Romans 8:14–39

¹⁴Certainly, all who are guided by God’s Spirit are God’s children. ¹⁵You haven’t received the spirit of slaves that leads you into fear again. Instead, you have received the spirit of God’s adopted children by which we call out, “Abba!^aFather!” ¹⁶The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. ¹⁷If we are his children, we are also God’s heirs. If we share in Christ’s suffering in order to share his glory, we are heirs together with him. 

God’s Spirit Helps Us

¹⁸I consider our present sufferings insignificant compared to the glory that will soon be revealed to us. ¹⁹All creation is eagerly waiting for God to reveal who his children are. ²⁰Creation was subjected to frustration but not by its own choice. The one who subjected it to frustration did so in the hope ²¹that it would also be set free from slavery to decay in order to share the glorious freedom that the children of God will have. ²²We know that all creation has been groaning with the pains of childbirth up to the present time. 

²³However, not only creation groans. We, who have the Spirit as the first of God’s gifts, also groan inwardly. We groan as we eagerly wait for our adoption, the freeing of our bodies ⸤from sin⸥. ²⁴We were saved with this hope in mind. If we hope for something we already see, it’s not really hope. Who hopes for what can be seen? ²⁵But if we hope for what we don’t see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. 

²⁶At the same time the Spirit also helps us in our weakness, because we don’t know how to pray for what we need. But the Spirit intercedes along with our groans that cannot be expressed in words. ²⁷The one who searches our hearts knows what the Spirit has in mind. The Spirit intercedes for God’s people the way God wants him to. 

Nothing Can Separate Us from God’s Love

²⁸We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God—those whom he has called according to his plan. ²⁹This is true because he already knew his people and had already appointed them to have the same form as the image of his Son. Therefore, his Son is the firstborn among many children. ³⁰He also called those whom he had already appointed. He approved of those whom he had called, and he gave glory to those whom he had approved of. 

³¹What can we say about all of this? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³²God didn’t spare his own Son but handed him over ⸤to death⸥ for all of us. So he will also give us everything along with him. ³³Who will accuse those whom God has chosen? God has approved of them. ³⁴Who will condemn them? Christ has died, and more importantly, he was brought back to life. Christ is in the honored position—the one next to God the Father on the heavenly throne. Christ also intercedes for us. ³⁵What will separate us from the love Christ has for us? Can trouble, distress, persecution, hunger, nakedness, danger, or violent death separate us from his love? ³⁶As Scripture says: 

“We are being killed all day long because of you. 

We are thought of as sheep to be slaughtered.” 

³⁷The one who loves us gives us an overwhelming victory in all these difficulties. ³⁸I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love which Christ Jesus our Lord shows us.^bWe can’t be separated by death or life, by angels or rulers, by anything in the present or anything in the future, by forces ³⁹or powers in the world above or in the world below, or by anything else in creation.