has this call reached you? Ministers, the gospel, providences, conscience have called you, but has the Spirit called you with an inward and effectual vocation from death to life, from sin to holiness, from the world to Christ, from self to God?

II. The privilege which appertains to this character.

1. All things under the righteous government of God must necessarily be a working out of good. Thou art good, and doest good. In Him there is no evil, and consequently nothing can proceed from Him that tendeth to evil. The passage supposes something antagonistic to the well-being of the believer in Gods conduct at times. And yet, to no single truth does the Church bear a stronger testimony than to this, that the darkest epochs of her history have ever been those from which her brightest lustre has arisen. But let us pass to individuals. Shall we take the most painful circumstances in the history of the child of God? The Word declares that these circumstances are all conspiring, and all working together, for his good. Take tribulation as the starting-point (Rom_5:3-5). The Bible is rich in illustrations of this. Take, e.g. the cases of Jacob (Gen_42:36), and Joseph (Gen_50:20).

2. Observe the unity of operation. They work together. Seldom does affliction come alone. Storm rises upon storm, cloud on cloud. Trace the wisdom and love of God in ordaining your path to heaven through much tribulation. Single, the good they are charged to convey were but partially accomplished. It is the compounding of the ingredients in the recipe that constitutes its sanative power. Extract any one ingredient, and you impair the others and destroy the whole. It is the combination of sound, the harmony of many, and often discordant notes, that constitute music. Oh, how imperfectly are we aware of a plurality of trial, to wake from our lips the sweetest anthem of thanksgiving to God! Thus it is that the most deeply tried believers are the most skilful and the most melodious choristers in Gods Church. They sing the sweetest on earth, and they sing the loudest in heaven, who are passing through, and who have come out of great tribulation.

3. It is a present working. It says not that all things have worked or shall work, though this is certain. But it says that all things do now work together for good. The operation may be as invisible and noiseless as the leaven fomenting in the meal, and yet not less certain and effectual. And whether the good be immediate or remote, it matters little; sooner or later it will accomplish its benign and heaven-sent mission.

4. Its certainty. We know it, because God has said it, because others have testified to it, best of all, because we have experienced it ourselves. The shape it may assume, the end to which it may be subservient, we cannot tell. Gods glory is secured by it, and that end accomplished, we are sure it must be good. Will it not be a good, if your present adversity results in the dethronement of some worshipped idol--in the endearing of Christ to your soul--in the closer conformity of your mind to Gods image--in the purification of your heart--in your more thorough meetness for heaven? (O. Winslow, D.D.)

All things working for good

All things, whether in nature, providence, or grace, work together for good to Gods people.

I. The persons.

1. Those who love God. By those who hate God, even blessings are turned into a curse.

2. Who are the called according to His purpose.

II. The object.

1. To purify from sin (Mal_3:3).

2. To promote growth in grace.

3. To prepare for heaven.

III. The means.

1. Afflictions.

2. Chastisements (Heb_12:6). Job was chastised in love and elevated in character to a height he had never otherwise attained.

3. Persecutions. These drive the soul nearer to God. They show who are the genuine professors. Joseph was persecuted, but great good was accomplished thereby (Gen_50:20).

4. Special providences. These are the turning-points in our lives. How wonderful that I am here rather than elsewhere! There is all the world to choose from; and yet Peoria is my home both by invitation and selection. Paul, on his journey from Iconium to Troas, was minded to labour in the regions of Bithynia, but the Spirit suffered him not, for He had other work for him to do in the greater centres of the worlds civilisation (Act_16:7).

IV. The time.

1. This is present. Gods children do not have to wait for the blessing. Loving God, all things are received from His hand as means to an end; and enjoying His love, afflictions are tempered, and blessings are not misapplied. Many misquote this text and read it in the future, as if it were only will work together.

2. The future (2Co_4:17).

V. Encouragements.

1. To courage (Heb_12:13).

2. To faith (2Co_4:18).

3. To hope (Heb_6:18-20).

4. To love (Rom_8:35-39).

It is the love of God (both His love to us and our love to Him) that changes all things, whether good or untoward, into blessings. Oh, the bountiful alchemy of love! (Homiletic Review.)

All things working together for good

I. The fact, We know, etc. Note--

1. The good determined: being conformed to the image of Gods Son. Each believing man is as a block of marble, hewn out of the great quarry of unregenerated humanity, and appointed to be dressed and formed according to the Divine ideal. The image of the living Christ, as portrayed in the holy Gospels, supplies the model. And the work to be accomplished is that of breaking off unshapely angles, polishing down all rough projections, chiselling out the life-like features, and cleansing away all obscuring dust, till the human subject, changed into the same image, from glory to glory, stands out at last, a living likeness of the living Lord. No doubt the final result will be blessedness, lordship, and glory. But the work which has now to be effected is that of securing in us a likeness to the Lord. In the external manifestations of our life we must be brought to be like Jesus, who went about doing good; and therefore are we said to be the workmanship of God (Eph_2:10). But the work of new creation penetrates below the surface, and enters into the very spirit and life of the man (Eph_4:22-24).

2. The workers employed by the Divine Artist. All things, i.e., all the influences of present lot; all the influences of--

(1) The objective creation.

(2) The perpetually changing events of Providence, both prosperous and adverse, whether as specially affecting only the individual, or also the family, the Church, the nation, or the world.

(3) Which proceed from good and from wicked men.

(4) The invisible world, which come streaming down from glorified saints, angelic hosts, and from the ever-blessed God.

(5) The world beneath. There is nothing neutral in the mighty process; and nothing but whose influence, blended with all others, is made to contribute something towards the accomplishment of the predestinated result.

3. On whose behalf the good is being wrought. Those only who love God, who are the called according to His purpose; namely, to justify, sanctify, and glorify all them who believe in Christ. For the called ones are those who have adopted the Christian vocation as their own, and have therefore become not only called, but also chosen and faithful. For them the call has become effectual. They have fallen into the line of the Divine purpose, and are therefore being helped along that line by all these harmonised converging forces. The action of the external forces themselves would never produce the desired result. Their influence upon others does but serve to make moral scars and deformity. Just as the deadly nightshade concocts its poison from the very same soil and atmosphere from which the wheat-plant provides us bread, and other plants our honey.

4. The ultimately resulting good is the consequent, not of any single influence, but of all the influences together. This does not, indeed, denote that they work either simultaneously or in perfect and understood agreement amongst themselves. They are oftentimes all unconscious of the service which they render. First one and then another comes near and does the work for which he is specially adapted. Or perchance a whole host of the workers are busily engaged at once, so as to become simultaneous helpers. So, too, it is in other departments of Gods works. How many and complicated the forces and influences which must contribute to the growth and perfection of the plant or animal! And how innumerable and varied those by which the infant is developed to manhood! And yet every one produces some lasting impression, and supplies its contribution, with all the others, towards the final product. And thus it is in the formation of Christian character.

II. The ground of the fact, and of our knowledge of it. For (i.e., because that)

whom He did foreknow, etc.. Observe--

1. That God Himself predestinated this result; namely, that those who were foreknown as believing the gospel, and as becoming obedient to its call, should he conformed to the image of His Son.

2. That He who predetermined this result has also provided the means for its accomplishment.

3. That which He can He will do to bring the pre-ordained result to its consummation. It is not only that the purpose is His own, formed according to His own good pleasure, and given us in Christ Jesus before the world began (Eph_1:9-10; Eph_3:8-12; 2Ti_1:9); and therefore a thing never to be abandoned; but one, in respect to the working out of which He has given the strongest assurance. For its accomplishment He spared not His own Son, etc. Nay; in and with Christ, those all things have been already given (1Co_3:21-23). And, therefore, the apostle, projecting himself forward to the time when the great work of redeeming love shall have been completed, and giving that which is its history in every individual case, affirms that whom He did predestinate, them He also … glorified.

Conclusion: Learn a lesson of--

1. Earnest diligence in the cultivation of the inner spiritual life. This is the true philosophers stone, by whose alchemic power everything may be transmuted into gold. Power over our own outward worldly condition we have but very little (Jer_10:23). Evil may come, and, if our hearts are not right with God, all things will but serve to intensify our selfishness, impatience, etc., making us to become more than ever vessels of wrath fitted for destruction. But, if we love God, we shall find a helping hand in everything.

2. Patient submission to Gods arrangements. Let us remember ever that His providence has to do with all things. Did He choose to do so, He could make our course of life, in all respects, prosperous and pleasant. But if trials, perplexities, and sufferings come, it must be because that these things are needed and good (Jam_1:2-4).

3. Joyful and triumphant confidence in God. This is that which is specially indicated by the apostle (verses 31-39). (W. Tyson.)

All things working for good

You have probably seen a large and complicated piece of machinery in full play. The parts, as you noticed, were very various--various in size and shape, various in the material of which they were made. There were wood and leather, and iron and brass; there were cranks and levers, and pistons and pulleys, and wheels great and small, with other instruments of which both the construction and the use were strange to you. And besides the difference of material, you observed a difference of movement among the parts. There was contrariety and opposition. The wheels whirled round in opposite directions; the chains seemed placed on purpose to resist each other. Checking and counterchecking, strain and counter-strain, were to be seen everywhere. And you felt confused as you stood contemplating the ceaseless and unintelligible whirl that was going on around you; yet you perceived that all the parts of the machinery, however diverse in themselves or in their mode of operation, were working together to produce a certain result--somehow or other their combined action led up to a certain definite point, and amidst all the apparent confusion, this point was invariably reached. (G. Calthrop, M.A.)

All things working for good

Storrs was a student at Andover Theological Seminary with young Gordon Hall. On a certain Saturday, towards the end of their course, Hall was preparing to go to Braintree to preach upon the following Sabbath, having some expectation that the invitation so to do would grow into a call. In the act of splitting some wood, however, his hat fell from his head beneath the axe, and was cut in twain and ruined. The circumstances were such that to replace it was impossible just then; and Hall, compelled to vacate his engagement at Braintree, arranged with Storrs to go in his place. Storrs went. His preaching pleased. He was invited to come again. And the result was that Hall was quite forgotten, a call was presently extended to Storrs, it was accepted, and he was in due time settled, remaining the minister of that parish until his dying day, a period of more than half a century. Hall, disappointed, one might naturally suppose at this thwarting of his hopes, had his mind turned to the foreign mission field, and became Gordon Hall, the first missionary of the American Board, whose name is for ever linked with the early enterprise of that eminent organisation. No one who has any belief in Divine providence will for a moment doubt that God stationed Storrs at Braintree and sent Hall to India; but does it not also seem as if He effected that arrangement by means of the accident to the hat? And this is the obvious lesson of the incident: that there is really no such thing as accident in this world; that all things work together in the execution of Gods purposes, and for good to them that love Him; that the most trivial occurrence should be contemplated in the light of the possibilities which may flow from it; and that our least concerns, as well as our greatest, are under the supervision and control of the heavenly Father.

Good to the good, the rule of Gods procedure with man

I. Who are the good? Them that love God. What love?

1. That type which God has predestined. His purpose.

2. That type to which God has called His creatures. How has He called them? By the revelation of His moral loveliness as revealed in nature, in conscience, in Christ. This love is--

(1) Paramount. Love as a passing subsidiary emotion is not religious love.

(2) Practical. Love that goes off in words or occasional acts is not religious love. It must be a ruling, practical force.

(3) Permanent. It must be in everything and for ever.

II. What is the good for them? It is good from all things. What good?

1. There is nothing good that does not promote moral goodness in the soul. Wealth, social position, power, health itself, are not only worthless but pernicious if they accomplish not this.

2. Whatever promotes moral goodness in the soul is good. Personal suffering, personal bereavement, social losses, etc., when they do this, are good. Tribulation worketh patience, etc. Our light afflictions. There is a glorious optimism in the history of the good. Conclusion: This subject--

1. Corrects a popular error: that religion is to a mans disadvantage in this world. No such thing. Pauperism with piety is infinitely better than a princedom with ungodliness.

2. This subject affords comfort to afflicted saints. The good can turn all to good. (D. Thomas,D.D.)

Trials good to the good

The afflictions of life are variously contemplated. Stoicism says, Submit to fate. Some are icy negatives in life. They stand amidst the problems and woes of humanity, calm and passive and scornful. Epicureanism says, Make thyself insensible by indulgence in pleasure. Many mean to take life cosily and sweetly. The whole creation groaneth and travaileth together in pain; but its groans shall not disturb the music of their life, nor its travail cloud the brightness of their little day. In contrast to this Pagan temper the Christian method is to look elements in the face, and see in them the promise of blessing. Christianity does not simply declare the inevitableness of sorrow, or merely lay down rules for lessening its bitterness. It discovers a wise and loving God directing all the mixed processes of life to a beneficient issue. And thus it soothes the heart into patience, lifts it into hope, and floods it with courage.

I. The circumstances which bring suffering into life.

1. Inherited moral defection. The passions, habits, weaknesses of one generation are transmitted. In consequence of this law, multitudes are born with the religious side of their nature so cramped and feeble that it is difficult to win them to goodness; and even when won, how slow is their growth in grace, how dwarfed their spiritual stature.

2. The universal condition of toil. Idleness is misery; congenial labour is gladness; but how much is congenial? How often the fierce competition harasses like a fever.

3. Contact with our fellow-men. You meet them in municipal councils, in business, etc.; and very often, the closer the intimacy the greater the recoil from the unlovely traits which are disclosed. There are men like the fox, like the tiger, like the serpent.

4. The sorrows that spring from our friendship. In having another united to you by the sacred chain of love, your liability to suffering is increased, according to the degree of your affection. If their hearts ache, so do ours.

5. Disappointment, in relation to the Divine and sacred ideals of the soul.

6. The triumph of policy over right; weakness crushed by strength; worth left to perish in obscurity; vice climbing into power; wrong slow to die; right slow to prevail.

II. Now he who loves God possesses, as it were, a grand spiritual alchemy by which these dark things of life are made sacramental. Sickness, disappointment, calumny, the discrepancy between the ideal and the actual, etc., are transformed into means of grace. Good comes to him from every source. The whole universe works in his behalf. As yet our knowledge of the way in which trial is promotive of good is necessarily imperfect. We can only see as through a glass darkly. Still, we have that degree of vision.

1. One form of good that is realised is the closer union of the soul with God. The natural instinct of the human heart in troubles is to betake itself to one able to sympathise and help. And to those who love Him, God is known as the God of comfort.

2. Trial also serves to develop the qualities which constitute true manhood. The right regulation of the character and conduct is inseparable from love to God. Now, as a man under irritation strives to be calm, he will grow in the mastery of his feelings; if under losses and perplexities he strives to be patient, he will grow in patience; if while smarting under a sense of injustice he steadily sets himself to preserve a heart of charity, he will grow in love; if, as pleasure calls, he resolutely endeavours to be faithful, he will grow in fidelity. And herein lies the contrast between the godly and the godless man: under the afflictive discipline of life, the one is soured, the other is sweetened; the one is cursed, the other is blessed. Put a piece of clay to the lapidarys wheel: it is ground to a heap of dust. But put a diamond on the wheel: the friction brings out its beauty.

3. And now, taking a more general view, what is to be the outcome of all the clash and discord and imperfection that has been going on since time began? This: the triumph of God. The prayer Thy kingdom come will be exchanged for The Lord reigneth. That final triumph in some measure belongs to the destiny of the godly man. It is the victory of those principles for which he lived and prayed and worked. (T. Hammond.)

The chief good

About 50 B.C. a cultivated Roman represents himself as discoursing pleasantly with his friends about the supreme good. He explains the views of the rival philosophers; but after surveying the whole field, he concludes without a word to indicate in which direction his own preference lay. In this, perhaps, he represented the majority of the thoughtful men of his time. To them life was a problem without any sure key to its solution. About 50 A.D. there were living in Rome a community of men who had arrived at the most astonishing conclusions on this very point. Though they were few and insignificant, they were persuaded that all the varied experiences of lifo worked out the highest blessedness. The explanation of the phenomenon was not to be found in any revolution, for things had perhaps changed for the worse. But something had happened in the interval which had set them in a new relation to all these things: and this was that the love of God, revealed in Christ, had been shed abroad in their hearts.

I. The good towards which everything is here declared to co-operate. The supreme good for man can never consist in anything external, for all such things are in their very nature inferior to Him, and are intended to serve as stepping-stones to something higher. Happiness consists in what we are and not in what we have. But what we are is precisely that which hinders our happiness, And the question is, How are we to compose our inward evils? To answer this we must find some one who has succeeded in being what it will be our blessedness to become, and who can help us to become like himself. Now Christ is Gods conception of manhood realised. In Him was reached that complete equilibrium and repose of all our frailties in which true blessedness consists. In Him there was no inward contradiction, no want which filled His heart with a continual ache. To be truly blessed, therefore, is to be like Him (verse 29).

II. All things combine to produce in Christians conformity to Christ. Life with Christians, so far as its outward framework is concerned, remains exactly as before. It develops anxiety, sorrow, disappointment. But Christianity shows all these things subjected to a Divine will and purpose. The order in which they come, their duration, the weight and the angle of their incidence, are wisely and unerringly adjusted, Each contributes in its own imperceptible, it may be, but effectual way to the desired result. And it is just because we lose sight of this result we often find the text so hard to believe. When some sudden catastrophe swallows up a mans fortune we are apt to ask with incredulous lips how that can be for good. When sickness comes or death plucks our sweetest flowers, is it possible to accept the stroke as a blessing in disguise? Without a struggle Certainly not, and not even thus always at first. No affliction for the present seemeth to be joyous, etc. Men are not made of cast-iron, and when they become Christians they do not cease to be men. Christ Himself once, at all events, submitted with strong cryings and tears. But if we only embrace the end of Gods discipline we shall see that these very things which we think work nothing but evil and woe, bring about precisely the opposite effects. Had Christ no trials? And did they work anything but good? Is He less glorious because His brow was crowned with thorns? And so as there was nothing in the life of our Lord but ultimately ministered to His glory, and that life embraced all the experience of humanity, so there will be nothing in your life that will not make you liker to Him, if only you receive it in His spirit. Listen to that flood of music that at the touch of a single hand rolls from a hundred pipes. It may at first confuse, overwhelm, astonish you. But amid all the apparently conflicting sounds, a practised ear can detect the expression of one tumultuous emotion, or it may be the melody of a simple air, that, divested of its manifold accompaniments, might be played upon an oaten stop. And in like manner if you suffer your life to be controlled by God, there will run through it the harmony of a Divine purpose, conforming you to the image of His Son.

III. The condition on which this working together of all things for good is based. That we love God.

1. It is plain that all things do not work together for good because of any peculiar virtue in the things themselves, nor simply because of the time and manner of their occurrence. Heat and moisture, light and air, are all necessary for the maturing of the crops; but if the soil be poor and insufficient, or foul with weeds, the harvest will be thin and disappointing, if it does not utterly fail. So the discipline of life may be all administered with the most beneficent design; but if there be no corresponding receptivity in us, it will do us no good. The skill, patience, and methods of the teacher may be unimpeachable; but if the pupil is lazy and disobedient these will not in themselves make him a scholar. He must to some extent make the aim of his teacher his own, and co-operate with him, in order to receive the full benefit of his tuition. Hence, St. Paul says we must love God if Gods providence is to conform us to Christ, that is, we must be at one with Him in seeking the fulfilment of His purpose.

2. But loving God also describes that clinging to God as a child clings to his father, especially at the approach of peril, and which, even at the time of chastisement, never dreams of questioning His love. And there is much need of this. For though we may know the fact we often cannot understand the fashion, in which all things are to work together for our good. We cannot discern the perspective of life or see clearly the relation in which each part stands to the whole. And hence we must take much on trust. We must cling to God in the dark, remembering that He leads the blind by a way that they know not, and yet that this way is sure to be the right one.

3. And lest at any time you should be shaken in your conviction of the blessed end of Gods dealing, by the fear that you do not satisfy the condition of loving Him, then remember that this love is not so much a feeling as a posture or habit of the soul.

4. Then remember that the essence of love is obedience: This is love, that we walk after His commandments. And be assured that if you are willing to be fashioned after the image of Christ, He will make good His word to you, and perfect that which concerneth you. (C. Moinet.)

The good in relation

I. To the Spirit of their life. They love God. This is not a passing sentiment such as exists in the hearts of most, but a permanently predominating force. It is--

1. The love of gratitude, awakened by the contemplation of Gods wonderful favours.

2. The love of esteem, awakened by the view of His moral excellencies.

3. The love of benevolence, awakened by a belief in the universal goodness of His purposes. In relation to man these may exist separately. We may feel gratitude where we cannot esteem, etc. But in relation to God it takes these three forms. His favours are infinite, His character perfect, His purposes only good, therefore these forms are supreme. Love thanks Him for what He has done, adores Him for what He is, wishes Him well for what He is pursuing.

II. To the conduct of God.

1. He has called them to love--not by force. Love cannot come by commands and penalties. He calls men to love by exhibiting the lovable in Himself--His mercies, perfection, benevolence; to awaken gratitude, esteem and goodwill. This He does--

(1) In the phenomena of nature. How lovable God appears in the forms and operations of the universe.

(2) In the dispensations of life. In all temporal events from the cradle to the grave God commands our affections.

(3) In the life of Christ. Here we have His kindness, perfections, benevolent designs.

2. He has called them to love according to His purpose. God does not act fitfully, or by caprice. From the beginning He purposed that His intelligent creatures should love Him. All the arrangements of nature, the machinery of His government, the revelations of Himself show this. The gospel is his especial call to man as a sinner to love Him: and how exquisitely adapted it is to generate affection in depraved souls.

III. To the workings of Providence.

1. All things--

(1) Work.

(2) Harmoniously.

(3) For good.

(4) For the good of the good.

2. This we know--

(1) From a priori reasoning. On the assumption that the Creator is benevolent, we are bound to conclude that He will direct all to the happiness of them that love Him. It is ever the instinct of His creatures to seek the happiness of those that love them.

(2) From the arrangement of the universe. Does not the exquisite adaptation of outward nature to minister to our animal senses, physical wants, desire for knowledge, and love of the beautiful show that the Creator intended to make His moral creatures happy?

(3) From the special provisions of the gospel. Here is pardon, purity, knowledge, consolation, holy fellowship, and a blessed paradise.

(4) From the operation of the affections. Love to God--

(a) Put the soul into harmony with the universe. The soul destitute of love to God is in antagonism to the whole system of nature.

(b) Enables the soul happily to appropriate the universe.

(5) From the biography of the good. Joseph, David, Daniel, Paul.

(6) From the assurances of Gods Word. (D. Thomas, D.D.)

The beneficial operation of all things for the good of the Christian

I. What a different thing this world is to those that love God, and those who do not.

1. The circumstances of the world, the general order of nature and providence, the mingled distribution of health, sickness, and accidents, are the same to both. They both share in great public benefits and calamities, and in this more favoured part of the world the Divine revelation shines on both classes alike. This fact would be a most mysterious thing without a light cast upon it from heaven, as was painfully felt by thoughtful men, even under the light of the earlier revelation.

2. To us is granted a light that pierces deeper through this sameness on the surface of things. And then, what an immense difference! The good things in mans condition--what do they do for the enemies of God? What to them is the effect of all nature, with its beauties, its vicissitudes, its productions? What to them the bounties of providence? Or what to them the share of general calamities? What are all these in effect to men who continue still irreligious, thoughtless, unthankful? The other class, however, is so disposed that all things operate towards it beneficially. And that one state of the soul should thus repel the essential, spiritual good of all things, and that an opposite one should attract it is not strange, if we consider the principle that is present or absent--the love of God. That being wanting, how should the soul derive the good of things? The perception, the discriminating faculty, the transmuting power, the principle to repel the evil is wanting; nay, the very will to obtain the good is wanting. The happy adaptation belongs only to them that love God, who are the called according to His purpose.

3. The latter part of the sentence explains how they come to love God--not that they first loved Him, but that He loved them. They were the objects of His gracious purpose. No one that knows anything of the alienated state of our nature can believe that a condition of the soul in which the love of God should prevail, can be created by any less cause than the sovereign operation of the Divine Spirit; i.e., by an effectual calling. But, then, neither can he imagine that this operation should be as if from a sudden and incidental thought of the Almighty. This, then, is the sacred process; the ancient purpose, fulfilled at length in the calling according to that purpose; and this calling being an inspiration of the love of God into the renewed soul. And this places the soul in a new system of relations with the world and its events, and that the most advantageous one that is possible. The indwelling of the love of God constitutes a radical change, so that the working together of things upon the mind shall be, mainly and predominantly, for good; and progressively more so, in proportion as that sacred principle more fully prevails. For the love of God makes the soul quick to perceive, to dislike, and to repel all that is evil; makes it solicitous, vigilant, and active to apprehend and obtain all the most essential good.

II. But, then, beyond all this the supreme security is that God will have it so. He will make all things work, etc. They are the most valued objects He has in the world; and it may well be believed that they shall not be left to chances for their welfare. For their sake He has given something incomparably more valuable than all things here, even His beloved Son, who is constituted to the Church, head over all things. And this cannot be less than a security that all things shall be made to minister to them. Strangers and enemies to God are very little aware of all this. They look on the good in the system, in its mere natural, material character of good, but little aware that this is made to impart a far higher, nobler kind of good to them that love God. And they regard the evil as simply evil; hardly sensible that even this is turned to infinite advantage to the children of God. The proud and mighty ones of the earth are exerting their utmost power and devices to make all things serve their interests, never dreaming that the Almighty Potentate is making all things, and them among the rest, cooperate for the advantage of His friends. And when they are working with all their might against one another, little do they suspect that they are all the while co-operating for the benefit of another class! Would not that, if it could suddenly come on their perception, pacify them at once? What! working with all this strife and cost for the advantage of those people they call saints! The very pride that raised the contest would still it!

III. Under this Divine superintendence all things work together for good. A large assertion! but where is the impossibility of its being true? A man whose soul is animated and sanctified by the love of God, what can he see, or hear, or encounter, from which, under the aid of the Divine Spirit, he absolutely cannot extract any good?

1. With this holy affection glowing in his soul, suppose him placed in the very centre of a scene of excessive iniquity--might he not draw from every point of the circuit something salutary? Might he not be struck with a religious horror lest himself should fall into sin? Or, inspired with fervent thankfulness for having been saved or redeemed from it, might he not feel an emotion to implore the interference of Almighty Power? Thus he might, in the very worst field, reap invaluable spiritual advantage.

2. There are the temporal good things. Now it is a mighty thing to say of any mortal that these shall absolutely work for his good. But the prevalent love of God will make them do so; will excite thankful admiration of the Divine bounty, stimulate a zeal to serve God, more benevolent compassion for those who are suffering the contrary of this temporal good, and excite to active charity.

3. But the most animating light of this truth falls on the darker side of human life. But temporal misfortunes may be made the means far more effectually to convince them that this is not their rest; that this world will not do for them; to promote their submissive adoration of an all-governing, wise, though mysterious Providence, and to inspire an energy of desire and effort toward a better country.

4. And even the evils of a spiritual kind; the pains of conscience, fears of the Divine wrath, temptation, perplexities concerning religious truth; through these, as a severe discipline, many minds have been drawn and exercised to the attainmeat of a happy elevation of Christian sanctity and peace. (John Foster.)

The Purpose, calling, and love of God

1. The law of motion is impressed on everything.

2. What is the good. In general the union of ourselves with God, the studying, loving, enjoying Him, and furthering His purpose for ever.

3. The apostle connects man here with three things--

I. The purpose of God. His purpose is--

1. Essentially one. He has a series of purposes harmonised into one, but one all-embracing idea. We call this idea providence when governing the world, and decree when saving the world.

2. Good. The purpose of God must be like God. He is good, and so is His purpose. Whatever form the good may assume, whether We call it instinct, rationality, volition, moral excellency, grace, perfection, if we trace the stream back into its origin, we shall look into the depth of the Divine decree.

3. Progressive. God is better known now than He ever was before, and will for ever and ever spread Himself before the faith, and love, and intelligence of His creation. Look at all the dispensations of time till now, and how many are continually unfolded. What is the administration of time but the unfolding of Gods one everlasting purpose?

II. The calling of God. God in Scripture is represented as calling men by His providence, His truth, conscience; and those who answer are the called. God decreed--

1. That you should have an intelligent, responsible, undying nature.

2. That the offer of salvation should be made to fallen man.

3. That the refusal of His offer should be punished.

4. That those who trust in His mercy shall be saved.

III. The love of God.

1. Gods dispensations towards man reveal His love. The apostle mentions five things in reference to this love--

(1) Foreknowledge.

(2) Predestination--a beautiful word, giving a destiny beforehand. He brought out the sun, and said, Your destiny is to illumine and warm these worlds. He said, Move on, and the sun has done it. Is it natural to suppose that God gave no destiny to man? God did not throw out souls for no purpose.

(3) Calling. There is the man, and God knows what he is for, and says, Man, keep up to thy destiny; leave earth, selfishness, sin, hell down beneath thy feet, and come up.

(4) Justification. When the man bears the call, and obeys it according to the great fixed plan, of which Jesus and His death is the great centre, he is justified, made right.

(5) Glorification--that is, reaching the destiny. All things work together. Do not attempt to take one link from the chain.

2. The work of Christ also reveals His love. Look to Bethlehem, to Calvary, to the grave of Joseph, the Mount of Olives, and the right hand of God. What is He doing? Making intercession for us. Do you see anything that is not encouraging? Who can separate us from the love of Christ? (Caleb Morris.)

The secret of the Divine ways

1. How many among you have felt, at the reading of my text, an involuntary doubt cross their mind! And, beyond the circle of believers, with what a smile of pity or of indignation is it greeted!

2. Moreover, the manner in which this truth is often presented revolts generous hearts. When I see a Christian overwhelmed by trials, yet not doubting the Divine goodness, blessing the hand which afflicts, I recognise both the tone of Paul and the spirit which animated him. But when, in the midst of a tame and easy existence of selfish happiness, I see a Christian delight in the thought that his lot is privileged above others, I can understand the sceptics smile and indignation. Under this narrow aspect the great thought of Gods intervention is often presented. Here is an epidemic; a believer who is spared pretends to see in this fact the mark of the special preference of God. Another is the only one who escapes from a shipwreck; he lets it be understood that God had cares and tenderness only for him. The atheist Diagoras, disembarking at Samothracia, went to the temple, where they showed him the offerings of voyagers rescued from shipwreck. Canst thou deny the providence of the gods, they said to him, when thou seest all those testimonies of their intervention? Ah! replied Diagoras, we should also hear the testimony of those who rest buried beneath the waves! If we must recognise with pleasure that God acts in preserving us from danger or suffering, we must also repel the theory of a special preference. God loves those unfortunate victims of epidemic or shipwreck as much as He loves us, and more perhaps. I cannot tell what I experience when I see Christians interpreting Gods dispensations in the sense which corresponds to their narrow hearts. In vain has the Book of Job condemned that error; in vain the Master has declared that the Galileans upon whom the tower of Siloam fell were not guiltier than others. We hear such explaining the ways of the Lord with a cold and axiomatic tone. A child is taken away; they ask if it was not made an idol of. A humiliating misfortune overtakes one of their neighbours; they conclude that it was undoubtedly necessary--an idea directly opposed to that of St. Paul, who affirms that all things work together for good to them that love God.

3. Now this error manifests itself under forms which are singularly hurtful to Christian beliefs. There are men who can see Divine intervention only in what is extraordinary. There are Christians who do not perceive God acting in the uniform laws by which He governs the world. A cure, for example, in which human science has taken no part, seems to them, should be attributed directly to God; if the physician had interfered, in their eyes he would have relegated God to the background. Thence proceeds a consequence which unbelief does not fail to draw. Ignorance is the mother of faith. In a dark century such an event is attributed to God; but to-morrow a more enlightened generation will know the law thereof. Now that is what we ought to fight against. God does not manifest Himself to us in that alone which astonishes and disconcerts us. All things work together for His plans. Let us now penetrate to the real centre of the apostles thought.

I. All things tend towards one end. That thought was born the day when Jesus taught His disciples to say, Thy kingdom come. Reason alone would conclude in an opposite sense. How can we recognise a Divine plan in that bloody play which is called history, in those ancient civilisations which have so thoroughly disappeared, in those insolent triumphs of force or cunning, in those miscarriages of the best causes? A deep thinker sums up his science on this point by saying that humanity, like a wheel, describes a fatal circle. And yet one would not dare to repeat this to-day. Progress is believed in; men have taken from Christianity their belief in the final triumph of justice and truth. Well! that belief belongs to us; we have given it to the world; do not let the world turn it against us. I see Christians confounded at the sight of this world, despairing of the future. Let that cowardly attitude be far from us! All serves to erect that eternal temple where God shall be adored by all His creatures; each generation which passes lays its stone there, and the building rises.

II. To believe in that general plan by which all things work together for the glory of God is not enough. I want to know what his plan is with regard to me. But how shall we show this without dashing against objections?

1. Our belief is taxed with pride. What presumption to believe ourselves objects of the vigilant care of God! So then, when you see your little child relating his faults to God, and asking Him to make him better, is that a teaching of pride? But you will answer, Have all Christians the admirable simplicity of that child? No. But that proves that they are men and sinners--nothing more. The ideal for them (the gospel declares it) would be to become children again. You insist on our insignificance. But if we are great enough to believe in God, to love Him, what pride is there in believing that God responds to that desire which He has Himself inspired? Would you charge with pride the feeble plant which, each day at sunrise, holds up its head and half opens to inhale its vivifying heat? God, you say, is too great to make all things work together for our good. What!--that God who has poured forth on the meanest of His creatures treasures of wisdom, of foresight; that God who decks the birds of the air and the flowers of the field would be too great to count our sorrows and our prayers! You accuse us of pride? But suffer me, in turn, to distrust your humility. A thousand times I have seen the rebel creature escape from God under pretext of his insignificance, and shelter his revolt under the veil of humility. Where is pride if not in that attitude of a feeble and sinful being who says, Let others call upon Thee; I can do without Thee?

2. Our modern stoics accuse us of obeying an interested sentiment. To hear them, man ought never to seek his own good. He ought to obey duty--that is all. But we may well remark that the gospel has said all that with an incomparable power. Never has the mercenary spirit been more mercilessly condemned than by Jesus Christ. But because I ought to serve God without calculation, does it follow that I ought to reject, in the name of my dignity, that Providence which makes all things work together for my good? No, certainly, for that would be to lie to my nature.

3. Why pretend that God occupies Himself with each of His creatures, since He governs the world by invariable laws? So then, in a well-ordered state, because the sovereign has made and observes the laws, he cannot testify his benevolence to any of his subjects, and the order which he has made to prevail will hinder him from ever manifesting his love. To be logical, we must go further, and say that God is chained by the laws, He has made, that there is no other God than those laws, and return to the inexorable fatality of the heathen.

4. Appeal is made to experience. Are you spared more than others, you who pray? And when you would escape from the evils which threaten you, are you not, like us, obliged to resort to the human means which experience points out? But have the objectors reflected that they confound the good of believers with their visible happiness, a confusion which the Bible never makes? Distinguish those two things, and light already begins to come. What God calls our good is not what we call our happiness. Happiness for us is success, health, glory, fortune, the affection of mankind, pleasure; in the sight of God the good for us is holiness, is salvation. God does not to-day attach happiness to faith, and success to piety; if He did so, we should obey Him in order to be happy, and God would be served only by mercenaries. But it is true only in appearance that all men suffer alike. Question believers, and they will tell you that in the severest trials they have discovered signs of the Divine goodness, Now, even when outwardly all seems to be identical in the life of him who loves God and of him who does not, we must admit that events will work upon men according to the mind with which they are accepted. Behold in nature those forces which frighten us by their power of destructiveness. In the plant, beneath a lovely flower, is a subtle poison; in the atmosphere is the hurricane and the electricity. Put the savage in presence of those forces, he will find only suffering and death. But the scientist extracts that poison, and finds in it a remedy for his ills; to the breath of the wind he spreads the sails of his mills or of his ships; he lays hold of the lightning, and upon an imperceptible thread cast into the depths of the ocean he commands it to carry his thoughts to the ends of the world. Well, this is a faithful picture of the manner in which the believing soul can turn to his good all the events of life, all the evils which overwhelm it. Here is failure, mourning, suffering alighting on a Christian soul. Well, you will see that soul seizing those terrible forces which might crush it under their strokes, humbling itself, praying, blessing, and drawing from what might be its death the secret of true greatness, of spiritual triumph and of holiness. (E. Bersier, D.D.)

The Christian conception of the universe

I. The universal law--all things work. Work is not blind and aimless labour, but power directed by knowledge to the attainment of some definite end. There is a prodigious amount of energy in operation which has the appearance of agitation only, without plan or project. But there is an unseen and beneficent Hand that wields and fashions the issues of all.

1. The inanimate creation is not exempted from the law of work. The viewless gases are never idle; the particles of dust beneath our feet have run successive careers of varied labour; the world itself is a colossal work, and its motion is a ceaseless flight. The sun never halts, every star is crowned for illustrious toil, and every atom as certainly shares the common lot.

2. In the lowest levels of animated existence there are the tokens of work. Life reveals itself in activity. The springing grass, the rising corn, the budding forest, are models of industry.

3. Work pervades the human and animal economy. A single drop Of water is an ocean capable of holding millions of inhabitants; a vegetable crevice of like dimensions is a populous world. Vast masses of rock are the tombs of microscopic animalcules in countless myriads that toiled in bygone time. What million-fold animation gleams and murmurs in the summer air! What vital energies centre in man! Every particle in his body is a separate worker. Work is demanded of every one who approaches the path of progress. Even sin is evil work, and death is the wages of its ill desert.

4. Angels and demons work. Little is said of angels, but names are applied to them taken from our highest ideas of might and dignity (Col_1:16). For what are they raised to this height? Are they not all ministering spirits? Angels which have forfeited celestial splendour retain all their native might, and exert it to the full (Eph_6:12; 1Pe_5:8).

5. The Godhead works (Joh_5:17; 2Co_3:8). The whole scheme of nature is the works of God. God never leaves off working (Isa_40:28). Virtue never ceases to go out of Him.

II. The universal method--all things work together. What unlike things subsist in the realm of creation! How difficult to imagine their concordant activity! Each wheel in the subtle and complicated mechanism revolves on its separate axle, yet all are cogged in some transcendent unity, and move towards one common and sublime destination.

1. The inferior objects of nature work together. Gases are rarely found alone. Their native affinities present them in combination. Matter does not exist in ultimate granules, but in cohering masses. World balances world. The star shining far away is working with every grain of sand upon our shores. The fragile insect, a mere speck of animated light, pipes its feeble song in harmony with the music of the spheres, and poises its wings of gauze for flight in consonance with the universal law and order of the great creation.

2. Men work together. All that we mean by civilisation is due to this. Multitudes, without knowing it, think the thoughts of Plato and Aristotle, Bacon and Newton. It is the same in the moral sphere. Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, Paul, and John operate upon us every moment. Why are we here to-day? Because Jesus died eighteen hundred years ago! How the remote ages work together! So is it in evil. Notwithstanding the lapse of all the centuries the hand of Adam is on us still.

3. Men work together with nature. The two were made for each other. There is nothing that does not co-operate with our intelligence and taste. A star that shone millions of years ago, and many millions of miles away, blends with my reason, and nourishes my sensibility. The venerable geological records are among the most influential facts of our life.

4. Men and angels work together, They are our fellow-servants, and are sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation. We pray daily to be lifted nearer to their ministry (Mat_6:10). With the fallen hosts men labour and combine. Whoever is disloyal to the Great King belongs to the ranks of the wicked one.

5. Men work together with God. That the righteous do so needs no proof. But what of the wicked? In all their evil He interworks and counterworks, and causes their wrath to praise Him (Psa_76:10). Pharaoh refused to work with God, but his wilful hardness of heart exhibited the Divine power and glory. Balaam would not work with God, but his very sins became the executors of the Divine righteousness. Herod, Pilate, etc., resolved not to work with God, yet they did whatsoever Gods hand and counsel determined before to be done.

6. All things, principles, and beings work together, and God moves amidst and works through them all.

III. The universal destination--to them that love God.

1. Why to them that love God? Not to love God, who is the centre and source of all Divine moral loveliness, is to be incapable of good.

2. All for good. The whole material system is a ministry for good to you. A Fathers tenderness shines down from every star, and smiles from every common flower. All the ages are linked together, and men of all time take hands to bless thee. For good to you Egypt reared its pyramids and Nineveh its palaces, Phoenicia traded, Greece speculated, and Rome conquered. For good to you Adam fell, Abraham believed, David sung, Isaiah soared, Jesus wept, agonised, and died. Are you not constrained to read all your own life with the same clue to its meaning? How all the course of your past life, without your design, has conspired to fit you to bear the burden and fulfil the vocation of this present hour! At an early stage of your course, it may be, you encountered a bitter disappointment. But you have long since seen that the discipline was necessary. You remember a time when you lay low. But you have many a time confessed, It is good for me that I have been afflicted. You have sad and sorrowful bereavements in your recollection. But you have not a sensibility at the present hour that death has not softened, and the clouds, so black at noon, now your sun is setting, are bathed in rosy light on the calm horizon of the better land. Are you crushed by some recent grief? Be patient, and good shall not fail to be worked. And what shall we say of your mistakes, follies, and sins? Peter arrived at courage through cowardice, and attained to fortitude through failure. While the world, the flesh, and the devil tempt, the Father sympathises, the Lord Jesus intercedes, the Holy Spirit waits to guide into all the truth, angels minister, and all things work together for good.

Conclusion:

1. If this be so, what should be our great concern? Manifestly, to love God.

2. The love of God in the heart is the secret of all spiritual rest and peace.

3. All things work together for ill to them that love not God. That the stars in their courses fought against Sisera is the symbol of a universe in league against the sinner. (H. Batchelor.)

All things working together for good

I. The character. It consists of two particulars.

1. The person loves God. And, that we may arrive satisfactorily at this conclusion, let us go by several successive steps.

(1) First, am I sure that I do not hate Him? The carnal mind is enmity against God.

(2) Do I think of God? Have I satisfaction in thinking of Him?

(3) Have you received Christ and the reconciliation and peace which are by Him? No man cometh to the Father but by Christ. Are you a suppliant for mercy, peace, and eternal life, through Christ Jesus? If so, you are a lover of God. I suppose the love of God to consist in these simple elements--

(a) First, delight in His excellence, complacency in His perfec-lions, mental apprehension of His surpassing and uncreated loveliness.

(b) The second element is goodwill to God, and to His plans and purposes; consciousness of an interest in them, and admiration of their wisdom, holiness, and power.

(c) There will be gratitude for the benefits we have received.

(d) Love to God supposes resignation to His will, and acquiescence in its decisions, without resentment or murmuring.

2. The next point is, the calling according to Gods purpose. Let us not forget that the purpose is not by reason of the love in us, but that the love is in us by reason of the purpose. It is this antecedent purpose which is the cause of our love. Therefore give diligence to make your calling and election sure.

II. The privilege. To these persons all things shall work together for good.

1. We take first, all Divine perfections; all the attributes and prerogatives of Gods nature. For who, I pray you, is the greatest worker in this universe? My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.

2. There is, secondly, the course and constitution of natural things, as they subsist around us in their harmony and concurrence of operation. Seedtime and harvest, day and night, summer and winter, do not fail. Surely this is not mainly and chiefly that lions may roar, horses be fed, insects creep, and eagles soar. All these things are subordinate; the higher purpose is the preservation and happiness of man. And we further inquire, what man or what men? The primary and the higher purpose is, that the just may live; that their excellencies may be revealed, and their character consummated; that the love of God may shine in them; and that they may accomplish the great end of their being, which is, to glorify God, and to enjoy Him for ever.

3. All the means of grace work for their good.

4. Fourthly and mainly; all the dispensations of providence are intended to work for good. It is for good. Did you ever read the maxim, I had perished if I had not perished? That is, I had been lost as to my soul, if I had not lost my estate. The affliction may be nearer. It may touch the bone and the flesh. There may be strong pain, or fever, or need of surgical operation. Must we say, It is for good? If we love God, it is for good. All the countless strokes of the chisel on the block of marble contribute to form the statue which almost breathes. The printing-press is filled with all its types; and forth comes the paper without a word deficient. All the medicines are mixed by the science of the physician; and from the mixture the healing result is realised. All the reapers in the field assist to bring the harvest home. And after the same manner as these emblems and illustrations represent, all things in Providence concur for the final salvation of those who love God, and are the called according to His purpose.

III. The certainty of all this. We know. St. Paul knew it by inspiration. The rabbins tell us concerning a certain Jew, that, whenever a calamity occurred, he was accustomed to say, This also is good; and they changed the mans name from Nahum to Gamzu, which means in Hebrew, This also. Blessed is that man in whose mind this principle is fixed, in all its light, and power, and consolation: come what will, it is good, for I am a lover of God, and called according to His purpose. (J. Stratten.)

Divine providence

I. God deals with His children after a fixed and definite plan. Were a person altogether unacquainted with architecture to visit some splendid temple in the process of erection, and observe the huge, rough stones, and hoards, and timbers, iron-castings, bricks, lime, mortar, lying scattered in confusion all around: were he to see one group of workmen cutting up material here, another digging trenches there, he might truly say that he could see no plan or system in the business. But let the observer set himself to watch from day to day the busy work as it goes on; let him patiently examine, not only the minutest details, but also try to obtain a view of the general scope of the whole, and he will not be long in finding out that some superior mind regulates all, and that every stroke of every workman is conducive to the same ultimate effect. God is building up the Christian in accordance with a perfect plan into a majestic temple for the decoration of the eternal city.

II. God not only carries on His great designs by a pre-established plan; but the very minutest concerns of human life are also comprehended in it. The piercing eye of God strikes through the deepest shades of night and sees with keenest sense each individual atom which makes up this grand, material universe. He perceives and clearly understands the constitution, use and properties, the bearing and the end of every organ, system, instrument, which forms this wide, mysterious world of animated nature that surrounds us. A single spark of fire may sink a city into ruins and seal the destiny of an empire; and so in Gods moral government the greatest and remotest ends are often brought about by the minutest means conceivable; a word, a silent thought, has saved a soul; and through that soul, ten thousand other souls, from rain. The combination of the elements is as perfect in a particle of water as in a diamond. Is not the plan of God as visible in the one as in the other?

III. But God has a plan; that plan extends to the minutest circumstances in the Christians life; and by that plan God makes everything work together for His good! Do you tell me God never bends the laws of nature to save or favour those that love Him? I admit it. But He brings those that love Him into such relation to the laws that they turn, as ten thousand rays of light from objects round you to the pupil of your eye, unto his benefit. A ray of light is bent by the same angle for the Christian as the sinner; but the difference is this: the one sees God in it, the other sees himself, or nothing in it. The Christians heart is a golden bowl turned up towards heaven, and into it God is ever pouring benefactions. The Christian does not always think them so; but in they come, pure benefactions.

1. Then let me say, if God be working so for us, we ought not to be too solicitous about results. God is working ever us; let us leave the consequence to Him.

2. Let us also suppress our murmurings at the allotments of Providence. If God is guided by a plan; if that plan reaches down to the minutest details of daily life, what need have we to murmur.

3. And if all things are working together for our good, what reason have we to envy the wicked in their riches and prosperity? If a man be standing firmly on a rivers bank and sees another gliding gaily but inevitably down to a tremendous precipice below, shall he be envious of the pleasant sail that intervenes before the dread catastrophe?

4. And if all things be working together for good, let us cast away our fears and press onward.

5. But while all things work together for good to those that love the Lord, we are told upon the same authority, the way of the ungodly shall perish! (Elias Nason.)

The Christians delivery from the tyranny of circumstance

I. There is a side on which this statement is unlimited. All things work for our good. The apostle, in this tremendously sweeping statement, is speaking about things external to us, and not what transpires within a mans own breast. Augustine, commenting on this passage, included under it even sin itself. His own experience helped him to see that where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. What Paul does say, however, is that everything external to us is working for our good. The stars in their courses fight for the Israel of God. A Pagan view of life would tell us that we are placed in a world where law and necessity reign. Stern, hard-and-fast laws, like a huge machine, are grinding out their unalterable decrees. They may work out ill, but all we can do is to resign ourselves to the inevitable. That is not the Christian view of Gods creation. One of the laws of God, one of the things that on this earth very nearly constitute a necessity, is--If man does not work, neither shall he eat. Men have often fretted at such a law. The Christian accepts this law, and acknowledges that Gods law of work is part of the great discipline of life. He would not have it otherwise, even though he could. It may need an exercise of faith to see that all these laws, which we call laws of nature, are working for our good; that the universe, with its great forces; the earth, with its lightnings; the sea, with its storms and shipwrecks, can do us no harm. Yet, when once we get a Christian view of the world, that is a certainty. These laws constitute the will of our heavenly Father. Let us now take a step further. Christ has helped us to see even in adversity a power working for good. Lastly, we may say that that which has been reckoned the great enemy of man--Death itself--is among the things that work together for good to them that love God. It is death that does for us the great service of perfecting our life. This Christian reading of life has been the death of death. Are we not now in a position to answer the question--Do all things work for our good? If our life is set upon mere physical happiness, then all things do not work for what we think our good. That is not the good for which things are working, But if we go deeper, and interpret by the good, the larger life, the maturer spirit, the holier existence, then there is a conspiracy in all things without to help us.

II. There is an aspect is which this statement is limited. It is limited as regards persons--to them that love God. Is there any need why this broad and general statement of Pauls should have any limitations whatsoever? Could we not say in the fullest sense that all things are working for good to all the children of men. There is nothing vindictive in God. He maketh His sun, etc. God is no respecter of persons. Are not My ways equal, saith the Lord. May not the explanation of the mighty difference in Gods providence to those who love Him lie within the heart and not without? The laws of the Infinite are abiding and eternal. The manner in which they fall upon different men lies with the individual soul. The laws of Gods universe are such that if a man is out of sympathy with God, all things seem to work against him. The further he is away from God, the more he is made to suffer. The selfish man who has been all his life long absorbed in schemes of self-aggrandisement; who has trampled on the rights of others, and been careless of their feelings, is at last met by such a body of adverse opinion that he is crushed. He set himself against Gods law of true usefulness, and so in trying to save his life he loses it. A good sailor, with his hand on the helm, can pilot his little boat amid rough waters, and never ship a sea. The man who has no skill or knowledge has his boat struck by every wave, and ships sea after sea, until at last he suffers shipwreck. So do men by unwisdom, amid favourable enough conditions, make shipwreck of their souls. On the other hand, if we hearken to God, all Gods creation will hearken to us. If we love God, we are in harmony with the whole working of Gods universe. For the earth is the Lords, and the fulness thereof. It is a hopeless struggle to fight against God, and the man who is on the side of the Almighty is not engaged in it. (D. Woodside, B.D.)

In what respects afflictions are for our advantage

I. The sufferings of those who love God have of themselves a proper tendency to promote their spiritual and supreme good, I shall consider the tendency which the sufferings of those that love God have to promote their true interest, in the following respects.

1. As they are proper to make us reflect on our past conduct.

2. To humble our pride and vanity,

3. To make us more sensible of our dependence on God.

4. To discover to us the sincerity of our love to God, and--

5. To raise our thoughts to the contemplation of a future and more perfect state of happiness.

II. God is pleased to further this natural tendency of them by special acts of His providence and grace.

1. Our afflictions not springing out of the dust, but coming from the hand of God, and being wisely designed by Him for some good end to us, we may comfortably assure ourselves that He will wisely dispose all events in such manner as may most effectually conduce to that end.

2. When He appoints us to the combat, He proportions His assistance to the nature and difficulties of the service: He does not leave us to fight it out with our own forces. God, therefore, who knows the frailty of our nature, is always pleased to send His staff with His rod, and to grant us such strength and protection as may support us in all dangers and carry us through all adversities.

Conclusion:

1. If afflictions have both in their own nature a tendency to promote our good, and be designed by God to this end, then we have great reason to be patient and resigned under them. As in other cases, the prospect of any great and certain advantage will make us cheerfully undergo many difficulties, and even expose ourselves to many visible and imminent dangers.

2. If God design afflictions for our good, then if we would not oppress or frustrate His design in them, we must endeavour to profit by them; for, like all other means of piety, they do not operate of themselves to our advantage without our own concurrence.

3. If afflictions have so proper a tendency to promote our spiritual good, it will concern us by reasonable acts of mortification and self-denial frequently to afflict ourselves.

4. If God means afflictions to us for good, under which I all along comprehend disappointments, then there is no forming any certain judgment of the wisdom or folly, of the virtuous or vicious state of men, from all that goes before them. I do not say that the weak reasons of a mans conduct never appear to us in his disappointments, for they often do; but we must see at the same time very particularly what way he took, what circumstances he was in, and upon what motives he acted. For it sometimes happens that a man is obliged in reason and justice to do those things which appear to others the most unreasonable. If there be any true judgment to be made of men, with respect to their spiritual condition, from their circumstances of life, we ought rather to judge in favour of the afflicted and unhappy, for there are several things spoken very much to their advantage in Scripture. (R. Fiddes, D.D.)

The operations of Divine Providence

are--

I. Unlimited in their sweep. All things. This is a bold assertion. We can understand how many things work together for good. Critical epochs in the worlds history, important reforms in national life, occasional afflictions in the domestic circle, but are there not innumerable petty details in life that are beneath Gods notice? No; all things, near and remote, great and small; all substances necessary for the growth of the body, all forces necessary for the development of the mind, all influences necessary for the perfection of our spiritual nature.

1. All the provisions of nature are destined for the good of Gods children. God made the world for our abode, and furnished it for our accommodation. For us the sun shines, the wind blows, the birds carol.

2. All the provisions of grace. The Sabbath, the sanctuary, the Scriptures. God the Father, who created us, watches over our steps; God the Son, who redeemed us, lives to intercede for us; God the Holy Ghost, who dwells with us, enlightens and sanctifies us.

II. Harmonious in their design. Work together.

1. Changes in the history of nations work together for good. The devout student has no difficulty in recognising the hand of God in the past. He regards the bondage of Israel, the crucifixion of Christ, the fall of the Roman Empire, and the dark periods of the worlds history as necessary links in the chain of Gods providential dealings. The future is as surely in Gods hand as the past. Light shall triumph over darkness, and good over evil. Gods hand is upon the wheel of providence; and when His work is complete, we shall say, He hath done all things well.

2. Changes in the history of individuals. There is a special as well as a general supervision of human affairs. Look at the life of Moses, and Joseph, and David. Little events are the hinges upon which great events turn. The steps of a good man are ordered of the Lord.

III. Benevolent in their aim. For good, not for our prosperity. Prosperity may, or may not, be a good thing. Not for our happiness. Happiness is not the highest attainment in the Christian life. Gods aim is the perfection of our spiritual nature. The discipline through which God leads us may be dark and inexplicable, but it is always for the best. As winter prepares the way for spring, and spring opens the door for summer, and summer ripens the golden harvest, so the darkest and most trying dispensations of Gods providence are working together for good to them that love God.

1. Sickness is often designed for our good. The mind may become dark, and need enlightening; the heart hard, and need softening; the life barren, and need pruning.

2. Bereavement. It is good for those who are taken to be present with the Lord. It is good for those who remain if it solemnises their thoughts and sanctifies their soul. God will be a friend to the friendless, and a husband to the widow.

IV. Discriminating in their application. The promise is not to the wise, or the strong, or the courageous, but to them that love God. Providence is for the righteous; it is against the wicked. Love manifests itself--

1. In practical service. The loving heart makes the diligent hand.

2. In a submissive spirit. When adversity comes, a man who loves God says, The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away, etc. When affliction overtakes him, he says, I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. When persecution arises, he says, Not my will, but Thine be done. The more perfectly we know God, the more implicitly we shall trust Him. God is wise, and cannot err; He is good, and will not.

V. Manifest in their results. The apostle does not say, I hope, or I think, but we know. This assurance is in perfect harmony--

1. With the promises of Gods Word. David says, No good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly. Moses says, And as thy day, so shall thy strength be. Christ says, Lo! I am with you alway, even unto the end. God says, My grace is sufficient for thee.

2. With the experiences of Gods children. It was a dark day in the experience of Moses when his mother could no longer hide him; but God watched over him, and preserved him from harm. It was a dark day in the experience of Joseph when his brethren east him into a pit; but God was with Joseph, and led him from prison to a throne. It was a dark day in the experience of the disciples when Christ was crucified; but His sufferings were the purchase of their salvation. (J. T. Woodhouse.)

Christian security

In this world of doubt and conjecture it is refreshing to find a man who declares that he knows what he says is true. Stilt more refreshing to find that what he says he knows is just that about which we have been much in doubt. From the text I learn that all things act--

I. Energetically. They work.From this our word energy is derived. Used here to denote the most intense, tireless activity. The universe is all alive under the Divine hand.

II. Harmoniously. They work together. In the mechanism of Divine providence there are no loose pullies on which idle belts career. All thinks work, not frictionally, or at random, but together. We see that things work, but we cannot see how they work together. How could we see so much?

III. Beneficently. For good. They all play into one grand purpose--for good, literally into good. In the light of this text the Christian loses his insignificance, and looms up before us in an attitude of importance and grandeur. God, not man, is to decide what this good is to be. Spiritually considered, when we talk about profit and loss, success or failure, very often we know not what we say. We are like children prattling about the affairs of nations. We may spell a word defeat, but God may pronounce it victory. We may pronounce a word gain, but God may call it loss. Men are sometimes congratulated when they ought to be pitied, and the reverse.

IV. Specifically--to them that love God. Those who do not love God have no right to its blessed comfort. To remain in sin is to antagonise the arrangements of infinite beneficence, and means danger, and folly, and suicide, and damnation. The great question that shall shape your eternity and mine is, Do we love God? We must not forget that the Holy Ghost gives us the tense of this verb, work. The text does not say all things will, or may, work for good; but all things are now working for good. To honour God and be strong, our love also must be in the present tense. (T. Kelly.)

The purpose of Gods afflictive providences

I once went with my brother to extract a crystal from the rock. With a mighty sledge-hammer he vigorously dealt blow after blow upon the rock, and chipped off piece after piece. At last the top of the crystal appeared. Then one might see what he was after, for it had not shown upon the outer surface of the rock. When the crystal appeared, then the whole strife became how so to break the rock away from it, and how so to strike the rock as to extract the crystal. The rock was good for nothing; the crystal was everything. The soul is mans crystal, and the body is but the incasing rock that holds it. Gods providences are omiting upon the rock, and breaking and cutting it away, and extracting the precious crystal, which is worth incomparably more than its setting in the rock. I stood once in Paris, where the stone is soft, and where the building blocks are cut, not on the ground, but in their places on the tops of the doors, and about the windows; and I saw the chiselling done. I saw the work going forward on some of the public buildings, where lions, and eagles, and wreaths of flowers were being carved. Men stood with little chisels and mallets, cutting, and cutting, and cutting the stone, here and there. Suppose one of these blocks of stone, when it first mounts into its place, is told that it is to be a royal lion, and it is to decorate a magnificent structure. The workman commences, and after working one day the head is rudely shaped, but you can barely tell what it is. The next day he brings out one ear. The third day he opens one eye. And so, day after day, some new part is added. The stone complains, and asks if the operation is to be an everlasting one; but the work goes on. And you cannot get anything out of stone except by myriads of blows continued until the work is done. I hear people say, Why am I afflicted? For your good. How long shall I be afflicted? Until you cease to ask how long. Until Gods work is done in you. God will go on chiselling as long as it is necessary, in order to elaborate first one feature and then another, and then another. The work ought to go on until it is completed. And every true heart ought to say, Lord, do not stay Thy hand; cut away until I am brought out into the fair lines and lineaments of the image of God. Troubles and afflictions and blows that are sent are useless unless they make you patient to your fellows and submissive to your lot. But rest assured that if you love God all things will work together for your good. And now join and work with them. Help God to work for you.

The security of believers

The argument for this is fivefold.

I. The Divine supremacy.

1. This co-operation among all things for the believers good is not the result of the conscious aim of the things themselves, but by virtue of an extrinsic force.

2. This force, which makes all things work together, must be a supreme force.

3. This supreme force is God.

(1) Because He alone is supreme.

(2) Because the controlling power is exercised in behalf of the objects of His love, who also are His called ones.

(a) To love God is the only true evidence of being His called ones.

(b) To be His called ones is to secure the co-operation of all things for our good.

II. The Divine purpose (verses 29-31).

1. This foreknowledge is more than prescience; it implies personal, loving approval.

(1) Otherwise there could be no discrimination, for God is prescient, knows, intellectually, all.

(2) Otherwise Universalism has in these words the strongest possible foundation.

(3) The conditions of this Divine approval must be conceived of in harmony with the nature of Him who does the approving.

(4) Being the moral approval of One who is holy and just, as well as loving, and who has predestined salvation only through the death and resurrection of His Son, it is easy to understand the plan of electing grace.

2. Far-reaching and all-loving purpose for the highest good of believers.

(1) The ineffable good of conformity to the image of Gods Son.

(2) Of contributing by Divine grace to the glory of Christ.

(3) Of being called by the Holy Spirit, justified by the Father, and glorified with Christ for ever.

3. The good of a righteousness unchallengeable to all eternity (verse 31).

III. The Divine sacrifice an argument for the believers security (ver. 32).

1. This form of statement undeniably implies a real sacrifice on the part of the Father in giving up His Son.

2. Such a sacrifice as this implies the withholding of no good from those who accept Christ.

(1) This argument is as self-evident as it is wonderful.

(2) The reality of the substitutionary character of Christs work is unavoidable, according to these words.

IV. Divine election (verses 33, 34).

1. The elect of God are His justified ones (ver. 33).

(1) The condition of justification and prerogatives of the justified are laid down in many parts of Scripture.

(a) Condition of justification (Rom_5:1; Gal_2:16).

(b) Prerogatives of the justified--peace, blessedness, pardonse salvation (Rom_5:1; Rom_4:6-8).

2. Divine justification rests on a solid foundation.

(1) Death, resurrection, session at Gods right hand, and intercession of Christ (vers34).

3. The security of the justified believer is as safe as the foundation on which it rests (verses 33, 34).

V. The enduring nature of the Divine love.

1. The love here mentioned is the Divine love (verses 35-39).

2. Consider the list of forces which seek to wrest the believer from its gracious grasp (verses 35-39).

3. The sublime assurance of the apostle (verses 38, 39).

(1) The foundation of the assurance--the Lord Jesus.

(2) Its far-reaching character--Nor things to come.

Conclusion: Let us never forget--

1. The glorious assurance of the Holy Spirit of promise (verse 28).

2. The glorious purpose for which believers are called--To be conformed to the image of His Son. Everything contrary to holiness in the life of the believer is a frustration of the Divine purpose.

3. Let us never forget the unchangeableness of Gods love. (D. C. Hughes, A.M.)

The true Christians blessedness

We have here--

I. The description of a true Christian, and a declaration of His blessedness.

1. Them that love God. Now, there are many things in which the worldly and the godly do agree; but on this point there is a vital difference. No ungodly man loves God in the Bible sense of the term. An unconverted man may love a God, as, for instance, the God of nature, and the God of the imagination; but the God of revelation no man can love, unless grace turn him from his natural enmity towards God. And there may be many differences between godly men; they may belong to different sects, hold very opposite opinions, but all agree in this, that they love God.

(1) As their Father; they have the Spirit of adoption, whereby they cry Abba Father.

(2) As their King; they are willing to obey Him.

(3) As their Portion, for God is their all.

(4) As their future inheritance.

2. The called according to His purpose, by which He means, that all who love God love Him--

(1) Because He called them to love Him. All men are called by the ministry, by the Word, by daily providence, to love God; the great bell of the gospel rings a universal welcome to every living soul, yet there was never an instance of any man having been brought to God simply by that sound.

(2) Because they have had a supernatural call.

II. Take the words one by one.

1. Work. Look around, above, beneath, and all things work--

(1) In opposition to idleness. The idle man is an exception to Gods rule. There is not a star which doth not travel its myriads of miles and work. There is not a silent nook within the deepest forest glade where work is not going on. Nothing is idle. The world is a great machine, but it is never standing still.

(2) In opposition to play. They are ceaselessly active for a purpose. The world hath an object in its wildest movement. Avalanche, hurricane, earthquake, are but order in an unusual form; destruction and death are but progress in veiled attire. The great machine is not only in motion, but there is something weaving in it, viz., good for Gods people.

(3) In opposition to Sabbath. Since the day when Adam fell all things have had to labour. Let us not wonder if we have to work too. If all things are working, let us work while it is called to-day, for the night cometh when no man can work.

2. Together.

(1) In opposition to their apparent confliction. Looking with the mere eye of sense, we say, Yes, all things work, but they work contrary to one another. The world is always active, but it is with the activity of the battle-field. Be not deceived. There is no opposition in Gods providence; the raven-wing of war is co-worker with the dove of peace. The tempest strives not with the peaceful calm--they work together. Look at our history. The strifes of barons and kings might have been thought to be likely to tread out the last spark of British liberty; but they did rather kindle the pile. The hearings of society, the strife of anarchy, the tumults of war--all these things, overruled by God, have but made the chariot of the Church progress more mightily. The charioteers of the Roman circus might with much cleverness and art, with glowing wheels, avoid each other; but God guides the fiery coursers of mans passion, yokes the storm, bits the tempest, and keeping each clear of the other from seeming evil still enduceth good, and better still; and better still in infinite progression.

(2) None of them work separately. The physician prescribes medicine; you go to the chemist, and he makes it up; there is something taken from this drawer, something from that phial, something from that shelf: any one of those ingredients, it is very possible, would be a deadly poison if you should take it separately; but he puts them into the mortar, and when he has worked them all up, and has made a compound, he gives them all to you as a whole, and together they work for your good. Too much joy would intoxicate us, too much misery would drive us to despair: but the joy and the misery, the battle and the victory, the storm and the calm, all these compounded make that sacred elixir whereby God maketh all His people perfect.

3. For good.

(1) There is the worldlings good, the good of the moment. Now God has never promised that all things shall work together for such good as that to His people. Expect not that all things will work together to make thee rich; it is just possible they may all work to make thee poor.

(2) The Christian understands by the word spiritual good. Ah! saith he, I do not call gold good, but faith! I do not think it always for my good to increase in treasure, but I know it is good to grow in grace.

(3) Good eternal. All work to bring the Christian to Paradise

(4) Sometimes all things work together for the Christians temporal good, as in the case of Jacob.

4. I return to the word work--to notice the tense of it. It does not say that they shall work, or that they have worked; both of these are implied, but that they do work now. I find it easy to believe that all things have worked together for my good. I can look back at the past, and wonder at all the way whereby the Lord hath led me. And I have an equal faith for the future, that all things will in the end work for good. The pinch of faith always lies in the present tense. However troubled, downcast, depressed, and despairing the Christian may be, all things are working now for his good.

5. Paul does not say, I am persuaded; I believe; but We (I have many witnesses) know. The apostle lifts his hand to where the white-robed hosts are praising God for ever. These, says he, passed through great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb: ask them! And with united breath they reply, We know that all things work together for good to them that love God. He puts his hand upon his poor distressed brethren--he looks at his companions and he says, We! We know it. Not only does faith believe it, but our own history convinces us of the truth of it. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The blessedness of believers

This text is a tonic. It is clear mountain air. Protracted conflicts with self, Satan, the world, adversities and sorrows, often leave us discouraged. Then we need this invigorating truth. It changes the aspect of every conflict of life. We shall not be injured, but benefited; shall not lose, but gain; shall not be defeated, but conquer. This conviction inspires courage, kindles enthusiasm, and girds with strength.

I. The promise is only to them that love God.

1. Obedience is the infallible test of this love. To belong to the Church; to be baptized; to be confirmed; to say prayers, is no proof that we love God, unless we keep His commandments; and those who do keep the commandments are known by their fruits. It is not doubtful what the trees are when they are in blossom. That pure white blossom is the cherry; that pink and white one is the apple. But when we eat the fruit we know the tree. That peach never grew on a crab-apple. But, granting that we may be mistaken, God infallibly knows them that love Him.

2. This special graciousness to them that love Him is open to all, but a righteous ruler must limit moral benefits to moral obedience. If God made all things work together for good to bad and good alike, there would be no moral principle in His government. Nay! such Divine co-operation would sanction the wickedness of men. His moral government must be consistent with His holiness.

3. As He loves His own eternal purposes of truth and righteousness, He must especially love and honour them who are fulfilling those holy purposes. God simply assures His obedient children that their obedience shall have its reward. Providence is in league with holiness.

II. Mark the wealth of the promise: All things.

1. Light is beautiful, but light alone cannot form the picture. Shadows must lie there--a dark background on which the light can pencil its beauty. God cannot form the beautiful rainbow until He has unbraided a beam of white light into the sevenfold colours of the prism, which borrow from and lend to each other enhancing loveliness. Thus also He knows how to blend the bright and dark things in human life to produce the most holy characters. Be patient and trustful, for He is making you after a beautiful pattern, even the image of the Only Begotten. The cutting and polishing of diamonds is done by friction. God puts His jewels on the friction-wheels only to polish them. He knows how to bring out the beauty of holiness. For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth. The darkness that comes across our sky is often but the shadow of a great blessing coming from heaven and passing between us and the sun. The thunderbolt that prostrates some sheltering tree lets heaven shine on a spot of earth where it never shone before. The banishment of John to Patrons seemed cruelty; but when there God revealed to him the visions of the Book of Revelation.

2. There is great force in the original verb, work together. I once visited a great carpet factory. I saw the wool seized by iron teeth, combed and carded, pressed under huge iron rollers and condensed into rolls, spun into yarn, dipped here in blue, there in black, yonder in crimson, there in orange, till vast piles of bobbins of every colour of yarn met my eye. But I could not see how these piles of coloured yarns could be woven into a carpet of such exquisite pattern. All seemed confusion and without intelligent design. Then the superintendent took me to the next floor, where he showed me a diagram of perforated cardboards, the exact pattern of the carpet designed--a plan unseen by the weavers below, but a plan connected with the looms and controlling all the shuttles of varied hues, thus guiding the weaving of all the threads into a web of beauty. This world is a vast factory; the events and experiences of life are crude materials seized by the iron teeth of trial, combed and carded, pressed under heavy rollers of sorrow, spun into warp and woof by the whirling spindles of duty, dipped here in the bright dyes of joy and prosperity, there in the dark hues of suffering and affliction. Confusion and mystery seemed everywhere. Then the Master took me up into the sanctuary and showed me the beautiful plan of the text, by which, unseen by the weavers below, the apparently random shuttles of life were weaving all the threads into a glorious robe of righteousness for them that love God.

III. The doctrine is not a pleasing fancy, a beautiful dream, but a glorious certainty: For we know. How?

1. We know the fact (not the philosophy) because it is the declared purpose and promise of God. Heaven and earth shall pass away; but not one syllable of His Word shall fail.

2. By the experience of them that love God. The breaking up of the family circle on earth has often been the means of re-uniting all the loved ones in heaven. The treachery of earthly friends has often driven us to closer communion with the faithful and true Friend in heaven. The wreck of mortal hopes has often enriched our immortal hopes. The vanity of this world has led us to seek more earnestly the solid realities of the world to come.

3. By the recorded testimony of good men. Before I was afflicted I went astray; but now have I kept Thy word. Take the experience of Paul in this chapter. (J. O. Peck, D.D.)

The great dome of Gods providence

In the baptistery of the cathedral at Pisa is a wonderful dome. Spacious, symmetrical, composed of the choicest marble, it is a delight to stand beneath and gaze upon its beauties. Thus I stood one sunny April day, when suddenly the air became instinct with melody. The great dome seemed full of harmony. The waves of music vibrated to and fro, loudly beating against the walls, swelling into full chords like the roll of a grand organ, and then dying away into soft, long-drawn, far-receding echoes, melting in the distance into silence. It was only my guide, who, lingering behind me a moment, had softly murmured a triple chord. But beneath that magic roof every sound resolved into a symphony. No discord can reach the summit of that dome and live. Every noise made in the building, the slamming of the seats, the tramping of feet, all the murmur and bustle of the crowd, are caught up, softened, harmonised, blended and echoed back in music. So it seems to me that over our life hangs the great dome of Gods providence. Standing as we do, beneath it, no act in the Divine administration towards us, no affliction, no grief, no loss which our heavenly Father sends, however hard to bear it may be, but will come back at last softened and blended into harmony, with the overarching dome of His wisdom, mercy, and power, till to our corrected sense it shall be the sweetest music of heaven. (J. D. Steele.)

The seasons of our education

We cannot skip the seasons of our education. We cannot hasten the ripeness and the sweetness of a single day, nor dispense with one nights nipping frost, nor one weeks blighting east wind. (F. W. Robertson.)

The guidance of our Pilot

A landsman at sea understands little how a vessel is worked; he sees her often heading almost back from her course, making strange and contrary traverses--sometimes stripped of her canvas when to him all seems fair; sometimes strong sails set upon her when the storm is driving fiercely; yet he trusts in the presiding skill, nor would he dare to give, much less countermand, an order; for in the extremity of his own ignorance he has the comfort of knowing that the pilot knows. So, in the hour of gloom, let us trust in God, for to Him the night shineth as the day; and what to us appears adverse, to Him is the guidance of our prosperity.

All things for good

Only a few years afterwards, Jeremiah was reduced to comparative poverty. The bulk of his property had been invested in the stock of the bank, which failed, unable to pay a shilling in the pound. Thus compelled to dispose of his expensive establishment, change his style of living altogether, and, with his wife and four children, take to short commons, his spirits did not desert him. Said Jerry, Never mind!--two words which he never failed to throw at the teeth of every mishap he encountered. Never mind! I like variety. I am tired of riding in a carriage; I once broke my leg in one. Walking is an exercise that I need very much. Come, come, this is not so bad an affair after all. It will test the value of my friends. Besides, now I can earn the bread we eat. Ah! it will be a labour of love, and that enriches the soul! I can almost say I am glad this accident has happened; I can indeed! (E. Paxton Hood.)

Mans mistakes rectified by God

I sometimes think of it as of a child sitting in a boat. The child does not know the coast, and it very little understands how to row. If the child were left to itself, pulling upon the oars, its right hand being a little stronger than the other, it would be all the time veering the boat to the right, and the boat would be constantly turning round and round. The child would, perhaps, make its way out of the harbour and into the ocean, and be carried away and lost, if there were no guiding power in the boat but its own. But there in the stern sits the father. The uneven strokes of the child would carry the boat this way or that out of its course; but the steady hand of the father overcomes those uneven strokes; and all the mistakes with the oars are rectified by the rudder, and the boat keeps its right course. So that the force exerted by the child, though misdirected, all works for good when the father guides. (H. W. Beecher.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 8:28. And we know — Though we do not always know particularly what to pray for as we ought, yet this we know, that all things — Namely, that occur in the course of divine providence, such as worldly losses or gains, poverty or riches, reproach or commendation, contempt or honour, pain or ease, sickness or health, and the ten thousand changes of life; work together — Strongly and sweetly, in a variety of unthought-of and unexpected ways; for spiritual and eternal good to them — Who, being justified by faith, and having peace with God, and access into a state of favour and acceptance with him, sincerely love him, having beheld what manner of love he hath bestowed upon them, 1Jn 3:1; or who have known and believed the love that he hath to them, and therefore love him who hath first loved them. “It is so plain,” says Dr. Doddridge, “from the whole context, that the apostle only speaks of providential events, and it is so evident that the universal expression all is sometimes to be taken in a limited sense, that it must argue, I fear, something worse than weakness to pretend that sin is comprehended in the apostle’s assertion.” This observation is as important as it is just: for sin, which is a real and positive evil, an evil of the worst kind, a moral evil, and an evil which is the source of all other evils, can, in itself considered, in no case whatever work for good. What may and does work for good with respect to it, is the punishment or chastisement of it, repentance for it, and the forgiveness of it. But providential dispensations, such as those just referred to, and especially those that are of an afflictive nature, may, and if received in a spirit of faith, humility, resignation, and patience, and used aright, assuredly will, work for our spiritual and eternal good. For whether they be considered, 1st, As the chastisements of our heavenly Father, by being chastised for our faults we are amended: or, 2d, As trials of our grace; being thus exercised, it is proved to be genuine, and increased. See on chap. Rom 5:4. Or, 3d, As purifying fires, they tend to purge us from our corrupt passions and lusts, as gold and silver are purified from their dross in the fire; and to cause us, who are naturally earthly, sensual, and devilish, to die to the world and sin, and become heavenly, holy, and divine. They tend, therefore, through the grace of God, without which they can do nothing, to increase our holiness and conformity to our living Head; and whatever increases these, must increase our happiness here and hereafter, especially hereafter. To which may be added, that God will as assuredly reward us in a future state for our sufferings in this life, if patiently endured, as for our labours faithfully and perseveringly performed. Hence even Plato, a heathen, could say, “Whether a righteous man be in poverty, sickness, or any other calamity, we must conclude that it will turn to his advantage, either in life or death.”

Observe, reader: these things we, true believers in Christ and his gospel, know, — but on what ground? 1st, On the ground of the divine perfections, particularly God’s infinite wisdom, power, and love, which are all engaged for the good of his people. For as these dispensations do not happen to us by chance, but by the permission or appointment of Him who numbers the hairs of our head, and without whom a sparrow falleth not to the ground, his wisdom cannot but know what is best for us, his love must have our good in view; and what his wisdom sees will be for our good, and his love designs, his power permits or appoints to happen to us. 2d, On the ground of the relations in which he stands to us; not only as our Creator, Preserver, and Redeemer, but as our Friend, Father, and Husband, in Christ Jesus; all which relations lay a solid foundation for our expecting good, and only good at his hand, though sometimes afflictive good. 3d, On the ground of his faithful declarations and promises, particularly this by his inspired apostle. 4th, On that of the nature of things; the providential dispensations which are painful and distressing to us, being evidently calculated to mortify our inordinate attachment to things visible and temporal, to crucify our corrupt inclinations, and raise our thoughts and affections to another and a better state of existence. 5th, On the ground of observation and experience: we have seen trials, troubles, and afflictions of various kinds, to have a good effect upon others, and if we be the true disciples of Jesus, we have proved their salutary influence upon our own souls.

To them who are, οι κλητοι, the called according to his purpose — Or determination, of bestowing the title and privileges of sons on all, whether Jews or Gentiles, who turn to him in true repentance and faith, and obey him sincerely; or, as it is expressed Rom 8:29, are really conformed to the image of his Son; who indeed imitate the faith and obedience which the Son of God showed while he lived on the earth, as a man. This purpose, or determination, God made known to man in his covenant with Abraham. See on Rom 8:30. The words called and elect, or elected, frequently occur in the New Testament, and in some places one of them, as here and 1Pe 1:2, is put for them both. But in some passages they are distinguished the one from the other, as having different meanings; as where our Lord says, Many are called, but few chosen, or elected; and 2Pe 1:10, where that apostle exhorts us to make our calling and election sure. The meaning of both expressions is explained 2Th 2:13-14, where the Apostle Paul tells the believers at Thessalonica, that God, from the beginning, namely, of his preaching the gospel to them, had chosen them to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth, whereunto, adds he, he called you by our gospel. By which words we learn, 1st, That they had been called by the gospel, namely, accompanied by divine grace, to believe the truth, and receive the sanctification of the Spirit. 2d, That in consequence of their obeying this call, and thereby making their calling sure, βεβαιαν, firm, a glorious and blessed reality, they were chosen, or elected, namely, to be God’s people, or children; a chosen generation, and a peculiar people, 1Pe 2:9 : and now they had only to make their election sure, by being faithful unto death, in order to their obtaining the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. These, and only these, are the persons who truly love God, and therefore to whom all things work together for good. This is the sixth motive to holiness.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL NOTES

Rom_8:28. All things.—Without exception—all things visible and invisible, our troubles, even our sins.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Rom_8:28

Consoling knowledge.—St. Paul was keenly alive to suffering. He sympathised with a suffering creation. And yet, as he stands amid suffering and desolation, a divine joy lights his countenance. Confidence sustains his soul. Whence this joy and confidence? The answer is found in the text. Amid the pains and perplexities of life we must trust in the unfailing wisdom and goodness of God. We must keep alive the consoling knowledge “that all things,” etc.

I. What is man’s highest good?—What is the highest good, not for man as a physical being, as a mere resident of earth, but for man in the greatness of his nature, in the importance of his destiny? The highest good for man is to love God, to be conformed to the image of God’s Son, to be beloved of God. The degree of man’s perfection is the measure of his loving God. The highest good is not material, but spiritual; the highest good is being developed both in the time-life and in the eternal existence.

II. The dispensations of God promote the highest good.—Man must work longer and more carefully in erecting a structure which is to endure than in making one which is soon to be taken down. The highest good has reference to the future, and the work to be done in the present must have reference to that future. The mystery of death-bed repentances must be left; the greatest lives on earth have been trained in rough schools and have tasted long experiences. God will harmonise the short Christian life of the dying thief on earth and the rough, long pathway of an apostle. Most have many experiences in the Christian course. Crosses and losses are not unknown. But true to their work, and work only for our good, are the cross providences of God. The temple of the human soul is to be built up to a glorious perfection, and the builders are the trials, sufferings, and afflictions with which God’s children are visited. Winter’s storm as well as summer’s sunshine tempers the oak; the snow that means death to the unwary traveller fertilises the land; the hurricane that shatters the building scatters the noxious vapours; the ocean that entombs brave men and fair women sends its bracing ozone on to the land. Thus all things, fair and foul, smooth and rough, prosperous and adverse, joyous and painful, are working to the greater perfection of those that truly love God.

III. The twofold guarantee.—This is found in the words “to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.” Our love to God is the outcome of His love to us. The human love is responsive to the divine love. True love to God will bring to light the good that may be concealed by the repulsive drapery of adversity. True love from God will evoke good out of seeming evil. The love of God broods over a groaning universe, and will turn the groans into hymns of praise. And surely the love of God specially watches over the beloved. God’s love can pierce the prison wall, and give glad songs to the prisoners for the truth’s sake. God’s love can visit the chamber of suffering, and smooth the pillow for the aching head and give heaven’s light in nature’s darkness. Love called, and love obeyed. Love called the human soul to divine heights. Shall love, backed by wisdom and power, leave the beloved to be destroyed by the strokes of adversity? Shall unchangeable love call, and then forsake? The purpose of divine love is that the beloved walk in the realm of perfect love; and this purpose cannot fail. Heaven and earth may fail, but divine purpose must stand. This knowledge is consoling. This confidence is sweet. “We know,” and by the sustaining power of that knowledge Paul showed himself the world’s great hero. Not-knowledge may be the boasted creed of some. Paul’s knowledge has in it divine consolations. We know, and we walk calmly and peacefully through the unknowable. We know that all things are working together for our good, and we work joyfully towards the infinite good and repose on the infinite love.

Rom_8:28. The discipline of sufferings.—Sufferings are either the result of our own folly or such as could not have been foreseen by us.

Why does God allow latter to happen? These answers have been suggested: God ignores man’s affairs (Hinduism); God only cares for a few men (Eclecticism); God is not quite almighty (Dualism). None of these can be Christian’s answer. His answer is to be gathered from this passage.

Bible nowhere says that our comfort or our pleasure is God’s chief care; but it does teach that our good is. (Be careful not to confuse these things.) God wishes our happiness, our holiness—not comfort or pleasure.

The good of pain, privation, suffering, bereavement. They correct evil, prevent evil, develop character (merchant, soldier), produce sympathy, promote brotherliness, promote enterprise (severe climates have energetic people), prepare for eternity. Example: David is at his best amid adversities, at his worst amid comforts.

A reservation in the statement “to them that love God.” Notice: No sorrow leaves us where it found us; it drives us from God, or brings us nearer to Him. Examples: The remorse of Judas; the remorse of Peter.

Resolution: To look on every trouble as a test and turning-point.—Dr. Springett.

Rom_8:28. All things working for good.—St. Paul believes that there is a purpose, that there is an end, towards which events are tending. It looks at first sight like a faith rather than the conclusion of an argument. Reason alone might arrive at an opposite conclusion. How can we see a providential guidance, a divine plan of any kind, in the bloody game which chiefly makes up what we call history? How in those failures of great causes, in the enervation and degradation of civilised peoples, which make philosophers like Rousseau look back with fondness to the age of barbaric simplicity? It is true enough that the purpose of God in human history is traversed, that it is obscured, by causes to which the apostles of human despair may point very effectively; and yet here, as ever, we Christians dare to say that we walk by faith where sight fails us, as elsewhere, and we see enough to resist so depressing a conclusion as that before us—to know that the course of events is not thus fatal, thus desperate. We believe in a future; we believe that all moves forward, through whatever failures, through whatever entanglements, to a predestined end, and that each race, each generation, each particular class in each society, does its part, whether we can accurately estimate that part or not, towards promoting that end.

“All things work together for good.” For what kind of good? The glory of the Master and Ruler of all? No doubt they do. As nothing exists without His permission, so the very forces of evil itself will have, against their own bias and bent, to do His will and secure His triumph. He would not be God if it could be otherwise. But this is not what the apostle here says, nor does he go so far as to say that all things actually work together for the good of all human beings; for clearly our experience tells us that they do not. Who would say that his wealth was for the good of the debauchee, that his power is good for the selfish despot? It may be true enough that in the original design all things, all circumstances, were strictly designed to work together for the good of all; but man must be something else to what he generally is if he is in this sense to inherit all things, if nothing that happens is to harm him, if he is to find in all around him sources of blessedness and strength. “All things work … that love God.” Not God’s glory merely, but the good of those that love Him, is the object of His providence. Surely the child is not guilty of outrageous pride when it turns to its mother with an instinctive confidence that she will nourish and protect it; and it is the childlike that is one of the highest moral instincts in us, which leads us to believe that “like as a father … that we are but dust.” Our Lord was careful to assure His followers that in the world they would have tribulation, and to proclaim the blessedness that would attend temporal failures. What is the “good” of which the apostle speaks? It is real, absolute—it is eternal good. It is the good of the soul rather than the body, the good of the eternal world rather than the present world. Why is it that all things are said to “work … that love God”? Because such love, and it only, can transform all circumstances into blessings. No life is made up of such commonplaces that each cannot be made, by this love, to sparkle with the highest moral interest. No misfortunes are so great that they cannot be built into the steps of the staircase by which souls mount to heaven. The soul which loves the imperishable can never be doomed to a real disappointment. Social or political trouble may teach us unselfishness. Religious controversy or the advance of unbelief may teach us earnestness. Probably they touch some of us far less nearly than the joys and sorrows of our private lives.

Much may be done in an hour which will last for ever. “If a thousand years are as one day before the eternal God, so surely one day may be a very eternity to the soul of man. Spiritual revolutions within the soul, the deepest changes for good or for evil, have no appreciable relation to time. Intensity, not duration, is the measure of their importance.” God grant us to pray with all our hearts that, as He has prepared for them that love Him such good things as pass our understanding, so He will pour into our hearts such love towards Himself that we, loving Him above all things, may obtain His promises, which exceed all that we can desire, through Jesus Christ our Lord!—Canon Liddon.

SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON Rom_8:28

All things for the best.—The first point to be spoken of is the excellent privilege of God’s children, that all things shall work together for the best; both good and evil shall turn to their happiness. The reason stands thus: All things shall work together for the best to them that love God. Therefore all afflictions, crosses, and vexations whatsoever that betide such persons shall work together for their good; and for this cause all God’s servants must learn patiently to bear and cheerfully to undergo poverty or riches, honour or dishonour, in this world. The first sin of all, which hath gone over whole mankind and is spread abroad in every one of us, this by God’s mercy and our repentance proves to all believers a transcendent good, for the fall and sin of the first Adam caused the birth and death of the Second Adam, Christ Jesus, who, notwithstanding He was God, took upon Him the nature of man, and hath made us by His coming far more happy than if we had never fallen. Neither would God have suffered Adam to have fallen but for His own further glory in the manifestation of His justice and mercy and for the greater felicity of His servants in Christ their mediator. And it is good we should have something within us to make us weary of the world, else when we have run out our race we be unwilling to depart hence. Now our bondage to this natural corruption serves exceedingly to make us mourn for our sinful disposition and hunger after our God, to be joined with Him, as we see in St. Paul’s example (Rom_7:24), where, finding the rebellion of his nature and the strife that was in him, the flesh lusting against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh, he cries out, saying, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from this body of death?” and seeketh to God in Christ for mercy straight. For the evils of body, such as sickness and diseases of all sorts, which daily attend our houses of clay, God by means hereof acquaints His children with their frail condition, and shows them what a little time they have to provide for eternity, thereby driving them to search their evidences and to make all straight betwixt Him and them. Outward weaknesses are oft a means to restrain men from inward evils. God usually sanctifies the pains and griefs of His servants to make them better. The time of sickness is a time of purging from that defilement we gathered in our health. We should not be cast down so much for any bodily distemper as for sin that procures and envenoms the same. That is a good sickness which tends to the health of the soul. Now the causes why all things do work together for the best to them that love God are these—viz., It is God’s decree, manner of working, and blessed covenant. It is the foundation of the covenant of Christ Jesus. The second cause why all works together for the best to believers is the manner of God working in things, which is by contraries. He bringeth light out of darkness, glory out of shame, and life out of death. We fell by pride to hell and destruction, and must be restored by humiliation to life and salvation. Christ humbled Himself, being God, to become man for us, and by His death restored us to life. When our sins had brought us to greatest extremities, even then were we nearest to eternal happiness. There is nothing in the world that to God’s servants is absolutely evil, because nothing is so ill but some good may be raised out of it; not as it is an evil, but as it is governed and mastered by a supreme cause. Sin is of all evils the greatest, and yet sinful actions may produce gracious effects through God’s ordering and guiding the same. A child of God is truly happy in the midst of all misery.—Sibbes.

God’s sovereignty and man’s freewill declared.—The “calling” here and elsewhere spoken of by the apostle is the working in men of “the everlasting purpose of God, whereby (before the foundations of the world were laid) He hath constantly decreed by His counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those whom He hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to everlasting salvation” (Art. XVII. of the Church of England). To specify the various ways in which this calling has been understood would far exceed the limits of a general commentary. It may suffice to say that on the one hand Scripture bears constant testimony to the fact that all believers are chosen and called by God, their whole spiritual life in its origin, progress, and completion being from Him; while on the other hand its testimony is no less precise that He willeth all to be saved, and that none shall perish except by wilful rejection of the truth. So that on the one side God’s sovereignty, on the other man’s freewill, is plainly declared to us. To receive, believe, and act on both these is our duty and our wisdom. They belong, as truths, no less to natural than to revealed religion, and every one who believes in a God must acknowledge both. But all attempts to bridge over the gulf between the two are futile in the present imperfect condition of man. The very reasonings used for this purpose are clothed in language framed on the analogies of this lower world, and wholly inadequate to describe God regarded as He is in Himself. Hence arise confusion, misapprehension of God, and unbelief. I have therefore simply, in this commentary, endeavoured to enter into the full meaning of the sacred text whenever one or other of these great truths is brought forward, not explaining either of them away on account of possible difficulties arising from the recognition of the other, but recognising as fully the elective and predestinating decree of God where it is treated of, as I have done in other places the freewill of man. If there be an inconsistency in this course, it is at least one in which the nature of things, the conditions of human thought, and Scripture itself, participate, and from which no commentator that I have seen, however anxious to avoid it by extreme views one way or the other, has been able to escape.—Alford.

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 8

Rom_8:28. Blessings in disguise.—In every burden of sorrow there is a blessing sent from God which we ought not to thrust away. In one of the battles of the Crimea a cannon-ball struck inside a fort, gashing the earth, and sadly marring the garden beauty of the place. But from the ugly chasm there burst forth a spring of water, which flowed on thereafter a living fountain. So the strokes of sorrow gash our hearts, leaving ofttimes wounds and scars, but they open for us fountains of rich blessing and of new life. Our pain and sorrow, endured with sweet trust and submission, leave us with life purified and enriched, and more of Christ in us. In every burden that God lays upon us there is always a blessing for us, if only we will take it.

“Then Sorrow whispered gently: Take

This burden up. Be not afraid;

An hour is short. Thou scarce wilt wake

To consciousness that I have laid

My hand upon thee, when the hour

Shall all have passed; and gladder then

For the brief pain’s uplifting power,

Thou shalt but pity griefless men.”

Rom_8:28. The happiness of suffering.—Dr. Richard Rothe, the eminent German theologian, once said, “There are people who, after experiencing in their youth the happiness of joy, come in their old age to enjoy the happiness of suffering.” To superficial thinkers this remark may seem perplexing. But sufficient study of it will reveal a profound meaning in it. Certainly to the Christian there is a happiness which is the outgrowth of suffering as of nothing else, and it is a very real and precious sort of happiness.—N. F. Boakes.

Rom_8:28. Persuasions and persuasion.—There are many “persuasions” amongst men—there is but one that is of value in the sight of God. A “persuasion” amongst men, when the word is used in a religious sense, means, What denomination in the Church do you belong to?—are you a Baptist, or a Congregationalist, or a Churchman? And a man may belong to any of these, or of the many other denominations or persuasions, and yet not be connected with the great and the right persuasion after all. In terrible agony a soldier lay dying in one of the American hospitals. A visitor asked him, “What Church are you of?” “Of the Church of Christ,” he replied. “I mean, of what persuasion are you?” “Persuasion?” said the dying man, as his eyes looked heavenward, beaming with love to the Saviour; “I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate me from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Church membership may exist without Christ membership: the first may be without any life or peace; in the latter there are both.

Rom_8:28. The great dome of God’s providence.—In the baptistery of the cathedral at Pisa is a wonderful dome. Spacious, symmetrical, composed of the choicest marble, it is a delight to stand beneath and gaze upon its beauties. Thus I stood one sunny April day, when suddenly the air became instinct with melody. The great dome seemed full of harmony. The waves of music vibrated to and fro, loudly beating against the walls, swelling into full chords like the roll of a grand organ, and then dying away into soft, long-drawn, far-receding echoes, melting in the distance into silence. It was only my guide, who, lingering behind me a moment, had softly murmured a triple chord. But beneath that magic roof every sound resolved into a symphony. No discord can reach the summit of that dome and live. Every noise made in the building—the slamming of the seats, the tramping of feet, all the murmur and bustle of the crowd—is caught up, softened, harmonised, blended, and echoed back in music. So it seems to me that over our life hangs the great dome of God’s providence. Standing as we do beneath it, no act in the divine administration towards us, no affliction, no grief, no loss which our heavenly Father sends, however hard to bear it may be, but will come back at last softened and blended into harmony, with the overarching dome of His wisdom, mercy, and power, till to our corrected sense it shall be the sweetest music of heaven.—J. D. Steele.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

The assurance of God’s eternal decree:

v. 28. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.

v. 29. For whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the First-born among many brethren.

v. 30. Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them He also called; and whom he called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified.

In his chain of arguments for the comfort and consolation of the Christians, Paul now adds another link: Further, we know. It is a matter of the certainty of faith that to them that love God, in whom their faith has brought forth this fruit of loving trust in God, all things, also the sufferings of this present time, work together, are of assistance, serve for good, for the best, and therefore also for the glory which Paul has in mind in the entire section. In accordance with the purpose of God everything, also affliction and suffering, must result in a good and salutary way for them that love God, or, as they are further described, that are called in accordance with a purpose, in whom the call of God unto salvation has been effective, who have really been brought to accept the blessings to which God invites all men in the Gospel. By the call of God they have been placed in the fellowship of Jesus Christ, 1Co 1:9; they have been called out of darkness into His marvelous light, 1Pe 2:9. It was not a matter of their own doing, whose insufficiency might afterwards cause doubts to arise in their minds as concerning the certainty of their salvation, but it is the effectual call of the faithful God, 1Co 1:9. With regard to those that do not heed the invitation and call of God in the Gospel nothing is said in this passage. The present and future state of such people is not due to any decree of God. With regard to the unbelievers the Bible merely states that God extends the invitation and call of the Gospel to them also, that He has overlooked and omitted nothing in their behalf, but that they on their part willfully hindered the effect of the Word, consistently and deliberately resisted the Holy Ghost in His efforts at converting them, that they would not listen to His appeal, and therefore have only themselves to blame for their final perdition The fault of any man’s damnation in no way lies in God, but altogether and alone in man. But in our passage the apostle discusses only those that have been regenerated by the call of God, and in the number of these he includes himself and his readers quite generally, without any invidious distinctions.

Of them that are thus called according to the purpose of God, the statement is now made: Whom, however, He did foreknow, them He also called. The calling of God is the result of His previous foreknowledge: He knew them beforehand as His own, it was an eternal foreknowledge coupled with effective love; He fixed His mind upon them in grace, He selected them in advance as such whom He would, in time, make His own. And in accordance with this foreknowledge the call of God was issued to them and was effective in them when they heard the Word of the Gospel. But before this took place, there was a second act on the part of God: For whom He foreknew He also foreordained, determined, decreed, to be conformed to the image of His Son, that they should, in appearance and acts, be like His Son, in order that He might be the First-born among many brethren. Because of and in His foreknowledge, because of His eternal selection by grace, God also foreordained, or predestinated, the selected ones to the divine sonship, with its fullness of heavenly glory, Christ being the first-born and the only-begotten Son and Heir of God, but all the many adopted children partaking of the same bliss in richest measure with Him. Thus the purpose and decree of God with reference to those in whom His call is effective, includes both foreknowledge and foreordination, and has for its object the presenting of heavenly glory in Christ.

And now the actual carrying out of this decree and purpose as it was made and formed in eternity is described: Whom He foreordained, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, them He also glorified. The foreordination of God was put into execution in those whom He had selected for His own, in mercy. His gracious call, in their case, was effectual; it kindled faith in Jesus Christ and His redemption. And thus the call, or conversion, resulted in their justification, the righteousness of Christ being given to them, God declaring them to be righteous for the sake of Jesus Christ, whom they had received by faith. And thus the justification, in turn, brings on, and merges with, the glorification. The full revelation of the glory is still in the future, but its possession is secure even now, only its enjoyment being a matter of hope. Thus the decree of God and its execution are pictured by the apostle in their sequence according to the gracious band of God upon the believers. He has brought out in a splendid manner the certainty of the future redemption and glory as based upon the eternal counsel and decree of God.

The Election of Grace

The passage from 8:28-30 is one of the proof-texts of the doctrine of the election of grace, a truth plainly taught in Holy Scriptures. And here it should be noted, first of all, that the apostle treats of this doctrine only after he has given a full exposition of the fundamental articles of Christian doctrine, of sin and grace, of justification and sanctification. He addresses himself specifically to the regenerated, justified, sanctified children of God, directing their attention to the wonderful counsel of God to their sanctification. To make the doctrine of predestination the fundamental principle and source of all Christian doctrines is not in accordance with Scriptures. The doctrine of the election of grace is a fountain of rich comfort for believing Christians, for them that walk in the Spirit and longingly await the future glory, and it therefore can be understood and properly appreciated by these only. It should also be noted that the apostle speaks only of an election of grace, unto eternal life, and nowhere teaches an election to damnation. To conclude from the fact that certain people are foreordained by God unto eternal salvation that the others are destined to eternal damnation is to confuse Law and Gospel and to upset Christianity. The election of grace has for its object each and every person of the elect; it concerns the children of God only that are chosen and elected unto eternal life. For these persons are the children of God, those that love God, the Christians. In the epistles of the New Testament the expressions "called," "sanctified," "beloved," and "elect" are used altogether promiscuously. And in the Lutheran Confessions the titles "elect," "Christians," and "children of God" are used as synonyms. Whenever Scripture, therefore, speaks of the elect, of those whom God has foreknown and foreordained, we should think of believing Christians and be sure to include ourselves in the number of the elect. It is true, incidentally, that only those are truly elect, remain in faith unto the end, and are finally glorified. But Scripture consistently speaks of, and describes, the Christians as persons whose characteristic is faith, and who receive the end of faith, the salvation of their souls. Therefore Luther defines the holy Christian Church, or the communion of saints, as the sum total of those whom the Holy Ghost calls, gathers, enlightens, sanctifies, and keeps with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. Now experience teaches that many who once were believers sooner or later lose their faith. And the Bible earnestly warns against backsliding and speaks of such as are believers for a time only. But all this does not belong to the doctrine of the election of grace; for this concerns only such people as believe and are saved. The eternal election, or predestination, since it concerns only certain persons, for that very reason differs from the counsel of redemption, from the express teaching of universal grace, which concerns all men. The eternal election of grace means that God has chosen each and every person of the elect, those that are now Christians and love God, and therefore us also, before the foundation of the world, unto Himself, for His own, and destined them for eternal glory; this decree being carried out in time, when God called these people and transmitted to them the full blessing of justification through the merits of Jesus. And this purpose of God will surely be carried out. Thus the election of God is the cause not only of our salvation, but also of our being called, converted, justified. Faith is the result of the election of God, and gives the believer the guarantee that he belongs to the elect and will finally obtain eternal glory. And therefore the doctrine of the election of grace, as it is taught in the passage above and in other passages, Eph 1:3 ff. ; 2Th 2:13 ff. ; 2Ti 1:9; 1Pe 1:1-2, is full of comfort for the Christians. If ever any doubt as to our salvation wants to rise in our hearts, then we should remember and cling to the knowledge that God from eternity has taken the matter of our salvation and all that pertains to it into His merciful and powerful hand. In the midst of all crosses and trials, when it would seem that God has abandoned us entirely, we should rest our faith upon His Word, which tells us that all the tribulations of this present time are but incidents along the way to heaven, and can in no way compare with the glory which shall be revealed in us on the day of our final redemption. If we thus adhere strictly to the argumentation of Scriptures and apply the comfort of Scriptures to our hearts, then our thoughts will not revert to others, then we shall not yield to the temptation of speculating about this doctrine in its so-called reasonable conclusions, and will thus be spared the dangers into which such speculations lead. If we thus hold fast the truth that the election of grace is not an absolute election, that it was not an arbitrary act of God’s sovereign pleasure, but flows from the eternal counsel of love, that it is based alone upon His grace and mercy, and that its object is to keep us safe in His Word and faith unto our end, then all thoughts of doubt will be removed from our hearts, and our faith will be most firmly established.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Subdivision 5. (Rom 8:28-39.)

The weak with the Strong.

The apostle concludes here with the assurance of the result for us of being thus with God, the weak with the strong. His purpose is being carried out in us and with us, and who shall gainsay it? Thus with the boldness which is simply that of faith, he can challenge everything, the whole universe, to disappoint this purpose.

1. The purpose itself is put clearly before us. Christ is of necessity in the forefront of it, and thus its justification, and the full assurance that it will be carried out. "We know that to those who love God all things work together for good, to those who are the called according to purpose." The present is linked with the future in a most absolute way. From God’s foreknowledge of us in the past eternity to the accomplished glory of the future, there is a perfectly linked chain of blessing, no link of which can ever be sundered. God’s purpose is that Christ His Son, should be a First-born among many brethren. How blessed to see the grace which is necessarily manifested when Christ is thus in the forefront! It is not here, therefore, the "Only-Begotten," of whom the apostle speaks. The Son is that; but He is here in human guise, a "Firstborn," which implies others, and that is clearly expressed. He is found thus with those whom He is not ashamed to call His brethren. God’s purpose, therefore, includes, of necessity, these. If it failed as to the brethren, it would fail as to the Son of His love. They are bound up together in His thoughts.

We have, therefore, strong words here, words that are often somewhat too strong for the faith of His people. "Whom He foreknew, He also fore-ordained to be conformed to the image of His Son." If Christ is, on the one hand, the image of God Himself, (and He alone can be that in the reality of all that is implied,) yet we are to be conformed to His image. That is God’s purpose as to us. He could not surely be without a purpose, and having the purpose, He could not be without the power of carrying this through. What comfort would there be for us in the midst of such a world as this, if it were not so? if God had not a purpose, or if He had one which could be set aside by man’s self-will? How blessed, when we know Himself, when we realize that His will is but the expression of His perfect nature, how blessed then to see His will in all its sovereignty! We may be sure, too, that He will respect all the powers with which He has endued His creatures. He will do violence to nothing, but while this is surely so, He will carry out in the most absolute way every part of His purpose. This is definitely asserted here. "Whom He foreordained, these He also called; whom He called, He justified; whom He justified, He glorified." It is remarkable here that there is one thing left out which we should expect perhaps to have a foremost place. After justification, we are accustomed to say, comes sanctification, but where is sanctification here? We are indeed to be conformed to the image of His Son, and that, one may say, implies it fully; but in the chain of blessing which we are looking at now, sanctification seems, surely purposely, to be omitted; for it is just here that, alas, we perplex ourselves with all sorts of questions. We make of a condition, a doubt; and the legality natural to us will seek to intrude at any possible point; but between justification and glory here, there is absolutely no room left for it to come in.

Notice that we begin with fore-knowledge. None surely can deny this to Him. He could not create, plainly, not knowing the future of what He was creating. If He foreknew, then He could not possibly be without a will with regard to the future of that which He had created. Fore-ordination follows, therefore, foreknowledge. He will have things to be according to His own mind. From this, our calling follows, which is here, of course, not the general call of the gospel, not a call that can be refused at all, but on the other hand, the creative call, as God says by the prophet: "I call them, they stand up together"; and, as we see here, those who are called are justified. No one drops out. Justification follows the call. Identified as it is, and as we have seen, with the life which follows this, if one is called in this way to spiritual life, justification can never be apart front this. We are justified from the first moment, with the first breath that we draw of true life from God. Then notice that "glorified" seems to be put in the past, just as much as "justified." It is the style of the prophets, -everything contemplated from God’s side, and, therefore, although in fact to be accomplished, yet seen as if it were already so. If God calls that which is not as if it were, its existence is by that absolutely pledged. This then is the purpose, and already He has said that, "All things work together for good," let us remember, according to that purpose. If we have anything else before our eyes, it is no wonder that we question very much how things are working for good to us. If we fail to keep in mind that which is present to God, we fail to understand what He is doing; for the fulfilment of His purpose, not one thing necessary can possibly be absent.

2. Naturally, if this be so, the challenge with which the apostle closes is yet, after all, simple: "What shall we say then to these things? If God be for us, who shall be against us?" What He has already done is the assurance that He will leave nothing undone. He has not spared His Son but delivered Him up for us all. God’s holiness has been fully satisfied and God’s love has not shrunk from that which is needed to give it satisfaction. If He has not spared His Son, "how shall He not also with Him freely give us all things?" A limitless blessing there, but what else could rightly measure the love which has given His Son? Then, what can be against this? "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?" As we see in the prophet, if Satan stands at the right hand of Joshua, clothed in filthy garments, his sins upon him, to resist him, the word which settles all is, God has chosen to pluck a brand out of the burning. Certainly it is a brand. Certainly it was just the thing for burning. If God chooses to pluck it out, who shall say Him nay? How completely our sinful condition is passed over in this, or rather, it is made the means only the more of glorifying the grace which comes in for us! If, then, God has His chosen ones, who shall lay anything to their charge? It is God Himself who justifies. Who, then, shall condemn? That is the proper connection of these expressions. God is the only One who has title, in fact, to justify. He will do it, of course, according to absolute righteousness, nay, as this epistle has shown us, His very righteousness is displayed in doing it, and in heaven those that are in Christ will thus be made "the righteousness of God in Him." But just on this very account, the thing is sure. "Who shall condemn when God is He who justifies?" Then "it is Christ who died, yea, rather, who was raised up and who is at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession (in the place of power) for us." Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? The question speaks for itself. Put as a question, it is put in the strongest form. It is a challenge, as already said, that whoever or whatever can do this be produced. Yet there are many things that seem against us. So then, "tribulation or anguish or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword?" can these? Nay, that was written and true of God’s saints of old; of them it was written: "For Thy sake we are put to death all the day long, we have been counted as sheep for slaughter." Can we separate these suffering ones from Him for whose sake they suffer? Nay, in all these things we more than conquer through Him who loved us. "Conquer" by itself is too little to express it. We more than conquer; conquer in result, conquer in the endurance of the very sufferings which cannot prevail unless to bless and brighten us. Christ, though He may seem absent, is superintending it all in a love which mixes the whole cup for us, and every ingredient is blessing.

"For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature:" -all these things are creatures. A promiscuous looking assemblage it may be, but he wants to sum up everything that could possibly be thought of. Nothing, then, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which in Christ Jesus our Lord has found a perfect title for its expression, and which in Him, as we look at Him, has found already perfect expression. Christ Jesus, our Lord, the Man Christ Jesus, already shows us God with man in the fullest possible and absolutely unchangeable blessing.

F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 8:28. Οἴδαμεν δὲ, Moreover we know) An antithesis to, we know not, Rom 8:26.—τοῖς ἀγαπῶσι, to them that love) The subject is here described from the fruit of those things, which have been hitherto mentioned,—namely, love to God; and this love also makes believers [by a happy art] dexterously to take in good part all things which God sends upon them, and perseveringly to overcome all difficulties and temptations, [Jas 1:12. Paul is an example, 2Co 1:3-11.—V. g.] Presently after, in the case of the called, the reason is given, why a predicate so excellent is attributed to this subject [why such blessed things are predicated of them who love God].—πάντα συνεργεῖ) all things work together, by means of groanings, and in other ways. So 1Ma 12:1, ὁ καιρὸς αὐτῷ συνεργεῖ, time works with (serves) him.—εἰς ἀγαθὸν, for good) even as far as to [up to] their glorification, Rom 8:30, at the end.—τοῖς κατὰ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς οὖσιν, to those who are the called according to His purpose) This is a new proposition in reference to what follows. The apostle designs to give a recapitulation of all the advantages involved in justification and glorification, Rom 8:30, and accordingly returns now first of all to its deepest [most remote] roots, which only can be known from these their sweetest fruits themselves:[98] he at the same time hereby prepares us for the ninth chapter [which treats chiefly of God’s election and calling]: πρόθεσις is the purpose, which God determined to carry into effect concerning the salvation of His own people. κλητοῖς, the called, is a noun, not a participle; inasmuch as οὖσιν is added [which it would not be, if κλητοῖς were a participial adjective], who are the called:—the purpose is unfolded, Rom 8:29, the called, Rom 8:30.

[98] i.e. the root, God’s calling and everlasting election, is known from the blessed fruits (all things working for their good) which it bears to the called.—ED.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom_8:28. Third ground of encouragement; comp. on Rom_8:26.

οἴδαμεν δέ] It is known to us, however (as in Rom_8:22). This δέ is not: on the other hand, however, in contradistinction to the sighing discussed since Rom_8:22, as Hofmann thinksa reference, that must have been marked in some way or other (at least by the stronger adversative ἀλλά). It is the usual μεταβατικόν, and carries us from the special relation discussed in Rom_8:26 f. over to a general one, the consciousness of which must finally place the good courage of the believer on a footing all the more sure.

τοῖς ἀγαπ. τ. Θεόν] the dative of communion. Paul characterizes as lovers of God (κατʼ ἐξοχ.) the true Christians (comp. 1Co_2:9; 1Co_3:8; Eph_6:24; Jam_1:12), as is plain from τοῖς κατὰ κ.τ.λ.

πάντα] everything, i.e., according to the context, all destined events, even those full of pain not excepted (Rom_8:35). On the thought, comp. Plat. Rep. p. 613 A.

συνεργεῖ] works along with, that is, contributes; βοηθεῖ, Hesychius. See Wetstein. The συν does not refer to the common working together of the elements contained in πάντα (comp. Rom_8:22), but to the idea of the fellowship in which he who supports necessarily stands to him who is supported. Comp. on Rom_8:26.

εἰς ἀγαθόν] indefinitely: for good; it works beneficially. Comp. Theogn. 161; Hom. Il. x. 102; Plat. Rep. l.c.; Sir_39:27; Rom_13:4. Reiche erroneously takes it as: the good of the Christians, their eternal welfare. In that case, the article at least must have been used as in Rom_14:16; and some witnesses in reality add it. Bengel has the right view: in bonum, ad glorificationem usque (Rom_8:30).

τοῖς κατὰ πρόθ. κλητοῖς οὖσιν] These words may mean either (οὖσιν as predicate, joining on): since they are the called according to His purpose (so Hofmann), or (taking τοῖς in conjunction with οὖσιν), as to those who (quippe qui, i.e. since they indeed) are the called according to His purpose. So usually; and this latter is the true rendering, because otherwise οὖσιν would be put not only quite superfluously, but also in a way very liable to misconception, since it would occur to every reader, at the first glance, to join τοῖς with οὖσιν. Had Paul meant what Hofmann thinks he did, he would have written simply τοῖς κ. π. κλητοῖς without οὗσιν, or possibly οἵτινές εἰσιν οἱ κ. π. κλητοί.

Respecting the idea itself, there is causally involved in the relation of being the called according to His purpose (for the emphasis rests on κλητοῖς), the certainty that to them all things, etc.; for otherwise that high distinction, which God has conferred upon them according to the purpose of His grace, would be vain and fruitless, which is impossible (Rom_8:30). The πρόθεσις here meant is the free decree formed by God in eternity for imparting bliss to believers through Christ (Rom_9:11; Eph_1:11; Eph_3:11; 2Ti_1:9; Eph_1:9). In accordance with that decree, the call of God to the Messianic salvation through the preaching of the gospel (Rom_10:14; 2Th_2:14) has gone forth to those comprehended in that decree. Therefore, when Paul terms the Christians κλητοί, it is self-evident that in their case the call has met with success (1Co_1:24), consequently has been combined with the converting operation of the divine grace,without the latter, however, being found in the word itself, or the word being made equivalent to ἐκλεκτοί. Comp. Lamping, Pauli de praedest. decreta, Leovard. 1858, p. 40 f. Christians are at the same time κλητοί, ἐκλεκτοί (Rom_9:11), ἅγιοι κ.τ.λ.; but the significations of these predicates correspond to different characteristic qualities of the Christian state. Consequently, just as it was quite a mistaken view to interpret πρόθεσις of the personal self-determination of the subjects (Chrysostom, Theodoret, and others), so also it was an unbiblical and hazardous distinction (see against this, Calovius) to put the called κατὰ πρόθεσιν in contrast with those who are called μὴ κατὰ πρόθ. (Augustine, Estius, Reithmayr, and others). Weiss aptly observes, in the Jahrb. f. Deutsche Theol. 1857, p. 79: Election and calling are inseparable correlative ideas; where the one takes place, there the other takes place also; only we cannot take cognizance of the former as an act before all time and within the divine mind, while the latter becomes apparent as a historical fact. Comp. also his bibl. Theol. p. 386 f.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 8:28-39 . Conclusion of the argument: the Apostle glories in the assurance of God’s eternal and unchangeable love in Jesus Christ.

οἴδαμεν δὲ = further, we know: in a sense this is one ground more for believing in the glorious future: God is ever with us, and will not abandon us at last. πάντα συνεργεῖ ( ὁ θεός ): συνεργεῖ is naturally neuter, and if ὁ θεός is the true reading, it is probably best to render “God co-operates for good in all things ( πάντα accus. of ref as in 1Co 9:25 ; 1Co 10:33 ) with those,” etc. τοῖς ἀγαπ . τὸν θεὸν describes the persons in question from the human side; τοῖς κατὰ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς οὖσιν describes them from the Divine side. It is in pursuance of a purpose of God (for πρόθεσις with reference to the eternal purpose of redemption, see Rom 9:11 , Eph 1:11 ; Eph 3:11 , 2Ti 1:9 ) that they are called. “Calling” in Paul never means “invitation”; it is always “effectual calling”.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

28. The thought passes from man’s striving in prayer with the help of the Spirit, to GOD’S constant activity for man, to promote that good, which is the object, even when unexpressed or inexpressible, of the children’s prayer.

οἴδαμεν, of an acknowledged fact of experience or conviction.

τοῖς ἀγαπῶσι τ. θ. The true temper of childhood, answering to and counting on the ἀγάπη of the Father; cf. Rom 8:35; Rom 8:39. The fundamental attitude on both sides now comes to the front. The dat. = for: see next note.

πάντα συνεργεῖ. συν. is intr. (Mark 16 [20]; 1Co 16:16; 2Co 6:1; Jas 2:22) = helps, so Herm. Sim. v. 6. 6; πάντα is the ‘inner accusative’ = helps in all ways, gives all needed help; cf. Blass, p. 90; cf. Polyb. XI. 9. 1, πολλὰ συνεργεῖν τὴν ἁρμογὴν τῶν ὄπλων εἰς τὴν χρείαν. S. H. qu. Test. xii. Patr. Issach. 3; Gad 4 where συν. = ‘help’ simply. Chrys. and Theodorus seem to make it tr., taking GOD for subject and referring πάντα to apparently adverse circumstances. Origen takes πάντα for subj. but makes it refer to GOD’S action described in Rom 8:29 f., Philocal. (Robinson) p. 229.

[ὁ θεὸς.] Whether we read this or not, we should supply it as subj. to συν. The whole point of Rom 8:28-30 is that GOD gives active help, etc. To make πάντα subj. introduces a quite alien thought, unless with Origen it is strictly referred to Rom 8:29 f.

εἰς ἀγαθόν, tr. for their good.

τοῖς κατὀ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς οὖσιν. πρόθεσις = purpose, of man (Act 11:23; Act 27:13; 2Ti 3:10), of GOD (Rom 9:11; Eph 1:11; Eph 3:11; 2Ti 1:9), describes the whole purpose of GOD for man, which results in the call. It is shown in its elements or stages in Rom 8:29-30. The call falls into the lines of the purpose and is conditioned by it alone. Cf. v[167] of Man 1:13, of GOD Eph 1:10 (alibi supra Rom 3:25).

[167] vb verb

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

On predestination as taught Rom 8:28-30.

Wherein consists the divine predestination undoubtedly taught by the apostle in this passage? Does it in his view exclude the free will of man, or, on the contrary, does it imply it? Two reasons seem to us to decide the question in favor of the second alternative:—1. The act of foreknowing, which the apostle makes the basis of predestination, proves that the latter is determined by some fact or other, the object of this knowledge. It matters little that the knowledge is eternal, while the fact, which is its object, comes to pass only in time. It follows all the same from this relation, that the fact must be considered as due in some way to a factor distinct from divine causation, which can be nothing else than human liberty. 2. The apostle avoids making the act of believing the object of the decree of predestination. In the act of predestination faith is already assumed, and its sole object is, according to the apostle’s words, the final participation of believers in the glory of Christ. Not only then does Paul’s view imply that in the act of believing full human liberty is not excluded, but it is even implied. For it alone explains the distinction which he clearly establishes between the two divine acts of foreknowledge and predestination, both as to their nature (the one, an act of the understanding; the other, of the will) and as to their object (in the one case, faith; in the other, glory).

Human liberty in the acceptance of salvation being therefore admitted, in what will predestination, as understood by St. Paul, consist? It contains, we think, the three following elements:

1. The decree (προορισμός) whereby God has determined to bring to the perfect likeness of His Son every one who shall believe. What more in keeping with His grace and wisdom than such a decree: “Thou dost adhere by faith to Him whom I give thee as thy Saviour; He will therefore belong to thee wholly, and I shall not leave thee till I have rendered thee perfectly like Him, the God-man”?

2. The prevision (πρόγνωσις), in consequence of the divine foreknowledge, of all the individuals who shall freely adhere to the divine invitation to participate in this salvation. What more necessary than this second element? Would not God’s plan run the risk of coming to nought if He did not foresee both the perfect fidelity of the Elect One on whom its realization rests, and the faith of those who shall believe in Him? Without a Saviour and believers there would be no salvation. God’s plan therefore assumes the assured foreknowledge of both.

3. The arrangement of all the laws and all the circumstances of history with a view to realizing the glorious plan conceived in favor of those foreknown. It is this arrangement which St. Paul describes in Rom 8:28, when he says that “all things must work together for good to them who are the called according to the eternal purpose.” What more magnificent! Once believers, we may be tossed on the tempests of this present time; not only do we know that no wave can engulf us, but we are assured that every one of them has its place in the divine plan, and must hasten our course.

Thus we have three points: 1. The end indicated by the decree; 2. The personally known individuals who are to reach it; 3. The way by which they are to be led to it.

If any one does not find this predestination sufficient, he may make one to his taste; but, according to our conviction, it will not be that of the apostle.

Vv. 28. “But we know that all things work together, for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to the design formed beforehand.”

We have shown how mistaken those expositors are who take the δέ as a simple particle of transition: then, and say: third or fourth ground of encouragement. The δέ is adversative: but. With this universal groaning which he has just described, and the source of which is in the sufferings of the present time, the apostle contrasts the full certainty already possessed by believers of the glorious goal marked out beforehand by the plan of God. This result, which they await with assurance, is the luminous point on which their eye is already fixed, and the brilliance of which is reflected on the obscurities of the way which they have yet to traverse: “We groan no doubt; we know not how to pray..., but we know”...The regimen: to them that love God, is placed at the beginning, as expressing the condition under which the prerogative about to be enunciated is realized in man. This characteristic of love to God is associated with the attribute of saints which he ascribed to believers, Rom 8:27, and more particularly with the cry: Abba, Father, the expression of their filial feeling, Rom 8:15. Those who belong to this class will never fail to be strengthened, and even to gain progress, by everything which can happen them; for in this normal path obstacles even become means of help. The end of the verse will explain why.

The term πάντα, all things, includes all that comes on us, especially everything painful in consequence of the miseries of the present time and of the sins of our neighbors. But it would be wrong to embrace under it what we may do ourselves in opposition to God’s will, since that would contradict the idea: them that love God.

The σύν, with, in the verb συνεργεῖν, to work together with, has been variously explained. According to some, it means that all things work in concert (comp. the σύν, Rom 8:22); according to others, All things work in common with God under His direction. Others, finally: All things work in common with the believer who is their object, and who himself aspires after the good. This last sense, which is well developed by Philippi, is undoubtedly the most natural. The Alex. and the Vatic. have added ὁ Θεός, God, as the subject of the verb. In that case we must give to συνεργεῖν a causative sense: “God makes all things work together.” But this meaning is foreign to the N. T., and probably to classic Greek; Passow does not quote a single example of it.

The regimen: εἱς ἀγαθόν, for good, has a more precise meaning in the apostle’s language than that usually given to it. It means not only any good result whatever in which everything issues for the believer, but that constant progress to the final goal to which the plan of God leads us, and which constitutes our real destination. Everything is fitted to hasten our progress in this direction, when the heart has once been subjected to God. The last words of the verse give the reason. Those who have come to take God as the object of their life and activity, and to live for Him like Jesus Himself (Rom 6:10), are exactly those in whose favor God has formed the universal plan. All therefore which happens according to this plan must turn out in their favor. Two reasons explain the co-operation of all things for the believer’s good: a subjective reason—he has entered into the true current (loving God); and an objective reason—all things are ordered in his favor in the plan of God; this is indicated by the second regimen.

The notion of the divine plan is expressed by the term πρόθεσις, the design fixed beforehand. Paul often uses this expression in a more or less extended sense; thus, 2Ti 1:9, he applies it specially to salvation by grace without works; Eph 1:11, this term is applied to the election of the people of Israel; Rom 3:24, the design of God has for its object Christ’s expiatory sacrifice. The classic passages, as they may be called, where this term is taken in its most general signification, are found in the Epistle to the Ephesians: Eph 1:3-10 and Eph 3:11. We see here that the design of God is eternal (before the ages), for it rests on Christ (in Jesus Christ), and that is was conceived freely, solely on account of the divine love (the decree of His will, according to His good pleasure).

In this plan of salvation there were comprehended at the same time the individuals in whom it was to be realized; hence they are designated here as the called according to His purpose. The call is the invitation addiessed by God to man, when by the preaching of His gospel He offers him salvation in Christ. This call by the Word is always accompanied with an inward operation of the Spirit which tends to render the preaching effectual. Those theologians who hold absolute predestination have no deubt denied the generality of this internal operation of grace; they have alleged that it does not accompany the outward call except in the case of the elect. Some have even gone the length of distinguishing between a serious and consequently effectual calling, and a non-serious and consequently ineffectual calling. But it will be asked, What could God have in view with a non-serious call, that is to say, one which He did not Himself seek to render effectual? It has been answered, that its object was to render those to whom it was addressed inexcusable. But if God Himself refuses to give the grace necessary for its acceptance, how is he who refuses thereby rendered more inexcusable? It must then be held that when the apostle in his Epistle speaks of the divine call, he always embraces under the term the two notions of an outward call by the Word and an inward call by grace, and that the apostle’s expression: the called according to His purpose, is not at all intended to distinguish two classes of called persons, those who are so according to His purpose, and those who are not. All are alike seriously called. Only it happens that some consent to yield to the call and others refuse. This distinction is indicated by Jesus in the saying: “Many are called, but few are chosen,” Mat 20:16. The chosen in this passage are those who accept the call, and who are thereby rescued from the midst of this perishing world; the called are those who, not accepting the call, remain called and nothing more, and that to their condemnation. In the Epistles, the apostles, addressing Christians, do not require to make this distinction, since the individuals whom they address are assumed to have accepted the call, from the very fact that they have voluntarily entered the church. The case is like that of a man who should say to his guests when assembled in his house: “Use everything that is here, for you are my invited guests.” It is obvious that by expressing himself thus, he would not be distinguishing invitation from acceptance, the latter being implied in the very fact of their presence; comp. 1Co 1:23-24. What the apostle means to say then is this: There is something prior to the present sufferings of believers; that is the eternal purpose in virtue of which their calling took place. It is not possible therefore but that all things should turn to their good.

The relation between the two clauses: them that love God, and them that are the called according to His purpose, reminds us of John’s words: “We love Him because He first loved us” (1Jn 4:19).

The participle τοῖς οὖσι, who are, strongly expresses the present reality of this condition described by the word called, in opposition to the ideal nature of the decree, previously to its realization in time.

The Greek Fathers, Pelagius and others, in their desire to escape from the idea of an absolute predestination, applied the act indicated by the word πρόθεσις, purpose, to man, and understood thereby his good will to believe, as in Act 11:23. But in the context it is the divine side of salvation only which is meant to be emphasized, as it is the only side which is expounded in the two following verses. The ground of the calling could not really be the believer’s disposition to accept it.

The idea of God’s purpose is developed in the two verses, Rom 8:29-30. Rom 8:29 indicates its final aim; Rom 8:30 marks off, as it were, the path along which it reaches its realization.

Frédéric Louis Godet — Commentaries on Luke, John, Romans, and 1 Corinthians — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1870s–1890s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom_8:28

And we know all things work together for good to them that love God, etc. This may be regarded as virtually, though not formally, an inference from what Paul had taught concerning afflictions. As they are comparatively insignificant, as they call forth the exercises of hope, and give occasion for the kind interposition of the Holy Spirit, far from being inconsistent with our salvation, they contribute to our good. It seems, however, more natural to consider the apostle as presenting the consideration contained in this verse, as an additional reason why the afflictions of this life are not inconsistent with our being the sons of God. These afflictions are real blessings. All things, as is usually the case with such general expressions, is to be limited to the things spoken of in the context, i.e. the sufferings of the present time. See 1Co_2:15, where the spiritual man is said to understand all things; Col_1:20, where Christ is said to reconcile all things unto God; and Eph_1:10, with many other similar passages. Of course it is not intended that other events, besides afflictions, do not work together for the good of Christians, but merely that the apostle is here speaking of the sufferings of believes. Tenendum est Paulum non nisi de rebus adversis loqui: acsi dixisset Divinitus sic temperari quaecunque sanctis accidunt, ut, quod mundus noxium esse putat, exitus utile esse demonstret. Nam tametsi verum est, quod ait Augustinus, peccata quoque sua, ordinante Dei providentia, sanctis adeo non nocere, ut potius eorum saluti inserviant; ad hunc tamen locum non pertinet, ubi de cruce agitur. Calvin.

Those to whom afflictions are a real blessing are described, first, as those who love God; and secondly, as those who are called according to his purpose. The former of these clauses describes the character of the persons intended, they love God, which is a comprehensive expression for all the exercises of genuine religion. The latter clause declares a fact, with regard to all such which has a most important bearing on the apostles great object in this chapter, they are called according to his purpose. The word called, as remarked above, (Rom_1:7) is never, in the epistles of the New Testament, applied to those who are the recipients of the mere external invitation of the gospel. It always means effectually called, i.e. it is always applied to those who are really brought to accept of the blessings to which they are invited. 1Co_1:24, But to those who are called, i.e., to true Christians. Jud_1:1, To those who are sanctified by God the Father, and are preserved in Jesus Christ, and called, 1Co_1:2, etc. The word is, therefore, often equivalent with chosen, as in the phrase called an apostle, 1Co_1:1; Rom_1:1; and called of Jesus Christ, Rom_1:6. And thus in the Old Testament, Hearken unto me, O Jacob, and Israel my called, Isa_48:12; see Isa_42:6, Isa_49:1, Isa_51:2. Those who love God, therefore, are those whom he hath chosen and called by his grace to a participation of the Redeemers kingdom. This call is not according to the merits of men, but according to the divine purpose. Who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. 2Ti_1:9; Eph_1:11; Rom_9:11. The design of the apostle, in the introduction of this clause, seems to have been twofold. First, to show, according to his usual manner, that the fact that some men love God is to be attributed to his sovereign grace, and not to themselves; and, secondly, that if men are called, according to the eternal purpose of God, their salvation is secure. By this latter idea, this clause is associated with the passage that follows, and with the general object of the chapter. That the calling of men does secure their salvation, is proved in Rom_8:29, Rom_8:30.

Doctrine

1. True Christians are the sons of God, objects of his affection, partakers of his moral nature, and heirs of his kingdom, Rom_8:14.

2. The relation of God to us is necessarily the counterpart of ours to him. If we feel as friends to him, he feels as a friend towards us; if our sentiments are filial, his are parental, Rom_8:15.

3. God who is everywhere present and active, manifests his presence, and communicates with his creatures in a manner accordant with their nature, although in a way that is inscrutable, Rom_8:16.

4. Assurance of salvation has a twofold foundation, the experience of those affections which are the evidences of true piety, and the witness of the Holy Spirit. The latter can never be separated from the former; for the Spirit can never testify to what is not the truth. He can never assure an enemy that he is a child of God, Rom_8:16.

5. Union with Christ is the source of all our blessings of justification and sanctification, as taught in the previous chapters, and of salvation, as taught in this, Rom_8:17.

6. Afflictions are not inconsistent with the divine favor, nor with our being the sons of God, Rom_8:18-25.

7. The future glory of the saints must be inconceivably great, if the whole creation, from the beginning of the world, groans and longs for its manifestation, Rom_8:19-23.

8. The curse consequent on the fall has affected the state of the external world. The consummation of the work of redemption may be attended with its regeneration, Rom_8:20-22.

9. The present influences of the Spirit are first fruits of the inheritance of the saints; the same in kind with the blessings of the future state, though less in degree. They are a pledge of future blessedness, and always produce an earnest longing for the fruition of the full inheritance, Rom_8:23.

10. As, for wise reasons, salvation is not immediately consequent on regeneration, hope, which is the joyful expectation of future good, becomes the duty, solace, and support of the Christian, Rom_8:24, Rom_8:25.

11. The Holy Spirit is our Paraclete (Joh_14:16) or advocate, we are his clients, we know not how to plead our own cause, but he dictates to us what we ought to say. This office of the Spirit ought to be recognized, and gratefully acknowledged, Rom_8:26.

12. Prayer, to be acceptable, must be according to the will of God, and it always is so when it is dictated or excited by the Holy Spirit, Rom_8:27.

13. All events are under the control of God; and even the greatest afflictions are productive of good to those who love him, Rom_8:28.

14. The calling or conversion of men, involving so many of their free acts, is a matter of divine purpose, and it occurs in consequence of its being so, Rom_8:28.

Remarks

1. If God, by his Spirit, condescends to dwell in us, it is our highest duty to allow ourselves to be governed or led by him, Rom_8:12, Rom_8:13.

2. It is a contradiction in terms to profess to be the sons of God, if destitute of the filial feelings of confidence, affection, and reverence, Rom_8:15.

3. A spirit of fear, so far from being an evidence of piety, is an evidence of the contrary. The filial spirit is the genuine spirit of religion, Rom_8:15.

4. Assurance of hope is not fanatical, but is an attainment which every Christian should make. If the witness of men is received, the witness of God is greater. As the manifestation of Gods love to us is made in exciting our love towards him, so the testimony of his Spirit with ours, that we are the sons of God, is made when our filial feelings are in lively exercise, Rom_8:16.

5. Christians ought neither to expect nor wish to escape suffering with Christ, if they are to be partakers of his glory. The former is a preparation for the latter, Rom_8:17.

6. The afflictions of this life, though in themselves not joyous but grievous, are worthy of little regard in comparison with the glory that shall be revealed in us. To hear these trials properly, we should regard them as part of the heritage of the sons of God, Rom_8:18.

7. As the present state of things is one of bondage to corruption, as there is a dreadful pressure of sin and misery on the whole creation, we should not regard the world as our home, but desire deliverance from this bondage, and introduction into the liberty of the children of God, Rom_8:19-22.

8. It is characteristic of genuine piety to have exalted conceptions of future blessedness, and earnest longings after it. Those, therefore, who are contented with the world and indifferent about heaven, can hardly possess the first fruits of the Spirit, Rom_8:23.

9. Hope and patience are always united. If we have a well-founded hope of heaven, then do we with patience and fortitude wait for it. This believing resignation and joyful expectation of the promises, are peculiarly pleasing in the sight of God and honorable to religion, Rom_8:24, Rom_8:25.

10. How wonderful the condescension of the Holy Spirit! How great his kindness in teaching us, as a parent his children, how to pray and what to pray for! How abundant the consolation thus afforded to the pious in the assurance that their prayers shall be heard, Rom_8:26, Rom_8:27.

11. Those who are in Christ, who love God, may repose in perfect security beneath the shadow of his wings. All things shall work together for their good, because all things are under the control of him who has called them to the possession of eternal life according to his own purpose, Rom_8:28.

Charles Hodge — Commentary on Romans (1835), First Corinthians (1857), and Ephesians (1856) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He calleth that, Purpose, which God hath from everlasting appointed with himself according to his good will and pleasure.

Eighthly, we are not afflicted, either by chance or to our harm, but by God’s providence for our great profit, who as he chose us from the beginning, so hath he predestined us to be made like to the image of his Son: and therefore will bring us in his time, being called and justified, to glory, by the cross.

Not only afflictions, but whatsoever else.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

And--or, "Moreover," or "Now"; noting a transition to a new particular.

we know, &c.--The order in the original is more striking: "We know that to them that love God" (compare Co1 2:9; Eph 6:24; Jam 1:12; Jam 2:5) "all things work together for good [even] to them who are the called (rather, 'who are called') according to His (eternal) purpose." Glorious assurance! And this, it seems, was a "household word," a "known" thing, among believers. This working of all things for good is done quite naturally to "them that love God," because such souls, persuaded that He who gave His own Son for them cannot but mean them well in all His procedure, learn thus to take in good part whatever He sends them, however trying to flesh and blood: and to them who are the called, according to "His purpose," all things do in the same intelligible way "work together for good"; for, even when "He hath His way in the whirlwind," they see "His chariot paved with love" (Sol 3:10). And knowing that it is in pursuance of an eternal "purpose" of love that they have been "called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ" (Co1 1:9), they naturally say within themselves, "It cannot be that He 'of whom, and through whom, and to whom are all things,' should suffer that purpose to be thwarted by anything really adverse to us, or that He should not make all things, dark as well as light, crooked as well as straight, to co-operate to the furtherance and final completion of His high design."

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

28. And we know, etc. He now draws this conclusion from what had been said, that so far are the troubles of this life from hindering our salvation, that, on the contrary, they are helps to it. It is no objection that he sets down an illative particle, for it is no new thing with him to make somewhat an indiscriminate use of adverbs, and yet this conclusion includes what anticipates an objection. For the judgment of the flesh in this case exclaims, that it by no means appears that God hears our prayers, since our afflictions continue the same. Hence the Apostle anticipates this and says, that though God does not immediately succour his people, he yet does not forsake them, for by a wonderful contrivance he turns those things which seem to be evils in such a way as to promote their salvation. If any one prefers to read this verse by itself, as though Paul proceeded to a new argument in order to show that adversities which assist our salvation, ought not to be borne as hard and grievous things, I do not object. At the same time, the design of Paul is not doubtful: “Though the elect and the reprobate are indiscriminately exposed to similar evils, there is yet a great, difference; for God trains up the faithful by afflictions, and thereby promotes their salvation.”

But we must remember that Paul speaks here only of adversities, as though he had said, “All things which happen to the saints are so overruled by God, that what the world regards as evil, the issue shows to be good.” For though what Augustine says is true, that even the sins of the saints are, through the guiding providence of God, so far from doing harm to them, that, on the contrary, they serve to advance their salvation; yet this belongs not to this passage, the subject of which is the cross.

It must also be observed, that he includes the whole of true religion in the love of God, as on it depends the whole practice of righteousness.

Even to them who according to his purpose, etc. This clause seems to have been added as a modification, lest any one should think that the faithful, because they love God, obtain by their own merit the advantage of deriving such fruit from their adversities. We indeed know that when salvation is the subject, men are disposed to begin with themselves, and to imagine certain preparations by which they would anticipate the favor of God. Hence Paul teaches us, that those whom he had spoken of as loving God, had been previously chosen by him. For it is certain that the order is thus pointed out, that we may know that it proceeds from the gratuitous adoption of God, as from the first cause, that all things happen to the saints for their salvation. Nay, Paul shows that the faithful do not love God before they are called by him, as in another place he reminds us that the Galatians were known of God before they knew him. (Galatians 4:9.) It is indeed true what Paul intimates, that afflictions avail not to advance the salvation of any but of those who love God; but that saying of John is equally true, that then only he is begun to be loved by us, when he anticipates us by his gratuitous love.

But the calling of which Paul speaks here, has a wide meaning, for it is not to be confined to the manifestation of election, of which mention is presently made, but is to be set simply in opposition to the course pursued by men; as though Paul had said, — “The faithful attain not religion by their own efforts, but are, on the contrary led by the hand of God, inasmuch as he has chosen them to be a peculiar people to himself.” The word purpose distinctly excludes whatever is imagined to be adduced mutually by men; as though Paul had denied, that the causes of our election are to be sought anywhere else, except in the secret good pleasure of God; which subject is more fully handled in the first chapter to the Ephesians, and in the first of the Second Epistle to Timothy; where also the contrast between this purpose and human righteousness is more distinctly set forth. Paul, however, no doubt made here this express declaration, — that our salvation is based on the election of God, in order that he might make a transition to that which he immediately subjoined, namely, that by the same celestial decree, the afflictions, which conform us to Christ, have been appointed; and he did this for the purpose of connecting, as by a kind of necessary chain, our salvation with the bearing of the cross.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(28) All things.—Persecution and suffering included.

Work together.—Contribute.

There is a rather remarkable reading here, found in the Vatican and Alexandrian MSS., and in Origen, inserting “God” as the subject of the verb, and making “all things” the object. “God works all things with,” or “co-operates in all things.” This reading is very early, if not original.

To them who are the called.—Further description of those “who love God.” They have also, as in His eternal counsels He had designed it should be, obeyed the call given to them in the preaching of the gospel, and definitely enrolled themselves in the kingdom of the Messiah.

(28-30) These verses contain a third reason for the patience of the Christian. He knows that whatever happens, all things are really working together for good to him.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

28. And we knew, &c.] Here appears a fresh assurance of safety. We have seen (1) the certainty of the son-ship of the believer; (2) the fact that his sorrows are only the prelude of glory; (3) the Divine assistance afforded him by the Holy Spirit, especially in prayer. Now, before the final appeal, we have an express statement of the truth that the children of God are the objects on His part of an Eternal Purpose, which must issue in their final blessedness, and must thus turn “all things” at last to good for them. This is stated as a confessed certainty, well known in the Church.

all things] In the amplest sense. See Rom_8:38-39 for illustration. No doubt St Paul has specially in view the sufferings of the saints, which would often tempt them to say “these things are against me.” But peace and rest, on earth, are perils also; and even such trials therefore need a similar assurance.—St Chrysostom’s dying words were, “Glory be to God for all things.”

work together] As means in the great Worker’s hand. It is instructive to note this expression in a passage where also the Divine Decrees are in view. The eternal Will takes place not arbitrarily, but through means; and those means are immensely various, and mutually adjusted by supreme Wisdom only.

for good] Chiefly, no doubt, the final Good is meant, the fruition of God in eternal Glory. But all true good by the way is included, as part of the path thither.

that love God] As His children; in whose hearts His love has been “outpoured by the Holy Ghost” (ch. Rom_5:5). Observe that this note of saintship stands first in this memorable passage; not eternal election, but that conscious love to God in Christ which is its sure fruit, and without which no speculation of mysteries brings the soul near to Him.—It is the True God alone who makes this His unalterable demand; “Thou shalt love me.”

to them who are the called] Identical with “them that love Him.” See on Rom_1:6, for the profound meaning of “the call.” 1Co_1:24; 1Co_1:26-27 is a clear illustration, in contrast with Mat_20:16; Mat_22:14. In the Gospels the word “call” refers to outward hearing; in the Epistles to inward reception, due to a special and sovereign influence from above.—See too Rev_17:14.

according to his purpose] Same word as Rom_9:11; Eph_1:11; Eph_3:11; 2Ti_1:9. See especially the last passage and Eph_1:11, for the sense in which St Paul uses the word here. It is the intention of “Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His will;” and it is absolute and sovereign, in the sense not of arbitrary caprice, (God forbid,) but in that of its being uncaused by anything external to Himself. The gift of life is “not according to our works, but according to His own purpose.” His “good pleasure” was, “before the world began,” “purposed in Himself.” (2Ti_1:9; Eph_1:9; Eph_1:11.) In the next verses, St Paul explains his meaning further.—(The word “His” is not in the Gr., but is certainly right in translation.)

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And we know that all things work together for good,.... There is a temporal good, and a spiritual good, and an eternal one. Temporal good is what the men of the world are seeking after, and generally have the greatest share of, and the saints the least; and yet they have as much as is needful for them, and what they have, they have with a blessing; and even sometimes afflictions work for the temporal good of God's children: spiritual good lies in a lively exercise of grace and a conformity of the soul to God; and is what the men of the world least regard, and the saints most; and sometimes afflictions issue in this sort of good, as they do also in eternal good, for they work for us an exceeding weight of glory: by "all things" may be meant, all beings good and bad: all good beings eternal or created: eternal, as Jehovah the Father, all his perfections, purposes, promises, provisions, and performances; Jehovah the Son, as the mighty God, and as Mediator, all that he is in himself, all that he has in himself, all that he has done, or is doing, all his titles, characters, and relations; Jehovah the Spirit, in his person, offices, and operations; these all have worked together in the council of peace, in the covenant of grace, and in redemption; and they do work together in sanctification, and so they will in glorification, and that for the good of the saints: all created ones, as good angels, good magistrates, good ministers of the Gospel: all evil beings, as devils, persecuting magistrates, heretics, and false teachers: all things, good and bad: all good things, outward peace and prosperity, external gifts, the ministry of the word, the administration of ordinances, church censures, admonitions, and excommunications; all evil things, sin the evil of evils: original sin, or the fall of Adam, which contains all other sins in it, was attended with aggravating circumstances, and followed with dismal consequences, yet has been overruled for good; hereby a Saviour became necessary, who was sent, came, and wrought out salvation; has brought in a better righteousness than Adam lost; entitled his people to a better life than his was, and makes them partakers of the riches both of grace and glory: actual sin, inward or outward; indwelling sin; which is made use of, when discovered, to abate pride, to lead to an entire dependence on Christ, to teach saints to be less censorious, to depend on the power and grace of God to keep them, and to wean them from this world, and to make them desirous of another, where they shall be free from it; outward sins, of others, or their own; the sins of others, of wicked men, which observed, raise an indignation in the saints against sin, and a concern for God's glory, and to look into their own hearts and ways, and admire the grace of God to them, that this is not their case; of good men, which are recorded, and may be observed, not for example and encouragement in sin, but for admonition, and to encourage faith and hope under a sense of it; of their own, for humiliation, which issues in weakening the power of sin in themselves, and the strengthening of the graces of others: but from all this it does not follow, that God is the author of sin, only that he overrules it to wise and gracious purposes; nor should any take encouragement to sin, to do evil that good may come; nor is sin itself a real good; nor is it to be said that it does no hurt; for though it cannot hinder the everlasting salvation of God's people, it does a great deal of hurt to their peace and comfort; and that it is made to work in any form or shape for good, is not owing to its own nature and influence, which is malignant enough, but to the unbounded power and unsearchable wisdom of God: all evils or afflictions, spiritual and temporal, work together for good; all spiritual ones, such as the temptations of Satan, which are made useful for humiliation, for the trial of grace, to show us our weakness, our need of Christ, and to conform us to him, and also to excite to prayer and watchfulness; the hidings of God's face, which make his presence the more prized when enjoyed, and the more desirable. Temporal afflictions, afflictions in body, name, or estate, nay even death itself, all work together for the good of God's people. The Jews tell us of one Nahum, the man Gamzu, who, they say, was (k) so called, because of everything that happened to him he used to say, , "Gam zu letobah", "this is also for good": and they give instances of several misfortunes which befell him, upon which account he used these words, and how they proved in the issue to his advantage: agreeably to this is the advice given by them,

"for ever (say they (l)) let a man be used to say, all that the Lord does, , "he does for good".''

Now that all things do work together for good, the saints "know", and are firmly persuaded of; both from the word and promises of God, and from the instances of Jacob, Joseph, Job, and others, and also from their own experience: and it is to be observed, that it is not said that all things "have" worked together, and so they may again, or that they "shall" work together, but all things work together for good; they "now" work together, they are always working together, whether it can be observed or not: prosperity and adversity, whether in things temporal or spiritual, work "together", and make an intricate woven work in providence and grace; which will be viewed with admiration another day: one copy reads, "God works together", or "causes all things to work together for good"; and so the Ethiopic version, "we know that God helps them that love him, to every good thing": and to this agrees the Syriac version, "we know that to them that love God, he in everything helps them to good"; and certain it is, that God is the efficient cause, that makes all things work together for his people's good. The persons to whom all things work together for good, are described as such

that love God; a character, which does not agree with all the sons and daughters of Adam: love to God is not naturally in men; it is wrought in the soul in regeneration, and is an evidence of it; it grows up with faith, which works by it; without it, a profession of religion is vain; and where it is once wrought, it lasts for ever; it ought to be superlative and universal, constant, warm and ardent, hearty and sincere: such who have it, show it by a desire to be like to God, and therefore imitate him, by making his glory the supreme end of their actions; by being careful not to offend him; by delighting in his presence, in his people, word, ordinances, ways, and worship; and by undervaluing the world, and all things in it, in comparison of him; who is to be loved for the perfections of his being, the characters and relations he stands in and bears to his people, and on account of the love with which he has loved them, and which is indeed the spring and source of theirs. They are further described, as such

who are the called according to his purpose. The called of God and of Jesus Christ; not to any office, or by the external ministry of the word only, but by special grace; from darkness to light, from bondage to liberty, from the company of sinful men to fellowship with Christ, from a trust in their own righteousness to a dependence on his, to grace here, and glory hereafter; which is done according to the purpose of God: the persons called are fixed upon by God; none are called but whom God purposed to call; those who are called can assign no other reason of it than the will of God; and no other reason but that can be given why others are not called; the time when, the place where, the means whereby persons are called, are all settled and determined by the will, and according to the purpose of God.

(k) T. Bab. Taanith, fol. 21. 1. Sanhedrin, fol. 108. 2. Cosri, fol. 151. 1. (l) T. Bab. Beracot, fol. 60. 2.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

Ver. 28. All things work together] Not affliction only (as some would here restrain it), but sin, Satan, all. Venenum aliquando pro remedio fuit, saith Seneca. Medici pedes et alas cantharidis, cum sit ipsa mortifera, prodesse dicunt. The drinking of that wine wherein a viper hath, been drowned cureth the leprosy. The scorpion healeth his own wounds, and the viper (the head and tail being cut off), beaten and applied, cureth her own biting. God changeth our grisly wounds into spangles of beauty, and maketh the horrible sting of Satan to be like a pearl pin, to pin upon us the long white robe of Christ, and to dress us with the garment of gladness.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And we know - This verse introduces another source of consolation and support, drawn from the fact that all flyings are under the direction of an infinitely wise Being, who has purposed the salvation of the Christian, and who has so appointed all things that they shall contribute to it.

All things - All our afflictions and trials; all the persecutions and calamities to which we are exposed. Though they are numerous and long-continued yet they are among the means that are appointed for our welfare.

Work together for good - They shall cooperate; they shall mutually contribute to our good. They take off our affections from this world; they teach us the truth about our frail, transitory, and lying condition; they lead us to look to God for support, and to heaven for a final home; and they produce a subdued spirit. a humble temper, a patient, tender, and kind disposition. This has been the experience of all saints; and at the end of life they have been able to say it was good for them to be afflicted; Psa 119:67, Psa 119:71; Jer 31:18-19; Heb 12:11.

For good - For our real welfare; for the promotion of true piety, peace, and happiness in our hearts.

To them that love God - This is a characteristic of true piety. To them, afflictions are a blessing. To others, they often prove otherwise. On others they are sent as chastisements; and they produce complaining, instead of peace; rebellion, instead of submission; and anger, impatience, and hatred, instead of calmness, patience, and love. The Christian is made a better man by receiving afflictions as they should be received, and by desiring that they should accomplish the purpose for which they are sent; the sinner is made more hardened by resisting them, and refusing to submit to their obvious intention and design.

To them who are the called - Christians are often represented as called of God. The word κλητός klētos is sometimes used to denote an external invitation, offer, or calling; Mat 20:16; Mat 22:14. But excepting in these places, it is used in the New Testament to denote those who had accepted the call, and were true Christians; Rom 1:6-7; 1Co 1:2, 1Co 1:24; Rev 17:14. It is evidently used in this sense here - to denote those who were true Christians. The connection as well as the usual meaning of the word, requires us thus to understand it. Christians are said to be called because God has invited them to be saved, and has sent into their heart such an influence as to make the call effectual to their salvation. In this way their salvation is to be traced entirely to God.

According to his purpose - The word here rendered “purpose” πρόθεσις prothesis means properly a proposition, or a laying down anything in view of others; and is thus applied to the bread that was laid on the table of show-bread; Mat 12:4; Mar 2:26; Luk 6:4. Hence, it means, when applied to the mind, a plan or purpose of mind. It implies that God had a plan, purpose, or intention, in regard to all who became Christians. They are not saved by chance or hap-hazard. God does not convert people without design; and his designs are not new, but are eternal. What he does. he always meant to do. What it is right for him to do, it was right always to intend to do. What God always meant to do, is his purpose or plan. That he has such a purpose in regard to the salvation of his people, is often affirmed; Rom 9:11; Eph 1:11; Eph 3:11; 2Ti 1:9; Jer 51:29. This purpose of saving his people is,

One over which a creature can have no control; it is according to the counsel of his own will; Eph 1:11.

(2)It is without any merit on the part of the sinner - a purpose to save him by grace; 2Ti 1:9.

(3)It is eternal; Eph 3:11.

(4)It is such as should excite lively gratitude in all who have been inclined by the grace of God to accept the offers of eternal life. They owe it to the mere mercy of God, and they should acknowledge him as the fountain and source of all their hopes of heaven.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

To them that love God, all things work together unto good. All trials, temptations, afflictions, must be taken as coming from the hand of God, who ordains or permits them for the greater good of his elect. --- For the good of those, who, according to his purpose [5] are called the saints. Literally, according to purpose: but it seems certain that to translate his purpose, is only to give the literal sense, if we compare this place with other texts, both in the Greek and Latin, where the same words signify according to God’s good will, or his eternal decree, and not according to the purpose, or will of men, as some expound it. (Witham)

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

Secundum propositum vocati sunt sancti, Greek: tois kata prothesin. See Romans ix. 11. Ephesians iii. 11. where in the Latin is secundum præfinitionem, and 2 Timothy i. 9. non secundum opera nostra, sed secundum propositum suum, et gratiam, where he speaks of God, Greek: sosantos emas...kata idian prothesin.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Another argument to comfort us under the cross, from the benefits of it;

We know that all things, &c. It is not matter of guess only and conjecture, but of certainty and assurance. How is this known?

1. By the testimony of God; the Scripture tells us as much, Psa 128:1,2; Isa 3:10.

2. By our own experience; we are assured of it by the event and effects of all things, both upon ourselves and others.

All things, even sin itself; because from their falls, God’s children arise more humble and careful. Afflictions are chiefly intended; the worst and crossest providences, those things that are evil in themselves, they work for good to the children of God.

Work together; here is their operation, and their co-operation: First, they work together with God. What the apostle says of himself and others in the ministry, 2Co 6:1, that may be said of other things, especially of afflictions; they are workers together with God. Some read the words thus, God co-operates all to good. Again, they work together with us; we ourselves must concur, and be active herein; we must labour and endeavour to get good out of every providence. Once more, they work together amongst themselves, or one with another. Take this or that providence singly, or by itself, and you shall not see the good it doth; but take it in its conjunction and connexion with others, and then you may perceive it. One exemplifies it thus: As in matter of physic, if you take such and such simples alone, they may poison rather than cure; but then take them in their composition, as they are made up by the direction of a skilful physician, and so they prove an excellent medicine.

For good; sometimes for temporal good, Gen 1:20; always for spiritual and eternal good, which is best of all. All occurrences of providence shall serve to bring them nearer to God here, and to heaven hereafter.

According to his purpose: these words are added to show the ground and reason of God’s calling us; which is nothing else but his own purpose and good pleasure; it is not according to our worthiness, but his purpose: see 2Ti 1:9.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

28. All things—Not only does the Spirit work in and for us, but when he works all things else cooperate. As the whole creation groaneth together waiting for the renovation of God’s sons, so the whole co-worketh to that glorious consummation.

Love God—And just so far and just so long as they love God. Just so far as their love to God is diminished and sin is committed, just so far is the working of all things lessened and doubtful; and when their love to God ceases, the co-working for good ceases, and they are no longer the called. For it is to the man as a GOD LOVER, not as a blank individual, that these promises are made.

The called—(See note on Rom_1:1.)

His purpose—Of glorifying in Christ the mortal bodies of all true believers, (Rom_8:21.) But the stages of glorification implied in 19-23, as belonging to believers, the apostle now beautifully traces in their divinely established order, from the foreknowledge of God in the past eternity to the consummation in and for the eternity of the future.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And we know that to them that love God all things work together for good, to them that are called according to his purpose. A still further reason for endurance. Not only do these inspired groanings strengthen our hope of deliverance; nay, also we know (whether from God"s Word, or inspired conviction, or experience of their effects) that these very trials that seem to hinder us are so overruled as to further the consummation to them that love God; (cf. above, Rom_5:3, etc.) and at the end of the verse there is added, as introducing a still further ground of assurance, toiv kata proyesin klhtoiv ; the significance of which expression is shown in the following versos, which carry out the thought of it.

We know, too, that all things, even all these present trials, far from harming us, work together for good to them that love God, being called according to his purpose.

Overruling providence.

Perplexity and mystery are part of the experience to be shared by all reflecting men. The world, and especially human life, furnish enigmas which the understanding cannot solve, which can only be dealt with by the higher principle of faith. The groans of creation mingle with the groans of men, and the discerning mind detects also the groaning of the Spirit. But, above all, is a harmony which overcomes and silences earth"s discords. The apostle heard this harmony, and summoned his disciples to recognize the operations of that providence which constrains all things to work together for good.

I THE PRINCIPLE PROPOUNDED.

1. There is purpose in all things. Modern teleology lays less stress upon the traces of intention and design in individual instances, in organs and organisms, than upon the striking evidence of purpose manifest upon the largest scale, in the vast arrangements and adaptations, in the wonderful chemical and mathematical laws which pervade the whole universe. The more the universe, as accessible to our observation, is studied, the more will it appear a system. Signs of order, of adaptation, of prearrangement, are obvious to every careful student. There is nothing too great, nothing too small, to illustrate the presence of mind. Human life is not exempt from the tokens of Divine foresight and adaptation. "There"s a Divinity that shapes our ends, Rough-hew them how we will. It is a mistake to suppose that the establishment of the reign of law, of physical causation, conflicts with the operation of purpose; that evolution and design are in any way opposed.

2. The purpose which may be detected in all things is a good purpose. A moral aim is discoverable throughout the universe, and emphatically in human life. All things work together, not indeed for the promotion of pleasure, but for moral good the highest and worthiest of all aims. This conviction is the key to many difficulties by which observant and reflecting minds have been distressed.

3. This moral purpose is secured so far as spiritual beings voluntarily conform to God"s will. As a matter of fact, the order of things does not actually secure the good of all beings; many will not receive the benefits which nature and life are intended to convey. But Christians who love God, and who respond to his call in Christ"s gospel, do really reap advantages to which others are strangers. These are the obedient, who are attentive to the Divine summons and accomplish the Divine purpose. For these all circumstances are ordained and overruled, that they may minister to the true well-being of God"s people.

II THE WORKING OF THE PRINCIPLE ILLUSTRATED.

1. Men"s circumstances may contribute to their true well-being. Thus poverty may be as spiritually serviceable to those who experience it as competence or wealth; obscurity as honour, etc.

2. Men"s own more personal experience is also overruled by God"s providence for their highest good. Thus even doubts of intellect, and sorrows of heart two of the most painful forms of moral discipline are both, as a matter of fact, caused to subserve purposes of supreme value in the development of character and in the acquisition of influence.

III PRACTICAL LESSONS DRAWN FROM A CONSIDERATION OF THIS PRINCIPLE.

1. The Christian may learn to avoid murmuring, when he remembers that even untoward circumstances are intended to work out his highest good. Such a conviction casts a new light upon daily experiences; and what otherwise might be regarded as annoyances, calling forth resentment, are now looked upon as ministrations of Divine love and mercy.

2. The Christian may seek to profit by all God"s providential dealings. It is the spirit in which these are received which determines whether or not they shall be means of blessing; and the proper spirit is one of submission and teachableness.

3. The Christian will cherish the expectation that the day will come when, looking back upon the path by which he has been led, and the discipline through which he has passed, he shall be able gratefully to acknowledge that God "hath done all things well.

God"s mingled providences.

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God." This was a remarkable statement for the Apostle Paul to make, especially when we consider how much he had suffered because of his love to God and his truth. He had been imprisoned, he had been stoned, he had been beaten with stripes; and yet, after all this, he is able to say that "all things work together for good to them that love God." Some might be disposed to doubt such a statement with regard to the experience even of the Christian. Yet many others besides Paul have borne similar testimony. David said, "I have been young, and now am old; yet never have I seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread". (Psa_37:25) And again, "Before I was afflicted I went astray; but now have I kept thy Word It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes". (Psa_119:67, Psa_119:71)

I THERE IS GOOD IN ALL THE PROVIDENCES OF GOD. Many persons think there is good only in those things that give pleasure or delight to body or mind. They will admit that there is good in health and prosperity, But they find it hard to see what good there can be in sickness, in adversity, in poverty, or in sorrow. The apostle takes a wider view of life"s experiences. He holds that all things work together for good." He could appreciate the joys of life, but he felt that there was a wise purpose and blessing in life"s sorrows and trials also. Our human nature is in itself unholy, alienated from God, easily absorbed by the influences of this present world, and easily led away by temptation and sin. What a proof of the ungodliness of man"s nature is afforded by the fact that many are as little affected by the most certain and most important religious truths, which they profess to believe in, as if they did not believe them at all! There are no truths more universally admitted than the existence and moral government of God, the certainty of death and of a future state of rewards and punishments. Yet how many do we see around us whose character and conduct afford almost no evidence that they believe in these truths at all! How, then, are men to be roused from their indifference? How are they to be led to think seriously of their own souls and that eternity that awaits them? Some might be disposed to answer By what we ordinarily call exhibitions of God"s love and goodness. But we are having exhibitions of God"s love and goodness supplied to us every day in our daily food, in health and strength, and all the other blessings and comforts which we enjoy. Yet these, instead of making men think of eternity, seem to make them think more of this present world. God"s goodness, instead of leading them to repentance, hardens their hearts. The discipline and awakening of suffering and trial are needed. These trials, breaking in upon the routine of our daily business and enjoyments, help to withdraw our desires from the things of this perishing world, and to fix them upon a more enduring substance. They remind us that this is not our rest; that we are entirely dependent upon a power that is above us for all our happiness and comforts; and that there is indeed a God that judgeth in the earth. There is nothing more calculated to show a man his own weakness and his dependence upon a higher Power, and to lead him to reflect seriously upon his future prospects, than to find himself, in the midst of important and perhaps pressing duties, suddenly laid aside, stretched upon a bed of sickness, racked, it may be, with pain, and unable to do anything for himself. In such circumstances we must feel that "it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps." There are many Christians everywhere who, with feelings of deep humility and gratitude, are ready to acknowledge that they never had any serious thought of eternity, that they never knew the power of the love of Christ, and that they were never led to seek him as their Saviour, until the day of adversity made them consider; until they were stripped of their dearest possessions; until they were warned by the sudden death of some one who was dear to them; or until they themselves were laid upon a bed of sickness, and brought nigh unto the gates of death. "Lo, all these things worketh God oftentimes with men, to bring back his soul from the pit, to be enlightened with the light of the living". (Job_33:29, Job_33:30) And through all the Christian life, how many times we have to thank God for the discipline of trial! Our trials have often proved to be our greatest blessings (see also on Rom_5:3-6).

II WHO ARE THOSE THAT EXPERIENCE THIS GOOD IN ALL GOD"S PROVIDENCES? "All things work together for good to them that love God. " It is not all men, therefore, who are entitled to such a happy way of looking at the events of life. There are many in whose case everything that God gives them seems to be turned into evil. Not merely the trials which harden their hearts, but also his blessings which they abuse and are ungrateful for, and the life he gives them, which they misspend. The more they have prospered, the more they have forgotten God. Those things that might be a blessing if rightly used, become their greatest curse. Love to God is the quality that makes all life happy and blessed. Love to God sweetens every bitter cup, and lightens every heavy burden. For if we love him, we must know him, we must trust him. That is the threefold cord that binds the Christian unto God, and that keeps him safe in all the changes and circumstances of life. In order to love God, we must know him and trust him. This knowledge and this trust can only come by the study of God"s Word. This love can only come from a heart that has experienced the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit. The natural man is enmity against God. Cultivate the love of God if you would have light for the dark places of life, if you would have strength for its hours of weakness, and comfort for its hours of trial and sorrow. Then you will experience that "all things work together for good to them that love God. C.H.I

Vers. 28-30. God"s purpose in Christ.

The apostle has indicated the hope of the future glory, in comparison with which all suffering now is as nought. He has also shown how, this hope is no vain imagining of a diseased mind, but the inspiration of God"s Spirit. And now he goes on to show that, since this divinely inspired hope corresponds with the great purpose of God concerning us, all things which enter into God"s plan for our governance, including apparently evil things which are suffered by him to befall us, must ultimately subserve his purpose and be for the fulfilling of our hope. All this, assuming that we "love God;" thus any carelessness or sin of ours is utterly excluded from the reckoning. It is, indeed, this inward principle of love which transmutes the evil into good, and prepares for the final glorifying. We have, then the purpose; the process.

I THE PURPOSE. God"s purpose concerning man dates back to the eternal past, for to God"s mind all things are ever present. But, objectively, it dates back to the wreck of the primal purpose in man"s transgression and death. On the first purpose a second purpose was built; out of the wreck of the old race a new race should be formed.

1. The Firstborn. Since the first man had betrayed his trust, and become the progenitor of a fallen race, there should be a second Man, the Lord from heaven. He should be God"s own Son, for the redemption-work was one which needed the powers of Divinity; he should be man"s Son also, one in whom the nature of the race might be concentrated, who might therefore redeem men, as God, but through the medium of a true humanity. He should humble himself, be shorn of his splendour, suffer and die, being baptized with blood for the remission of our sins; he should also, "dying, draw the sting of death," and, rising as the Firstfruits of a justified race, pass into the heavens as our Forerunner. Being perfect in all things as Son of man, obedient to the Father, and having performed a perfect work, he should enter perfected into life, glorified with the glory which he had with the Father before the world was.

2. The many brethren. Such was God"s purpose in his Son. But, glorifying his Son, he should also "bring many sons unto glory"; (Heb_2:10) for the Son, "having been made perfect," should become "unto all them that obey him the Author of eternal salvation". (Heb_5:9) For them he suffered, and therefore they also must suffer, "becoming conformed unto his death"; (Php_3:10) but, just as he passed through death unto life, so they also, dying with him, should with him "attain unto the resurrection from the dead". (Php_3:11) "Conformed to the image of his Son:" yes, this was God"s purpose in Christ for man, the inward conformation of consummate holiness, and the outward conformation of consummate happiness.

II THE PROCESS. Those, then, who by their own free choice should become Christ"s people for all others are here left out of account were foreknown and foreordained by God, "according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus," as sharers together with him in the perfect adoption of sons of God. Now, such a purpose, formed by God, and formed m the eternal past such a purpose concerning believers and faithful ones (for, as above, all possible misuse of freedom on the part of man, whether for rejecting. God"s grace, or for casting away a grace received, is here warred, and it is assumed that the purpose formed by God is embraced and adhered to by man) such a purpose cannot fail of its result, but the process of God"s working must issue in its complete accomplishment.

1. Called. The summons in accordance with the purpose. God calls his people, by the outward Word, by the inward Spirit; or, in other words, invites them, summons them, to enter into life. Can his Word be broken? Can his Spirit deceive? He means what he says, and, responding to his call, his people have a guarantee which is more sure than the pillars of the universe. (Mat_24:35)

2. Justified. The virtual instatement in accordance with the purpose. Calling them, he justifies them. There is a Name which destroys all guilt, and acquits for ever, and upon them this Name is named. They are "in Christ Jesus," and "there is therefore now no condemnation." From darkness into light; from death unto life. And the justification is the pledge and beginning of all blessings in Christ that shall tend to the consummation of the life. It carries with it the regeneration of our nature; it supplies the power that shall issue in our complete sanctification; and it points unfalteringly through all the tears and darknesses of the intermediate discipline to "the revealing of the sons of God.

3. Glorified. The actual instatement in accordance with the purpose. This "revealing of the sons of God" is so assured to us, that it is spoken of here as though already an accomplished fact. Yes, all things must be made consistent and harmonious at last; the discord must be done away; the blessedness of the saved spirit must be wedded to the blessedness of a saved world, and so "all things be made new." Such shall be the culmination of the process by which God"s purpose shall be fulfilled. The lesson insisted on is this: God will let nothing thwart him. Only love him, throw yourself into the current of his good purpose, and all things shall be made good to you. Opposition there may be, affliction there may be; but God in Christ shall triumph triumph in you. The very hindrances shall become helps, the enemies unwitting friends. Yes, "we know that all things," etc. T.F.L.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And we know - This in general; though we do not always know particularly what to pray for. That all things - Ease or pain, poverty or riches, and the ten thousand changes of life. Work together for good - Strongly and sweetly for spiritual and eternal good. To them that are called according to his purpose - His gracious design of saving a lost world by the death of his Son. This is a new proposition. St. Paul, being about to recapitulate the whole blessing contained in justification, (termed "glorification," ver. 30,) first goes back to the purpose or decree of God, which is frequently mentioned in holy writ. To explain this (nearly in the words of an eminent writer) a little more at large:-When a man has a work of time and importance before him, he pauses, consults, and contrives; and when he has laid a plan, resolves or decrees to proceed accordingly. Having observed this in ourselves, we are ready to apply it to God also; and he, in condescension to us has applied it to himself. The works of providence and redemption are vast and stupendous, and therefore we are apt to conceive of God as deliberating and consulting on them, and then decreeing to act according to "the counsel of his own will;" as if, long before the world was made, he had been concerting measures both as to the making and governing of it, and had then writ down his decrees, which altered not, any more than the laws of the Medes and Persians. Whereas, to take this consulting and decreeing in a literal sense, would be the same absurdity as to ascribe a real human body and human passions to the ever-blessed God. This is only a popular representation of his infallible knowledge and unchangeable wisdom; that is, he does all things as wisely as a man can possibly do, after the deepest consultation, and as steadily pursues the most proper method as one can do who has laid a scheme beforehand. But then, though the effects be such as would argue consultation and consequent decrees in man, yet what need of a moment's consultation in Him who sees all things at one view? Nor had God any more occasion to pause and deliberate, and lay down rules for his own conduct from all eternity, than he has now. What was there any fear of his mistaking afterwards, if he had not beforehand prepared decrees, to direct him what he was to do? Will any man say, he was wiser before the creation than since? or had he then more leisure, that he should take that opportunity to settle his affairs, and make rules (or himself, from which he was never to vary? He has doubtless the same wisdom and all other perfections at this day which he had from eternity; and is now as capable of making decrees, or rather has no more occasion for them now than formerly: his understanding being always equally clear and bright, his wisdom equally infallible.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

That is, "All dispensations of providence whatsoever, whether they be ordinary afflictions, or extraordinary trials, which do befall the children of God in this life, shall certainly be directed by his wisdom, and overruled by his power and goodness, for the temporal, spiritual, and eternal good of his children and people.

Observe here, 1. What those things are, which are especially installed in that comprehensive term, All things.

By all things here, we are to understand, Omnia tristia, non Omnia turpia; "All the saints’ afflictions, not their sins;" for then they might rejoice in their sins and wickedness, which is damnable impiety, as well as in their sufferings for Christ, seeing they may rejoice in tht which by God’s designation tendeth to their good.

But by all things, the apostle means all providential occurrences and dispensations, all stations and conditions whatsoever; be it prosperity or adversity, health or sickness, liberty or captivity, life or death, God’s glory and his children’s good shall be certainly furthered and advanced by it.

Observe, 2. In what sense all things may be said to work for good to good men; namely, as they shall promote and further the temporal, spiritual, and eternal welfare, of the children of God.

If it be good for them to be rich, to be in honour, to be at liberty, they shall be so; if it be better for their souls, and more conducive to their eternal welfare, to be low in the world, to be frequently under the rod, to be harassed with afflictions, and assaulted with temptations, they shall have them.

Nothing that is needful shall be kept from them, only God must be judge what is needful and when ’tis needful.

He that thinks he can cut better for himself than God can carve for him, makes himself wiser than God, and has not only lost his faith, but his wits too.

Observe, 3. That all things are said to work together for good; not singly, separately, and apart, but as coadjutors, and adjuvant causes, and mutual helps.

Afflictions and temptations seem to work against us; but being put into the rank and order of causes, they work together with other blessed instruments, as the word and prayer, to an happy issue.

More particularly: they work together with God, they work together with us, and they work together one with another, for our good, sooner of later.

Observe, 4. How can all things be said to work for good: particularly evil things? sufferings from God, and sufferings from man for God’s sake?

What! must we call evil good? pain pleasure? torment ease? and loss gain? Must we disbelieve our senses that we may believe the scriptures?

Answer, Though affliction, which is evil in its own nature, cannot bring forth good; yet surely God can bring forth good out of evil, light out of the way to their triumph, and every cross providence a step to the accomplishment of his promise.

God suffers evil things to befall us, to keep out worse things, and causes evil things to prepare us for better things; the cross makes way of the crown.

For affliction, there is glory; for light affliction, a weight of glory; and for light affliction, which is but for a moment, a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

Observe, 5. The character of the persons to whom this privilege doth belong: they are described by their Christian affection, they love God, and by their effectual vocation, they are called according to his purpose.

They love God, and evidence their love to him by an high estimation of him, by their delight in him, by their desires after him, by their longings for the full fruition and final enjoyment of him.

And as they love God, so are they called of God; externally by the dispensation of the gospel, internally by the operation of his Holy Spirit: they are called out of darkness into light, out of bondage into liberty, and all this efficaciously and powerfully, yet sweetly, and freely, in a way congruous to the will’s liberty.

Observe, 6. The certainty and evidence of this proposition and assertion, That all things work together for good; it is not built upon conjecture, or bare probability, but upon certain knowledge, We know; partly by divine revelation, God has told us so; partly by experience, we find it so. And when the apostle speaks it out, We know, it is a word of confidence and assurance, it is a word of comfort and encouragement: all the saints of God to the end of the world, as well as the apostle himself, may depend upon it, live in the faith and assurance of it, and draw all that consolation from it, which may render their lives in some sort an heaven upon earth.

And now if this be an indubitable and undeniable truth, That whatever sufferings and afflictions a saint meets with shall work together for good: then we may infer, that a suffering condition is not so bad a condition as the world supposes it. The lion of affliction is not so fierce as he is painted. Times of difficulty and trial bring serious thought of God into our minds, who are too prone to forget both him and ourselves in affluence and quiet.

Blessed be God, the time of affliction is no unprofitable time, nor uncomfortable time neither. ’Tis a thinking time, an awakening time, a teaching time, a repenting time, a weaning time; therfore blessed is the man whom God correcteth and teacheth.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

28. “But we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, who are the elect according to his purpose.” You see the climax, beginning with conviction, and running through justification, sanctification and glorification, finally culminates in election. This verse literally inundates God’s true people with floods of unutterable consolation, promoting them beyond all disappointment, and literally putting them out of reach of all evil, locating them in cloudless sunshine, even amid a world of storms. The simple solution of the whole matter hinges on the fundamental problem of this divine love, which is the nature of God, the only essential element in the plan of salvation experienced in the blessing of first love in conversion, and made perfect in sanctification, when all the antagonistic, malevolent affections are eliminated away. So long as this divine love is truly dominant in the heart, you are actually under the “shadow of the Almighty,” as safe on. earth as if in heaven, thus truly the “elect of God according to his purpose” that we should be conformed to the image of His Son, which is perfect love. Thus we are actually invulnerable by all the emissaries of Satan in earth and hell, the impregnable presence of God always intervening between us and every peril, making. everything indiscriminately incidental to us a blessing. This grand climactic truth is beautifully elucidated in the case of Balaam, Satan’s wicked, false prophet, whom Balak, the King of Moab, had hired with a princely fortune to come to his aid and curse Israel for him, as he feared to meet them on the battlefield, and believed that Balaam had such power with the gods that the people whom he anathematized were destined to fade from the face of the earth. If ever a man did his best to pronounce woes and curses on a people it was Balaam, when, the royal sacrifices having been sumptuously offered on the altars of Moab to the gods whom he believed to rule the universe, taking position on the pinnacle of Pisgah, and looking down upon the goodly tents of Jacob, spread out over the plains of Moab, standing on tiptoe and invoking the gods of the Orient, he opens his mouth with the avowed determination to pour the most withering and blighting anathemas on Israel. But, behold, blessings instead of curses pour out of his mouth. Balak rallies again and offers more sacrifices, thinking the matter will yet prove a success. Again Balaam, from the summit of Pisgah, opening wide his mouth, endeavors to curse Israel; but benedictions, richer and grander, only pour forth from his lips. Again they rally, offer sacrifices and try it again, thus repeating their diabolical orgies six times, not a single anathema ever escaping the lips of the prophet, but blessings, more and more copious, incessantly flowing from his eloquent lips. Finally, the royal patience utterly collapsing, the king, giving up in despair, flies into a rage and orders the prophet “be gone” like a dog. But he does not get rid of him so easily. Again he stands upon the summit of Pisgah, overlooking the goodly tents of Jacob, and, opening his mouth, blessings, more copious and eloquent than ever before, flow like rivers from his inspired lips. The spirit of prophecy mightily resting on him, he sweeps down the intervening ages, hails with triumphant gaudeamus the rising star of Bethlehem, and hears the seraphic song heralding upon earth the world’s Redeemer; on through the ages flash the splendors of his prophetic fire, reveling in the glorious millennial theocracy, girdling the world with the triumphs of the Second Advent. What lesson do we learn from this? Why, the clear and ostensible fact that it is utterly impossible for men or devils to inflict spiritual detriment on God’s true people, because he is always present with them, turning every curse into a blessing. Hence it makes no difference whether men bless or blame, God will make it a blessing to you if you truly love Him; hence the lonely pilgrim environed by millions of devils can shout and sing with utter and eternal impunity, there being no power in earth or hell competent to hurt him. You are truly immortal till your work is done. God can bless us through our enemies as well as our friends, Himself being the only source of blessing in all the universe.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And we know that to them that love God all things work together for good, even to them that are called according to his purpose . [In addition to the encouragements already mentioned, there is this: We know (partly by experience, but primarily by revelation) that all these present ills, hardships, adversities, afflictions, etc., are so overruled of God as to be made to combine to produce the permanent and eternal advantage and welfare of those who love God, even, I say, to those who love God, or who may otherwise be described as those that are called according to his purpose. "All things" evidently refers to all that class of events which threaten to result in evil. The phrase evidently is not to be pressed, for it can hardly include sin or any other thing which injures the soul. The apostle himself, in verses Rom_8:35-39 ; fully describes what he means by "all things." "The love of believers for God," says Lange, "is not the ground of their confidence, but the sign and security that they were first loved of God." The gospel reveals God's purpose to redeem, justify and glorify those who believe in Jesus. Those who accept this gospel through belief in Jesus are truly called of God according to the purpose for which he extended the call. Paul does not regard unbelievers as thus called, as the context shows, for the other descriptive clause which he here applies to the "called" (viz.: "those who love God") would not be applicable to unbelievers. Therefore the two clauses taken together show that Paul is simply speaking of Christians, or those who have heard the gospel, and have accepted it, and have been saved by it. All such know assuredly that God will direct the events of life so that they shall result in good to those called according to his purpose; for his purpose is of such import, such magnitude, such eternal fixedness and perennial vitality, etc., as to be a guarantee that God will permit no temporal accidentals to thwart it.]

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

28–30. All things work together for good. The third ground of encouragement to saints in suffering is now given. To them, under God's providence, all things, even their sorrows, trials and persecutions, work together for blessing. This precious assurance is not to all mankind, saint and sinner, but is limited to a class. To them that love God; the called according to his purpose. These are those who enjoy the blessed assurance just given. These two expressions are different ways of describing the same class. Notice the order in the Revision, which is the order of the Greek. The love of God is the very foundation of the Christian life. See Luke 10:28, and John 14:23. The expression, “Those that love God,” is synonymous with “Followers of Christ.” See 1 Cor. 2:9; Eph. 6:24; 2 Tim. 4:8; James 2:5. The called. These have been called by the gospel and have accepted the call. Many others are called, Jews and Gentiles, but only those who hear and obey are chosen (Matt. 20:16; 20:14). Paul uses the term of the latter class; those who hear and obey. The evidence that we are “the called” is that we love God. According to his purpose. This call was purposed from the time that God promised a Deliverer of the fallen race.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Connecting Statement:

Paul reminds the believers that nothing can separate them from God's love.

for those who are called

You can translate this in an active form. AT: "for those whom God chose" (See: Active or Passive)

those whom he foreknew

"those whom he knew before he even created them"

he also predestined

"he also made it their destiny" or "he also planned in advance"

to be conformed to the image of his Son

God planned from before the beginning of creation to grow those who believe in Jesus, the Son of God, into persons who are like Jesus. You can translate this in an active form. AT: "that he would change them to be like his Son" (See: Active or Passive)

Son

This is an important title for Jesus, the Son of God. (See: Translating Son and Father)

that he might be the firstborn

"so that his Son would be the firstborn"

among many brothers

Here "brothers" refers to all believers, both male and female. AT: "among many brothers and sisters who belong to the family of God" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

Those whom he predestined

"Those whom God made plans for in advance"

these he also justified

Here "justified" is in the past tense to emphasize that this will certainly happen. AT: "these he also put right with himself" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

these he also glorified

The word "glorified" is in the past tense to emphasize that this will certainly happen. AT: "these he will also glorify" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

translationWords

love

God

works

good

call

foreknew

predestine

image of God

Son of God

firstborn

brother

just

glory

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

28.] Having given an example, in prayer, how the Spirit helps our weakness, and out of our ignorance and discouragement brings from God an answer of peace, he now extends this to all things—all circumstances by which the Christian finds himself surrounded. These may seem calculated to dash down hope, and surpass patience; but we know better concerning them. But (the opposition seems most naturally to apply to ver. 22, the groaning and travailing of all creation) we know (as a point of the assurance of faith) that to those who love God (a stronger designation than any yet used for believers) all things (every event of life, but especially, as the context requires, those which are adverse. To include, with Aug. de Corrept. et Grat., c. ix. (24), vol. x. pt. i. p. 930, the sins of believers in this πάντα, as making them ‘humiliores et doctiores,’ is manifestly to introduce an element which did not enter into the Apostle’s consideration; for he is here already viewing the believer as justified by faith, dwelt in by the Spirit, dead to sin) work together (συνεργεῖ, absolute, or ἀλλήλοις implied: not, ‘work together for good with those who love God,’—‘loving God’ being a ‘working for good:’ which, though upheld by Thol., seems to me harsh, and inconsistent with the emphatic position of τοῖς ἀγ. τ. θ. Surely also in that case πάντα would have been τὰ πάντα, all things, as one party working, set over against οἱ ἀγαπῶντες τ. θ., the other party working: whereas πάντα συνεργεῖ gives rather the sense of all things co-operating one with another.

If the reading of be adopted, we should understand either (1) that God causeth all things to work, &c.: taking συνέργει as from συνέργω, concludo: or (2) that, as Syr. renders it, “in every thing He helpeth them for good.” But in this last case, we should require τὰ πάντα) for (towards, to bring about) good (their eternal welfare;—the fulfilment of the purpose of the ἀγάπη τ. θεοῦ ἡ ἐν χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ τ. κυρ. ἡμῶν, ver. 39),—to those who are called (not only invited, but effectually called—see below) according to (His) purpose.

In this further description the Apostle designates the believers as not merely loving God, but being beloved by God. The divine side of their security from harm is brought out, as combining with and ensuring the other. They are sure that all things work for their good, not only because they love Him who worketh all things, but also because He who worketh all things hath loved and chosen them, and carried them through the successive steps of their spiritual life. The calling here and elsewhere spoken of by the Apostle (compare especially ch. 9:11) is the working, in men, of “the everlasting purpose of God whereby before the foundations of the world were laid, He hath decreed by His counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those whom He hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to everlasting salvation.” Art. X. of the Church of England. To specify the various ways in which this calling has been understood, would far exceed the limits of a general commentary. It may suffice to say, that on the one hand, Scripture bears constant testimony to the fact that all believers are chosen and called by God,—their whole spiritual life in its origin, progress, and completion, being from Him:—while on the other hand its testimony is no less precise that He willeth all to be saved, and that none shall perish except by wilful rejection of the truth. So that, on the one side, God’s sovereignty,—on the other, man’s free will,—is plainly declared to us. To receive, believe, and act on both these, is our duty, and our wisdom. They belong, as truths, no less to natural than to revealed religion: and every one who believes in a God must acknowledge both. But all attempts to bridge over the gulf between the two are futile in the present imperfect condition of man. The very reasonings used for this purpose are clothed in language framed on the analogies of this lower world, and wholly inadequate to describe God regarded as He is in Himself. Hence arises confusion, misapprehension of God, and unbelief. I have therefore simply, in this commentary, endeavoured to enter into the full meaning of the sacred text, whenever one or other of these great truths is brought forward; not explaining either of them away on account of possible difficulties arising from the recognition of the other, but recognizing as fully the elective and predestinating decree of God where it is treated of, as I have done, in other places, the free will of man. If there be an inconsistency in this course, it is at least one in which the nature of things, the conditions of human thought, and Scripture itself, participate, and from which no Commentator that I have seen, however anxious to avoid it by extreme views one way or the other, has been able to escape. See, for a full treatment of the subject, Tholuck’s Comm. in loc.

29,

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

28. οἴδαμεν δέ passes on to another ground for looking confidently to the future. The Christian’s career must have a good ending, because at every step in it he is in the hands of God and is carrying out the Divine purpose.

πάντα συνεργεῖ: a small but important group of authorities, A B, Orig. 2/6 or 2/7 (cf. Boh. Sah. Aeth.), adds ὁ Θεός; and the insertion lay so much less near at hand than the omission that it must be allowed to have the greater appearance of originality. With this reading συνεργεῖ must be taken transitively, ‘causes all things to work.’

The Bohairic Version, translated literally and preserving the idioms, is ‘But we know that those who love God, He habitually works with them in every good thing, those whom He has called according to His purpose.’ The Sahidic Version (as edited by Amélineau in Zeitschrift für Aegypt. Sprache, 1887) is in part defective but certainly repeats Θεός: ‘But we know that those who love God, God … them in every good thing,’ &c. From this we gather that the Version of Upper Egypt inserted ὁ Θεός, and that the Version of Lower Egypt omitted it but interpreted συνεργεῖ transitively as if it were present. It would almost seem as if there was an exegetical tradition which took the word in this way. It is true that the extract from Origen’s Commentary in the Philocalia (ed. Robinson, p. 226 ff.) not only distinctly and repeatedly presents the common reading but also in one place (p. 229) clearly has the common interpretation. But Chrysostom (ad loc.) argues at some length as if he were taking συνεργεῖ transitively with ὁ Θεός for subject. Similarly Gennadius (in Cramer’s Catena), also Theodoret and Theodorus Monachus (preserved in the Catena). It would perhaps be too much to claim all these writers as witnesses to the reading συνεργεῖ ὁ Θεός, but they may point to a tradition which had its origin in that reading and survived it. On the other hand it is possible that the reading may have grown out of the interpretation.

For the use of συνεργεῖ there are two rather close parallels in Test. XII Patr.: Issach. 3 ὁ Θεὸς συνεργεῖ τῇ ἁπλότητί μου, and Gad 4 τὸ γὰρ πνεῦμα τοῦ μίσους … συνεργεῖ τῷ Σατανᾷ ἐν πᾶσιν εἰς θάνατον τῶν ἀνθρώπων· τὸ δὲ πνεῦμα τῆς ἀγάπης ἐν μακροθυμίᾳ συνεργεῖ τῷ νόμῳ τοῦ Θεοῦ εἰς σωτηρίαν ἀνθρώπων.

τοῖς κατὰ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς οὖσιν. With this clause St. Paul introduces a string of what may be called the technical terms of his theology, marking the succession of stages into which he divides the normal course of a Christian life—all being considered not from the side of human choice and volition, but from the side of Divine care and ordering. This is summed up at the outset in the phrase κατὰ πρόθεσιν, the comprehensive plan or design in accordance with which God directs the destinies of men. There can be no question that St. Paul fully recognizes the freedom of the human will. The large part which exhortation plays in his letters is conclusive proof of this. But whatever the extent of human freedom there must be behind it the Divine Sovereignty. It is the practice of St. Paul to state alternately the one and the other without attempting an exact delimitation between them. And what he has not done we are not likely to succeed in doing. In the passage before us the Divine Sovereignty is in view, not on its terrible but on its gracious side. It is the proof how ‘God worketh all things for good to those who love Him.’ We cannot insist too strongly upon this; but when we leave the plain declarations of the Apostle and begin to draw speculative inferences on the right hand or on the left we may easily fall into cross currents which will render any such inferences invalid. See further the note on Free-Will and Predestination at the end of ch. 11.

In further characterizing ‘those who love God’ St. Paul naturally strikes the point at which their love became manifest by the acceptance of the Divine Call. This call is one link in the chain of Providential care which attends them: and it suggests the other links which stretch far back into the past and far forward into the future. By enumerating these the Apostle completes his proof that the love of God never quits His chosen ones.

The enumeration follows the order of succession in time.

For πρόθεσις see on ch. 9:11 ἡ κατʼ ἐκλογὴν πρόθεσις τοῦ Θεοῦ, which would prove, if proof were needed, that the purpose is that of God and not of man (κατʼ οἰκείαν προαίρεσιν Theoph. and the Greek Fathers generally): comp. also Eph 1:11; Eph 3:11; 2Ti 1:9.

It was one of the misfortunes of Greek theology that it received a bias in the Free-Will controversy from opposition to the Gnostics (cf. p. 269 inf.) which it never afterwards lost, and which seriously prejudiced its exegesis wherever this question was concerned. Thus in the present instance, the great mass of the Greek commentators take κατὰ πρόθεσιν to mean ‘in accordance with the man’s own προαίρεσις or free act of choice’ (see the extracts in Cramer’s Catena ‘e cod. Monac.’; and add Theoph. Oecum. Euthym.-Zig.). The two partial exceptions are, as we might expect, Origen and Cyril of Alexandria, who however both show traces of the influences current in the Eastern Church. Origen also seems inclined to take it of the propositum bonum et bonam voluntatem quam circa Dei cultum gerunt; but he admits the alternative that it may refer to the purpose of God. If so, it refers to this purpose as determined by His foreknowledge of the characters and conduct of men. Cyril of Alexandria asks the question, Whose purpose is intended? and decides that it would not be wrong to answer τήν τε τοῦ κεκληκότος καὶ τὴν ἑαυτῶν. He comes to this decision however rather on dogmatic than on exegetical grounds.

It is equally a straining of the text when Augustine distinguishes two kinds of call, one secundum propositum, the call of the elect, and the other of those who are not elect. Non enim omnes vocati secundum propositum sunt vocati: quoniam multi vocati, pauci electi. Ipsi ergo secundum propositum vocati qui electi ante constitutionem mundi (Cont. duas Epist. Pelag. ii. 10. § 22, cf. Cont. Julian. v. 6, § 14). In the idea of a double call, Augustine seems to have been anticipated by Origen, who however, as we have seen, gives a different sense to κατὰ πρόθεσιν: omnes quidem vocati sunt, non tamen omnes secundum propositum vocati sunt (ed. Lomm. vii. 128).

κλητοῖς: ‘called,’ implying that the call has been obeyed. The κλῆσις is not au salut (Oltr.), at least in the sense of final salvation, but simply to become Christians: see on 1:1.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Work together [συνεργει] . Or, are working together, now, while the creation is in travail. Together refers to the common working of all the elements included in panta all things.

For good. Jacob cried, all these things are against me. Paul, all things are working together for good.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.