Romans 8:31-34, God's Everlasting Love Part I

Paul

³¹ What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? [Jews would think of Isaac, who Paul would see foreshadowing Jesus.]  ³³ Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? [When God takes the side of the defendant, no amount of evidence can produce an adverse verdict.] It is God who justifies. ^34a Who is to condemn?

This is Wright’s translation of 8:31-34a:

³¹ What then shall we say to all this? If God is for us, who is against us? ³² God, after all, did not spare his own son’ he gave him up for us all! How then will he not, with him, freely give all things to us? ³³ Who will bring a charge against God’s chosen ones? It is God who declares them in the right. ³⁴ Who is going to condemn?

Paul moves to a string of rhetorical questions. He wants his hearers to think through his thoughts and come up with the answers themselves. In the second question, verse 31b, the question does not mean no one will ever oppose us, but when they do, we can know that, because God is for us, any such opposition will in the long run be negligible, however painful and frustrating it may be at the time. In verse 32 he calls to mind, and weaves into the text, an allusion to Genesis 22, where Abraham prepares to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. Abraham did not spare his only son; and now, remarkably enough, this can be said of God himself as well. He isn’t saying there won’t be problems. He is holding out a stupendous promise that will far outshine any and all challenges. Paul then speaks of God giving us all things with and through Jesus.

In verse 33 Paul declares that no one can bring a charge against God’s chosen ones because he has already declared them to be in the right. Verse 34 is more complex. It opens a sudden window on Paul’s overall view of the risen and ascended Jesus and his continuing ministry on our behalf. Verse 8:1 declared that there was “no condemnation” for the Messiah’s people. “Who is going to condemn?” in verse 34 follows the story in John 8:1-11 of the woman caught in adultery. Jesus says to her, “Has no one condemned you? Neither shall I.” Sin has been condemned in the flesh of Jeus, so there is now no condemnation. God has chosen to dwell in us through his Spirit, so there is no condemnation. We are already in the Messiah, so there is no condemnation.