"Be not weary in well-doing" (2 Thess. 3:13)

Romans 8 was written to assure the weakest believer that salvation in Christ is eternally certain because it is the work of our triune God. There is no condemnation in Christ (v1). God accomplished in Christ’s life and death what the law by our life and death could never do (vv. 2-4). We died with Christ to sin’s guilt and the curse and bondage of God’s law (Rom. 6:3-11; 7:4). By this we are justified before God. Though in our natural mind we are hostility itself towards God (v7), nevertheless we have been raised in spirit; the Spirit of Christ and of God now lives in us (v10). Our spirit now lives because Christ lives in us and He is our life (Col. 1:27; Gal. 2:20; 2 Cor. 3:6; Eph. 2:4). He has given and will yet give us all grace to trust and hope in Christ unto the end, to lead us ever onward in this walk of faith until He raises our bodies in the totality of our redemption (vv. 5-11). We are  therefore happy debtors to Christ for His saving grace. We are not slaves under the law. We are not slaves to our flesh. We are glad servants in the grace of Christ, our great God and Savior (vv. 12-13). We are sons of God. This is by the will and predestinating purpose of God our Father (James 1:18; John 1:12-13). This is by the incarnation and redeeming blood of the Son of God in our nature (Heb. 2:9-10; 9:12-15; 10:7; Eph. 1:4-7; Gal. 4:4-5). This is by the indwelling, life-giving Spirit of God (John 3:6-14; Rom. 8:9-10; Gal. 4:6). But though we are now the sons of God, we have not yet received the promised possession of eternal glory; it does not yet appear to our sight what we shall be (1 John 3:1-2; Heb. 10:35-36; 11:8-16; Rom. 4:13-25). Therefore, we both hope and patiently wait for the salvation that is ours in Christ (Lam. 3:22-26; Rom. 5:1-10; Gal. 5:5). Christ has obtained eternal glory for us (Heb. 1:3; 9:12-16). He has taken possession of our inheritance that is ours with Him (Rom. 8:17; Heb. 6:20). By God-given faith in Christ, heaven is our present possession (Heb. 11:1; Acts 18:27). We not only trust Christ by the grace of the Spirit of Christ in us, but we also hope for glory, which is the reward of Christ’s righteousness (Rom. 8:19-25; Col. 1:27; 2 Tim. 2:10). As if that weren’t enough to ensure our victory, the Spirit of Christ also helps our infirmities (vv. 24-25). In all of our weaknesses, He makes intercession for us (v26). He knows the will of God. We are indivisibly joined to Him (1 Cor. 6:17). His intercession and groanings in us causes us to groan in our spirit. Though in ourselves do not know what to pray, His intercession in us perfectly expresses the eternal will of God in every detail of our lives (v. 26). Christ, on His glorious throne of grace, searches the hearts of all men, but especially the hearts of His blood-bought people to know the mind of the Spirit for us. He makes intercession for us at the right hand of God in all the efficacy and glory of His blood and righteousness, which He offered and fulfilled in our behalf (Rev. 19:13). This mysterious operation of God by His Spirit in us, and Christ on the right hand of God for us, is according to the eternal will of God the Father (vv. 27-28). It pleased the Father to save us by Christ as our Substitute. And it pleased our Father that we would come to the completion of this salvation through a life of faith in Christ and the expectancy of hope in Christ, all through the operation of His Holy Spirit in us, and by Christ on the throne for us (v27; Gal. 5:5). Thus, all things in time and life and death and this world and heaven itself, even in hell beneath, work together for our good, to conform us to the image of God’s dear Son (vv. 28-29). There can be no failure in one thing God determined and Christ purchased for His people (v32). This has been His will from eternity (v30). He will make known to the onlooking universe that we are His, that we are Christ’s, that we are the sons of God, that He has justified us, that Christ died for us, that He rose for our justification and is seated in glory to make intercession for us to bring about all that He established and purchased in the blood of His everlasting covenant of grace (vv. 28-34; Heb. 9:12-16; 13:20). He will save to the uttermost all who come to God by Him (Heb. 7:25; Rom. 5:9-10)! The great conclusion is drawn for us in preeminent climax: nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord; He is the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth whose will and word and work cannot fail (vv. 35-39)!

Therefore, since our all-wise and all good God and Father has ordained that we live and are saved in this grace of faith and hope in Christ, “let us have grace that we may serve God in reverence and godly fear” (Heb. 12:28). “Be not weary in well-doing” (2 Thes. 3:13), but “be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58). If nothing is impossible for our God and Father, if He has given His Son up to judgment for us; if He has given us who are the epitome of weakness His Spirit of grace, and revealed to us His eternal purpose and work in Christ; if He has promised to give us all grace in Christ; then we are free as sons of God to embark in every work and endure every trial looking to Christ and hoping to the end as we run this race, knowing we cannot fail because our Rock is Christ (Deut. 32:31). He is immovable and unfailing (2 Tim. 2:10-13; Matt. 7:24-26).

Rick Warta