Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself.
Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us.
Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death?
Romans 8:33-35 NLT
When Adam and Eve sinned by disobeying God, the consequences were 3 fold.
The first consequence was guilt. Their consciences accused them of wrong doing. We can see this by the fact that they tried to cover their nakedness and then hid from God. Sin always brings a sense of shame and guilt and wanting to be away from God’s presence.
The second consequence was condemnation. Adam blamed Eve and Eve blamed the serpent; each tried to condemn the other for the sinful situation they were in. God then brought condemnation on the serpent – he was to crawl on his belly and eat the things of the dust from that time forth. Eve was now to suffer painful childbirth, and Adam was now condemned to a life of relentlessly hard work to provide for his family.
The third consequence was separation. Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden, which represented the presence of God with man. They could no longer enjoy uninterrupted fellowship with their creator. The angel with the flaming sword who guarded the entrance to the garden was placed there to ensure they would never enter that paradise again.
As born-again Christians we can rejoice in the fact that Jesus dealt with these 3 consequences of sin when He died and rose again. Paul writes to encourage us that no-one, not even our own selves can accuse us before Him. When we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9). God will not break His word to us. Jesus’s death was the all-sufficient sacrifice for all our sins, past, present and future. When sins are forgiven, God remembers them no more (Hebrews 8:12). We are now justified in His sight – just as if I’d never sinned.
The devil takes delight in heaping condemnation on our heads by reminding us of all the sins we have committed. He can no longer accuse us before God, because Christ has paid the debt that we owed. He gives the plea of “Paid in full” every time the devil brings accusations against us before the throne of God. But he will keep trying to get us to feel condemned, so that we will doubt that we are forgiven and walk in fear of God rather than in the confidence of His love for us. We need to shake off that condemnation and embrace Galatians 5:1 – “It was for freedom that Christ has set us free.” We are free from condemnation!
Adam and Eve were separated from God, but we are not. Christ’s blood has united us with Him again and nothing can separate us from that love. The devil will whisper in our ear every time we are going through a hard time that God has forgotten us, or forsaken us. But Paul assures us that as born-again Christians, absolutely nothing can ever separate us from His love again. We will go through trials and hardships, Jesus assures us of that, but that is not a sign that God has separated Himself from us. He has promised that he will never leave us or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5).
The death of Jesus broke the 3-fold consequences of sin. No-one can accuse us or condemn us in God’s eyes, and nothing will ever separate us from God’s loving care again. We have so much to be joyful and thankful for. What other God would ever have done for His creation what our God has done for us!
