God's Megaphone: by CS Lewis

Psalm 86:1-2 Hear me, Lord, and answer me, for I am poor and needy. Guard my life, for I am faithful to you; save your servant who trusts in you. You are my God;

The human spirit will not even begin to try to surrender self-will as long as all seems to be well with it. Now error and sin both have this property, that the deeper they are the less their victim suspects their existence; they are masked evil. Pain is unmasked, unmistakable evil; every man knows that something is wrong when he is being hurt. .... And pain is not only immediately recognizable evil, but evil impossible to ignore. We can rest contentedly in our sins and in our stupidities; and anyone who has watched gluttons shoveling down the most exquisite foods as if they did not know what they were eating, will admit that we can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.

A Relationship of Cooperative Love: by Dallas Willard

For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building. 1 Corinthians 3:9

We must never forget that God speaks to us for the purpose of developing an intelligent, freely cooperative relationship between him and us, in which we are fellow workers or co-laborers with him. God wants us to participate in the governance of his kingdom. This relationship is drenched in the maturity and richness of genuine agape love.

Our primary goal, then, is not just to hear the voice of God but to be mature people in a loving relationship with God. This will result in our living a certain kind of life—one of loving fellowship with God and those who love him. Only with this in mind will we hear God rightly.

Go over the phrase “God’s fellow workers” (1 Corinthians 3:9) and personalize it. Let it sink in and compare it with the common idea that God hits people over the head with a two-by-four to get them to do what is right. Thank God that an intelligent, freely cooperative, love-drenched relationship can exist between you and him.

Limitation to the Promise: by ML Jones

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

We now note what we might call the limitation to this promise. “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to his purpose.” In the original that is emphasized by placing “to them that love God” at the commencement of the sentence. “We know that to them that love God all things work together for good.”

The promise is definitely limited. It is not universal as to the people included. The popular idea of the love of God is the very antithesis of this. That idea says that He is regarded as promising to bless all in exactly the same way. That He does so in His providential dealings with mankind in general is true. But following that, there is a great fundamental division and distinction everywhere in the Bible between the saved and the unsaved, between those who have entered into a covenant relationship with God in salvation through Jesus Christ and those who have not, or, to use the words of our text, “those who are the called” and those who have not been called.

Salvation is the result of the operation of special grace, and there are special promises to those who have received this grace. The Gospel has but one word to speak to those who do not believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. It is to exhort them to repent and to believe. It holds out to them no special promises until they have done so. Indeed it threatens them with disaster. It does not tell them that “All things work together for good” for the reason that it tells them that they are “condemned already.” Special promises and comforts and consolations are not to be obtained directly. They are the consequences and results of salvation. They are offered only to those who “love God.”

An All-Inclusive Promise: by ML Jones

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

Let us look at the all-inclusiveness of the promise—“all things work together for good.” It is generally agreed that the “all things” has special reference to trials and tribulations. Here is one of the most remarkable claims ever made for Christianity. Here is certainly the boldest justification of God’s ways to man.

Let us observe what this verse says. Perhaps we shall best be able to grasp its significance if we approach it along the negative route. We see clearly that, as Christians, we are not promised an easy time in this world. Our Lord Himself in His teaching told the disciples that they would have tribulations and trials and sufferings. And in the same way Paul teaches that “unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake” (Philippians 1:29). The Christian’s view of life and of the world is realistic, not romantic. He does not avoid troubles and problems. Neither does he try to minimize the seriousness and the greatness of the troubles and problems. The glory of the Gospel is that it faces the whole situation without shirking anything, and yet shows the way out.

Some of the older versions bring out this feature in our text very clearly by adding the word “God” to “all things work together for good”—i.e., that “God works all things together for good to them who love him.” And that is undoubtedly what the apostle teaches. These trials are not to be ignored; neither are they without any explanation whatsoever. God uses them to our advantage in order to bring His own great purposes to pass. “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to his purpose.” That is the ultimate justification of God’s ways; that is the ultimate answer to all our questions as to why God allows certain things to happen.

God’s Palms: by JI Packer

See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. Isaiah 49:16

What matters supremely is not the fact that I know God but the larger fact that underlies it—the fact that he knows me. I am graven on the palms of his hands. I am never out of his mind. All my knowledge of him depends on his sustained initiative in knowing me. I know him because he first knew me and continues to know me. He knows me as a friend, one who loves me. There is no moment when his eye is off me or his attention distracted from me, and no moment, therefore, when his care falters. This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort—the sort of comfort that energizes, be it said, not enervates—in knowing that God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love and watching over me for my good.

I Must Speak: by John Owen

Ephesians 4:15 Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.

Consider, then, that of our Savior to Peter in Luke 22:32, “When you have turned back, strengthen your brothers” which containing nothing but an application of one of the prime dictates of the law of nature, cannot, ought not, to be restrained unto men of any peculiar calling as such. Not to multiply many of this kind (whereof in the Scripture is plenty), add only that of St James, James 5:19, 20, “My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back,  remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.” etc. From these and the like places it appears to me, that, —

There is a general obligation on all Christians to promote the conversion and instruction of sinners, and men erring from the right way.

Again, consider that of our Savior, Matt. 5:15, “Men do not light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it gives light unto all that are in the house;” to which add that of the apostle, “If anything be revealed to another that sits by, let the first hold his peace,” 1 Cor. 14:30 which words, although primarily they intend extraordinary immediate revelations, yet I see no reason why in their equity and extent they may not be directory for the use of things revealed unto us by Scripture light. At least, we may deduce from them, by the way of analogy, that, — Whatsoever necessary truth is revealed to any out of the word of God, not before known, he ought to have an uncontradicted liberty of declaring that truth, provided that he use such regulated ways for that his declaration as the church wherein he lives (if a right church) cloth allow.

Amos 3:8 says, “The lion hath roared, who will not fear? the Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy?” and Jer. 20: 9, “Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones; and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay;” with the answer of Peter and John to the rulers of the Jews, Acts 4:19, 20, “Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye; for we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.”

From this it appears, that, — Truth revealed unto any carries along with it an unmovable persuasion of conscience (which is powerfully obligatory) that it ought to be published and spoken to others.

That none may take advantage of this to introduce confusion into our congregations.

Is It Unlikely? By Oswald Chambers

Joab . . . had conspired with Adonijah though not with Absalom. — 1 Kings 2:28

Joab passed the big test: he remained loyal and true to David for nearly four decades, and he resisted the fascinating and ambitious Absalom. It might seem unlikely that a man of such proven integrity would ever turn his back on God. And yet, when David was on his deathbed, Joab conspired to help the scheming Adonijah seize the throne (1 Kings 1:1–7).

Always remain alert to the fact that where one has turned back, any may turn back. “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind” (1 Corinthians 10:13). Have you recently passed a big test of loyalty to God? Now is the time to pay attention to the details. “But,” you protest, “it’s not at all likely that I’ll turn back now—not after everything I’ve been through.” Don’t try to predict how temptation will come; peril lies in the least likely thing. It is in the aftermath of a great spiritual transaction that the sphere of the small and seemingly insignificant begins to exert itself. It doesn’t become dominant, but if we don’t remember that it is there, if we don’t remember to warn ourselves about it, it will trip us up.

If you’ve remained true to God under great and intense trials, now is the time to watch out for the undertow. Don’t become morbidly introspective, looking toward the future with dread. Just remain alert, keeping your memory bright before God. Unguarded strength is double weakness. The Bible characters fell on their strong points, never on their weak ones. “Shielded by God’s power” (1 Peter 1:5): that is the only safety.