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Sin is so serious that Adam and Eve's sin in the garden sent all of creation from perfection into futility. But we are awaiting a day when God is going to deliver all creation from that bondage back into perfection again when we understand the text.
Many of the Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When we understand the text as an online ministry committed to teaching sound doctrine and exposing the faulty, visit our website at www .utt .com.
Now here's our host, Pastor Gabe Hughes. Thank you, Becky.
Romans chapter 8, verses 18 through 25 is where we are today. And between today and tomorrow, going to focus primarily on that paragraph. So if you want to open up your Bibles and join with me, I'm going to begin in verse 18.
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.
For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves who have the first fruits of the spirit grown inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope for who hopes for what he sees. But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. Going back to verse 18, for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
And I think that Paul is bringing back into this something that he stated previously in chapter 5, verse 3, where he says, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance and endurance produces character and character produces hope.
And hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. So rejoicing in suffering that produces something. And whether we're talking about a suffering that is an ache in the body, like a physical pain that we would experience or emotional turmoil or the suffering that we're going to endure for the cause of Christ by preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, we will be ridiculed for that will be put down, ostracized, separated from friends.
We will will even be persecuted for our faith. The apostle Paul said to Timothy, those who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. These are things that we will suffer through while we're in this life.
But no matter what suffering we're talking about in all these things, it is producing something, a suffering that develops into something else. We give glory to God even in the midst of suffering because we know that we are sharing with the sufferings of Christ.
So we're talking about a suffering that produces something. And to be more specific with what it is producing, Romans 8 29 says, for those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of the sun.
So in all the sufferings that we share in with Christ, we are being made more like Christ. So it is a suffering that produces something. It's kind of a strange thing for Paul to say in verse 18 that we can't compare the sufferings of this present time with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
Well, of course not, because this is suffering and the glory that is coming. There is no suffering, but that's not necessarily what Paul is referring to. What he's saying is that the suffering that we endure now produces something.
It makes us more like Christ. But what he's saying then with the glory that is to be revealed, we will be like Christ. First John 3, 2, where it says, beloved, we are God's children now and what we will be has not yet appeared.
But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is and everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. So we're enduring something right now, something that is producing in us this process of sanctification, shaping us more into the image of Christ.
So we rejoice in that. Amen. Praise the Lord that we are enduring this suffering for the glory of God. But even though that's a suffering that is producing something, it just can't be comparable to the glory that awaits us.
If we endure, we are going to be made like Christ in a way that our lowly bodies are going to be transformed to be like his glorious body, as Paul said to the Philippians. So even though our suffering is producing in us a Christ likeness, it just can't be compared to the glorious likeness of Christ that we're going to have when we meet with him in glory.
That's basically what Paul is saying there in verse 18, talking about our future glory for the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. And here he personifies creation versus 19 through 25.
We had, we have this picture of creation personified. I mean, creation doesn't have a consciousness in which it's just kind of sitting around going, man, how terrible it is that man sin. And I've been subjected to futility like this.
And I've just got to sit here like this until the sons of God get what they're, what they have coming to them. And then once they're restored, well, then I get to be restored to, you know, creation's not sitting around wondering those things.
So Paul is personifying creation. It's not just we and our bodies who are going to be glorified with God, but that when Christ comes back, bringing in his peaceful kingdom, ushering in his peaceful kingdom, removing all evil and restoring all things.
It's not just we whose bodies will be made to be like his and we'll see him as he is, but it is also all of creation will be restored. Everything will come back to the way that it was when God created it, looked at it and said it is good.
So man, we're looking at this restored earth, this restored creation that is incorruptible and is perfect. The way God meant it to be when he first created it before sin came into the picture and all things were subjected to futility.
Verse 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
All things restored Christ coming back to restore all things. All that we see in this world going on, all of the chaos that is happening, the entire universe, in fact, all of the chaos that happens in the universe, the collisions, the explosions, the destruction on and on it goes.
All of this is the result of sin. Sin is so serious. Adam and Eve's eating of a fruit that God told them not to eat their rebellion against God and disobeying his perfect law. One command and they disobeyed it was so serious that it sent all of creation from the earth to the far reaches of the universe into upheaval.
All of creation changed after that. God said to Adam that the ground would be producing thorns and thistles for him now where previously the work was easy. Now it was going to be hard and he would find no satisfaction in it.
From the dust you came to the dust you will return and the dust you will be working your entire life. Part of the curse. All of creation sent into this chaos in this this place that it is in God turning people over to their depraved minds because they have set themselves against God and worship the created rather than the creator, which we read about in Romans chapter one.
Sin is a serious, serious rebellion against the holy, righteous, perfect God of the universe. And yet we ask questions like, why would God send a person to an eternal hell for a little white lie? Well, it's because of that kind of thinking that by thinking that, you know, better than God, what's the big deal, God?
Why is this such a big issue? Because you think of your ways as being higher than God's ways, loftier than God. You think, you know, better than God. And and that kind of thinking is what condemns a person is why God will judge them to an eternal hell, because even if they gave them all eternity to repent, they never would.
They would go right on believing that their ideas about how this whole thing should work is greater than God's ideas, even the smallest sin. What we might think in our human fleshly means as being the smallest sin is still the worst rebellion against God.
It is a heart that is hardened against the perfect holiness of God. And because of that, this world, as we know it, went from perfection to futility. But we are waiting for a day that will come when all of creation will be restored in our Lord Jesus Christ, as it says in Colossians 120, making peace by the blood of his cross.
The cross was the pivotal point in all of human and cosmic history. Everything revolves around the cross and the entire universe. Now, at this point, all of creation waiting for deliverance of the sons of God, because the children of God, because on the day that that happens, when Christ returns and we are all united with him in glory, he ushers in his peaceful kingdom.
He removes all evil and everything is restored to the state that it was in at the time of the Garden of Eden. So we are are so filled with hope, hopeful anticipation until that day. But in this moment, the sufferings that we endure, we give glory to God, even the aches and pains that we experience in our body make us long all the more for that day when this creation will be subjected to futility because we inhabit the creation.
Our body is part of this creation. We're feeling it breaking down every day. We feel the weight of declining health and and just decay of our bones, you know, these kinds of things. So as we experience these aches and pains, it makes us desire and long for heaven.
As we see evil happen in this world, we even endure evil patiently, as the apostle Paul said in Second Timothy two. But as we see these things happen, it makes us long all the more for God to come back and bring in his peaceful kingdom where there will be no more of these evils any longer.
We endure this suffering that produces endurance, character and hope, longing all the more for that day when we will be together with God. But that what that's producing just cannot be compared to the glory that awaits our Lord God.
We thank you for the assurances that you have given us in your word. And I pray that we are storing up these continued treasures in our heart, longing all the more for that day when Christ will be revealed.
As Horatio Spafford wrote, Lord haste the day when my faith shall be sight, the sky be rolled back as the scroll. The trump shall resound and the Lord shall descend. It is well, it is well with my soul.
That is our hope. And we pray these things in Jesus name.
Amen. This is a protection of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas. Find us on the web at www .utt .com.