A Penitent Blogger
Working for good
A truly comforting thought for these days of disaster - such is the first verse from one of the readings available for today(Rom 8:28-30):
We know that all things work for good
for those who love God,
who are called according to his purpose.
“ALL things work for good?!” some will exclaim. “Even the deaths of thousands? A million people homeless? A hundred billion dollars of destruction?”
The fact that the passage speaks more than once of the “predestined” does not help: making the passage sound even more like pie-in-the-sky elitism.
To be sure, “predestination” can be a theologically complicated topic and has been the subject of debate through the centuries. On a practical level, some interpretations of “predestination” lead to smugness and presumption, some to fearfulness and despair, still others to fatalism and hedonism.
The bottom line of predestination, however, is neither smugness nor fear nor fatalism.
The bottom line of predestination - and the bottom line of this passage from Romans - is hope.
St. Paul is not here saying that people are predestined to hell, nor is he saying that everything is good when things are not good.
This is a message of hope: a hope that is grounded in God’s eternal plan but is not yet fully realized (that’s what makes it hope).
This hope is not some mindless optimism or "Pollyanna on steroids," for it is grounded in God’s eternal plan. God has predestined us “to be conformed to the image of his Son” - the Crucified One who rose from death and now reigns in glory.
As human beings, our perception and our comprehension are not unlimited. Moreover, in times of crisis and tragedy, our focus can become narrow, our vision clouded, and our minds overloaded.
Hope enables us to continue where our human faculties can reach no further.
We cannot always see the path; we cannot always understand the entire eternal plan; but we can always have the gift of hope by the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and NOTHING can stop that grace from making all things work for the good, no matter what terrible things we may have to suffer, as Paul makes so eloquently clear at the end of this chapter.
For I am convinced
that neither death, nor life,
nor angels, nor principalities,
nor present things, nor future things,
nor powers, nor height, nor depth,
nor any other creature
will be able to separate us
from the love of God
in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We know that all things work for good
for those who love God,
who are called according to his purpose.
“ALL things work for good?!” some will exclaim. “Even the deaths of thousands? A million people homeless? A hundred billion dollars of destruction?”
The fact that the passage speaks more than once of the “predestined” does not help: making the passage sound even more like pie-in-the-sky elitism.
To be sure, “predestination” can be a theologically complicated topic and has been the subject of debate through the centuries. On a practical level, some interpretations of “predestination” lead to smugness and presumption, some to fearfulness and despair, still others to fatalism and hedonism.
The bottom line of predestination, however, is neither smugness nor fear nor fatalism.
The bottom line of predestination - and the bottom line of this passage from Romans - is hope.
St. Paul is not here saying that people are predestined to hell, nor is he saying that everything is good when things are not good.
This is a message of hope: a hope that is grounded in God’s eternal plan but is not yet fully realized (that’s what makes it hope).
This hope is not some mindless optimism or "Pollyanna on steroids," for it is grounded in God’s eternal plan. God has predestined us “to be conformed to the image of his Son” - the Crucified One who rose from death and now reigns in glory.
As human beings, our perception and our comprehension are not unlimited. Moreover, in times of crisis and tragedy, our focus can become narrow, our vision clouded, and our minds overloaded.
Hope enables us to continue where our human faculties can reach no further.
We cannot always see the path; we cannot always understand the entire eternal plan; but we can always have the gift of hope by the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and NOTHING can stop that grace from making all things work for the good, no matter what terrible things we may have to suffer, as Paul makes so eloquently clear at the end of this chapter.
For I am convinced
that neither death, nor life,
nor angels, nor principalities,
nor present things, nor future things,
nor powers, nor height, nor depth,
nor any other creature
will be able to separate us
from the love of God
in Christ Jesus our Lord.
posted by Penitens | 6:13 AM
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