Shaped by Every Circumstance (Romans 8:28–30)

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 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. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
– Romans 8:28–30

There’s so much here, and I feel like maybe more than any other verse on this podcast. I refer to Romans 8:28 as we’re praying this promise that for those who love God, all things work together for good. For those who are called according to His purpose. And we just need to remember what good means here, what His purpose is here.

Romans 8:28–30 teaches us God’s purpose for every circumstance.

Romans 8:29 goes on to describe His purpose, to conform us to the image of His Son. So God’s good purpose in our lives is that He works everything together for us to become more like Jesus, to be conformed to His image, knowing that it’s in Jesus that we have life. This is eternal life: to know and be with Jesus, to become like Him, this is life. And if that’s life, then God is saying in this passage, “I’m working everything together toward that end, towards your good”. Which may involve really hard things in our lives.

This is where I think about one of my favorite quotes from Elizabeth Elliot, who lost her first husband, Jim Elliot, as a missionary, going to spread the gospel among an unreached tribe, and he was killed by those tribesmen who eventually came to know Jesus, and she walked through all that suffering and pain of losing her husband.

And she said this: “God will not protect you from anything that will make you more like Jesus”. Let me say that one more time. God will not protect you from anything that will make you more like Jesus. This means that when we walk through hard times, even through suffering… Which we prayed about in other parts of Romans and is evident all throughout Romans 8… When we walk through suffering, we can be confident that suffering is not the end.

Romans 8:28–30 teaches us that God’s purpose is to make us more like Jesus.

God is working even in our suffering to make us more like Jesus. And that is the best end of all. That is life forever, being with and becoming more like Jesus. And so this is why we pray according to Romans 8:28. God, please take every single circumstance in our lives today and work it together for good. Work it together, we pray to make us more like Jesus.

God, I pray that over my life today, over every single one of our lives today, with whatever circumstances You lead us to lead us through, we pray that tomorrow at this time, we would look more like Jesus than we do right now. And God, we pray the same would be true the next day. We pray that no matter what happens in our lives this week, work it all together so that a week from now we look more like Jesus than we do now.

We pray that over the next year of our lives. God, we pray that whatever the next year holds, as long as You give us breath, we pray that You’d work everything together for our good so that we look more like Jesus. So that we’re closer to Jesus. And that we know and love Jesus more. And we reflect Jesus more a year from now than we do right now.

This verse challenges us to trust God in every circumstance.

God, we pray that that would be the story of our lives, that we, as we behold your glory, Jesus, would become more and more like You. That we would be transformed from one degree of glory to another, knowing that You’re working everything together toward the end. That we might be glorified with Jesus. So do it, God, we pray. Whatever that means for us today or tomorrow or the next day after that, we pray that You would accomplish Your good purposes for us through whatever we are facing.

And God, we pray this not just for us. We pray this for others around us as they’re walking through all kinds of things. We pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ who come to our mind, who may be walking through hard days. God, we pray that You would help them to become more like Jesus and help us to spur them on toward Jesus, toward life in You.

A Prayer for the Sadgope Yadav People

God, we pray for that for people who don’t know you right now. God, help us to lead others to life in You. Jesus, here we pray for the spread of life in You around the world. God, we intercede today for the Sadgope Yadav people of India and Bangladesh. 2.8 million of them, with hardly any known followers of Jesus among them. God, we pray for Your good purposes for humanity to be conformed to the image of Jesus, only possible through the gospel, through the good news of Jesus spreading to all people.

So God, we pray, please cause the gospel to spread to the Sadgope Yadav people of India and Bangladesh that they might experience life in Jesus. We pray all this over them and over our lives today. God, we want to experience Your good purpose in our lives today, and we want others to experience Your good purpose around the world. In Jesus’ name, amen.