Wanting God's good

Romans 8:28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

When a woman is in the throes of labor there is one thing she wants to know from the doctor or midwife, well, actually two things: how much longer?  Is the baby OK?  So too for the suffering Christian we cry out with the generations of suffering believers who have used the words of the psalmist (Psalm 90:13 for example), "How long, O Lord?"  Rarely, if ever, does God answer that question.  However the second question, "Is everything going to be OK?" He answers with a resounding yes in Romans 8:28.  Here is the ground of our hope, the guaranteed promise from God that whatever evil has come upon me, whatever loss I have encountered, whatever pain I am enduring, it is, while I suffer it, working together for my good.  The good that it is working does not depend upon me in any way.  It depends upon the sympathetic, according to the will of God prayers of the Holy Spirit on my behalf.  That is why every suffering Christian can know that whatever evil has come upon him or her that it cannot and will not harm him or her but will result in her good.

The verse does not say bad things happen and then somehow God makes good out of the mess.  No, the thing itself, good or bad, is working for our good, even while it may be causing us pain.  Cancer has no will of its own to do good or bad to me.  Thus, the only way the suffering can possibly be working for good is if God himself is working in and through and by it for my good.  As God the Spirit knows my pain and intercedes on my behalf according to my need and according to God's will, this is how it is certain that all things, including cancer are working for my good.  I do not need to fear the cancer or the chemotherapy or my son's disability because all these things are are work for my good accoring to the direction and will of my Father.

What is the good for which all things are working in my life?  That is v. 29.  "For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers."  The good that God is working by means of all the trouble is my conformity to the image of his Son.  It is a process now underway that will not be completed until Jesus returns and makes all things new (1 John 3:2).  At that time all of God's children will be perfectly conformed to the image of Jesus so that it will be obvious to all of creation that we are of the same family as Jesus.  We will perfectly reflect the character of our elder brother.

So the real question that every Christian must ask himself or herself: how important is it to you to be like Jesus?  What are you willing to pay to be conformed to his image?  Our ability to endure the suffering in hope is directly related to our desire to be like Jesus.  This is the chief good for which every true Christian longs.  We suffer with Christ when we believe what God says in Romans 8:28-29, God is making the suffering work together for our good, which is conformity to the image of Christ forever.