“life cannot separate us from the love of God” - Robert Murray M’Cheyne

“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?...For I am sure that neither death nor life…nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” - (Romans 8:35,38-39)

“The age in which this epistle (to the Romans) was penned, was fruitful of suffering to the church of God. And if any period, or any circumstances of her history threatened a severance of the bond which united her to Christ, that was the period, & those were the circumstances. But, with a confidence based upon the glorious truth on which he has been descanting, the security of the church of God in Christ, & with a persuasion inspired be the closer realization of the glory about to burst upon her view, and with the most dauntless courage, he exclaims, ‘For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord’ (Rom. 8:38-39). Let us briefly glance at each of these things which may threaten, but which cannot succeed in separating us from the love of God, & from our union with Christ…

Life cannot. I remember reading of one of Brainerd’s converts, who, when brought to a full sense of the love of God, cried out, ‘Oh, blessed Lord, take me away; do let me die, & go to Jesus Christ. I am afraid if I live I shall sin again.’ She feared that life would separate her from the love of God. But no, life cannot, ‘neither death nor life’. The hope of life is meant. The apostle wrote, as we have remarked, in a peculiarly suffering era of the church, an age of fiery persecution for the gospel’s sake. Under these circumstances, life was not infrequently offered on condition of renouncing the gospel & denying the Saviour. This was a strong temptation to apostasy.

When, in suffering times, in full view of the rack, the cross or the stake, life, precious life, with all its sweet attraction & fond ties, was offered, & when a simple renunciation of the cross, & a single embrace of the crucifix, would purchase it back – to some who were weak in faith, such a temptation might be well-nigh irresistible. But it shall not succeed in separating the suffering Christian from the love of Christ.

Nor shall anything connected with life, its trials, its vicissitudes, or its temptations, sever us from God’s affection. Thus both life & death shall but confirm us in the assurance of our inalienable interest in the love of God, ‘For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s’ (Romans 14:8). Are you in Christ? Do not fear to live. The love of God will still be poured into your heart, & the Spirit of God will be given to you. ‘I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one’ (John 17:15). Neither death, nor life, can separate us from the love of God.”

- Robert Murray M’Cheyne, New Testament Sermons

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“All truly united to Christ are united to Him in His death..." - Robert Murray M’Cheyne

"You must look on Christ and all that cleave to Him as one great body of which He is the head and we the members. This is the very way in which God speaks of us in the Bible. ‘For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.’ (1 Cor. 12:12). ‘Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it’ (verse 27). Again, God ‘gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all’ (Eph. 1:22-23). And Paul speaks of ‘the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God’ (Col. 2:19).

Just as it pleased God to unite us to Adam as members of one body, so that when he sinned we sinned, when he fell we fell, so it has pleased God to unite those who believe to Christ, so that when He obeyed we obeyed, when he died we died, when He was buried we were buried with Him. The moment a poor guilty sinner cleaves to Christ, he is reckoned by Jehovah a member of Christ’s body; so that when Christ was nailed to the tree, we were nailed; when the cup of God’s wrath was poured out to Him it was poured out to us; when His blood streamed from His wounds it covered us, for we were His members.

This explains the true meaning of Galatians 2:20, ‘I have been crucified with Christ’; and Colossians 2:20, ‘If with Christ you died…’; Colossians 3:3, ‘For you have died.’ When paleness spread over the dying frame of Immanuel, it spread over us. When the last drops of blood were oozing from His wounded hands and feet, that was our life blood. When He bowed His head in agony, crying, ‘It is finished’, that was out head that bowed. It was the curse due to our sins that was finished in that awful hour. And further still, when they laid Him in the rocky sepulcher, pale, cold, motionless, where He continued under the power of death for a time, we were buried with Him.

Let us learn from this how completely believers are freed from the curse of sin. ‘For one who has died has been set free from sin’ (Rom. 6:7). When a malefactor suffers the last punishment of the law, when his dead body is cut down from the gibbet and hurried to the malefactor’s grave, the law has no more vengeance to pour out upon him. So it was when Christ died. On the cross He was in the hands of justice. But when He rose from the grace the curse was all gone. He left sin behind Him like the grave clothes, or the napkin that was about His head! So free are you from the guilt of sin, believer in Jesus! You have left all your sins in the rocky sepulcher. Sin and you are quits. ‘You are crucified’, ‘you also have died to the law through the body of Christ’ (Rom. 7:4)…

Often you despair of ever reaching a sinless world. Ah, there is one blessed way. If you are united to Christ, then God engages to make you walk in newness of life. He has pledged His glory that He will do it. His truth & covenant faithfulness, His honour & justice, His holiness & love are all pledged that He will raise you up by the almighty power of His Holy Spirit, that you may walk in newness of life! Greater is He that is for you than all that can be against you. He engages His Word & glory to give a new heart, a new mind, a new life. Be not afraid, only believe.”

- Robert Murray M’Cheyne, New Testament Sermons