All Things Work for Our Good, According to God

(Overcomer Wu)

"And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son," --Romans 8:28-29

In these last days fraught with many changes, calamities, and uncertainties, it is comforting to be reminded of the fact that God is still on the throne and that all things work together for good to those who love God. Please note moreover that these verses are immediately preceded by the mentioning of the Spirit's intercession in our intercession. And how that the Spirit intercedes for us "according to God" (Rom 8:27). Due to the fact that this verse is spoken in the context of verse 29 that plainly tells us God's purpose, which is to conform us to the image of Christ, it is appropriate for us to understand the phrase "according to God" (Rom 8:27) as stating, "according to God's purpose/plan." And with this in mind, we can also properly understand the "good" for which God is orchestrating all things toward -- to be conformed to the image of His Son, which is also His original and eternal purpose in creating man according to His image and after His likeness. However, when things are in fact working towards this "good" goal, it may not necessarily appear to be good in from our limited human standpoint. The key to a healthy spiritual growth is to know and embrace the ways of the Lord in helping us to reach this "good" goal.

We need to ask the Lord to give us the vision to see each circumstance through the lens of God's eternal plan and purpose. Then as we yield to the Spirit's intercession through us to allow the God the freedom to work all things according to His purpose, we will not be frustrated, stumbled, or resentful at some of these "things" that are cloaked in severity, sufferings, and sorrow. In the midst of it all, we will be able to rest in the Lord whatever betide and humbly say to our heavenly Father, "Thy will be done"... confident in the fact that God truly knows what is best for us. And our constant attitude of faith will be like that of Job: "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him" (Job 13:15). This is the pathway as well as the sign of true spiritual maturity.

To experience the transforming/conforming work of God in our lives, we need to understand that one of the most effective means He uses is our failures. Let me hasten to qualify that... by failure I don't mean sinning, but failures pertaining to our self-reliance even in matters of Christian service and our Christian life, where we are under a deception of living by the Lord's life when in fact it is our own good self or good flesh that is actively at work. Some believers' life are marked by continuous failure -- that is not indicative of the Lord's work in their lives but the lack of it. For if we have learn to triumph in the conquering life of Christ in us, we will experience victory after some failures that are engineered by Him. But for the Christians who have allowed the Lord to work His purpose out in their lives, they may sometimes be frantic and be disconcerted by the occasional failures allowed by Him. If we find ourselves in such circumstances, we should not attempt to ignore our failures, hide them, or rationalize them away; rather we should allow the Lord to use His instruments of failures to work in conforming us to His image by learning to abandon our self as the source of our daily life and draw from the abundant Source of "Christ our life" (Col 3:4), Whose life knows no failure.

Applying these verses in our intercession for others who are in dire circumstances, we need to realize that we cannot truly intercede effectively if we do not see and believe in His ways of transformation. Instead, we will simply be turning intercession into mere human sympathy for others, which will serve only to increase the contentment they have for remaining in spiritual infancy by perpetuating a state of self-reliance apart from the life of Christ. True intercession involves lifting the person and the circumstance that seems to be crashing in on him/her, before God, until he/she is consistently living, moving, and having his/her being in Christ (Act 17:28); in such a person, the Spirit can do His transforming work of changing the center and source of our lives from self to Christ, bringing us into the reality of "Not I, but Christ" (Gal 2:20).