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While We Wait - Waiting For Salvation

  • Writer: Paul Downie
    Paul Downie
  • 9 hours ago
  • 18 min read

Romans 8:22-27 NIV

[22] We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. [23] Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. [24] For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? [25] But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. [26] In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. [27] And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

I have a confession to make. In the mid 1990s-early 2000s, I was a fan of grunge music.

I know that some of the lyrics were not so wholesome. I had a real problem with some of the more controversial lyrics on Nirvana’s ‘Nevermind’. I admired the poetry and artistry and skill of Pearl Jam’s ‘Ten’, even though some of the songs about mental health issues, child abandonment and teenage suicide were very depressing. I really enjoyed the early Radiohead albums, before they became wildly experimental. There were quite a few other bands whose music and aesthetic I admired. Most people found it just dark and heavy. What I saw behind it was the angst I and millions of other teenagers were feeling. They were singing our reality.


Which was actually highly ironic. We lived in some of the most wealthy, most privileged nations in the world. Yet we were listening to angry, jaded music about the dingy realities of contemporary life that yearned for something more.


They were singing our angst-ridden truth.


Yet we had far more than many teenagers in the world.


To quote one female rock star, ‘Isn’t it ironic, don’t you think?’


Many Christians may have condemned this movement outright. After all, these were scruffy people singing aggressive songs about sometimes dark realities. They weren’t at all happy, uplifting or remotely positive.


However, to condemn this movement is to ignore what it represented. Underneath the unkempt hair and the baggy clothes and the often-encountered issues with substance abuse was a profoundly deep movement against the blind optimism of the shiny, but failed, trickle-down economics of the 1980s.


This angry music emerged from tbe industrial city of Seattle, WA, where, like many industrial cities, jobs were being lost and economies were shrinking, as big business entered the race to the bottom and abandoned the more expensive workforce in their own towns. These people felt badly neglected. They bore deep wounds. They were yearning for a deeper reality beyond their ‘left behind’ lives, but felt it was always just beyond them.


These were people who had a ‘God-shaped hole’ in their life that was filled with only emptiness and despair.


Their ‘quiet-loud-quiet’ song structures hid a longing for the reality that only God can fulfil.


Their songs had a much deeper meaning than the industry-produced money-making racket that is modern popular music.


That yearning for a deeper reality may have been expressed in ways we find difficult to take, but the truth is that every Christian ought to feel the same groans they did. In fact, the Bible teaches that not only Christians groan! 


This groan comes from the angst and pain of living in the ‘in-between world’: of being saved on earth, but but not yet experiencing the completeness of the heavenly joys. It’s that deep sense that this earth is not our home: that there is something else out there, but we just don’t have it completely yet.


This is precisely the feeling that Paul talked about here, in verses easily eclipsed by the giant verses on either side. Yet this simple passage spells out the yearning that exists inside every one of us, and also tells us how it will be satisfied. It tells us what we are waiting for, why we wait, and how it feels to wait. That makes these verse some of the most evangelistic in the whole Bible.


Because where some Christians might seem aloof and detached from the everyday life in which we exist, these verses meet it square on and in incredible detail.


We see here that three entities groan. When we discover what they are and why they groan, the mystery behind why we feel the angst we sometimes feel is laid bare.


The first entity is that of The Whole Creation.


The Whole Creation Groans

Romans 8:22 NIV

[22] We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/rom.8.22.NIV)


If anyone was to ask you, ‘The Bible says that the whole of creation is groaning. Why do you think that is?’ what would be your answer?


Global warming?


Pollution?


Exploitation?


War?


Neglect?


Natural disasters?


We could go on and on and list plenty of reasons why the world is groaning. And I don’t imagine for a second that many would be wrong. 


But the Bible gives a different reason – one that perhaps we would not expect:


Romans 8:19-21 NIV

[19] For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. [20] For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope [21] that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

We saw here the reason for groaning. And that reason is that creation wants to know who the children of God are. And who are the children of God?


John told us:


1 John 3:1 NIV

[1] See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/1jn.3.1.NIV)


It’s us. We are the children of God. We are the people this world is longing to know.


Paul taught that the reason creation groans is that it does not know who we are. John taught that the reason why it does not know who we are is because it does not know Jesus.


Why is that?


Because it was Jesus who made it possible for us to be adopted into the family of God (Galatians 4:4-7).


We also see the cause for groaning: that is, creation was created to groan! In fact, we might be surprised to see that God created creation to groan. This is how wise Solomon explained it:


Ecclesiastes 3:10-11 NIV

[10] I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. [11] He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. 

In other words, all of us – every part of creation, in fact – are born with an awareness that this life is not all there is and that there is something beyond. We don’t know what it is, but we yearn for it.


The garage rock band Soul Asylum put it this way:


We are not of this world

But there’s a place for us...

And Oh, I am so homesick

But it ain’t that bad

Cos I’m homesick for the home I never had


Romans tells us that this homesickness is normal, that we are created to feel it, that it’s part of our nature and that we should embrace it.


But God had a reason for making us this way. In fact, that reason was described by Paul to the Areopagus in Athens:


Acts 17:24-27 NIV

[24] “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. [25] And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. [26] From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. [27] God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 

God made us groan and yearn for eternity so that we would realise that our deepest needs are not met in anything from this world, but only in Him, and no-one else.


God did that so that all of creation might be wholly unsatisfied with the cheap trinkets of this world and might reach across into eternity to find Him. Then it would find the hope that those who are already the children of God have found. As the famous French philosopher, mathematician and Christian Blaise Pascal is famed for saying ‘There is a God-shaped vacuum at the heart of every man’. 


Paul went further. He said that it was at the heart of all of creation. And the only way creation will fill that hole is to reach across from the temporary, fading world to the eternal God.


That is the purpose in the groaning.


So we see, then, that creation’s biggest problem, and ours in particular, is that we have a deep need only God can fill. If we allow anything else to fill it, we will remain empty. Part of the reason why so many fall into nihilistic ruin or existential despair and depression is because they keep trying to fill the hole that only God can fill with just about anything else, and get frustrated, angry and depressed when it just does not work.


Because that was not the way we were made to be.


So we see that the whole creation groans because it needs God.


But it is not alone. We Groan.


We Groan

Romans 8:23-25 NIV

[23] Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. [24] For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? [25] But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

I have met a lot of groaning Christians. I have to say that very rarely has it been about eternal matters.


However, this groan is very interesting. Those who are without Christ groan because they feel there is something better, but can’t substantiate that feeling; as Christians, we know there is something better out there and we long for it to happen. We know there is an eternity. We know there is a heaven. We know that the best of life is ahead of us. We are just not there yet now.


We could look at it another way. Imagine for a second the best holiday you could ever hope for – money and distance are no object. Now imagine you booked that holiday. It was in your calendar. You would, naturally, be very excited about going. Of course you would. It’s the holiday of a lifetime.


But you would also be impatient and frustrated because you haven’t got there yet. You would constantly be comparing the grind of daily life to the holiday and longing for it to happen.


Multiply that emotion by infinity and you have how we ought to feel.


We live in a fallen, mortal world. We live in a world where things wear out, rust, decay, break; where people experience pain and sickness, grow old and die. We live in a world pock-marked by joy, but with the inevitable approach of despair. This is not how things should be, and we know it.


But for the Christian, there is hope. Real hope. Undeniable hope. As Paul explained:


1 Corinthians 15:50-57 NIV

[50] I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. [51] Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— [52] in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. [53] For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. [54] When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” [55] “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” [56] The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. [57] But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Do you see it?


Because of Jesus Christ, the gravitational pull towards entropy and death is over. Because of Jesus, every tunnel has a light at the end of it. Because of Jesus, every midnight has a dawn. Because of Jesus, every suffering has an end. 


Because of Jesus, we see this:


Revelation 21:3-4 NIV

[3] And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. [4] ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/rev.21.3-4.NIV)


So yes, we groan. Why shouldn’t we? But our groans are not about the frustrations and despair of this life. No, our groans are because of this:


2 Corinthians 5:1-10 NIV

[1] For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. [2] Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, [3] because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. [4] For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. [5] Now the one who has fashioned us for this very purpose is God, who has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. [6] Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. [7] For we live by faith, not by sight. [8] We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. [9] So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. [10] For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/2co.5.1-10.NIV)


We groan because we long for the day when every injustice will be put right, when every tear will be wiped away, when every hate will be replaced by love, when every longing will be satisfied, when every sadness will be long forgotten, when every ungratefulness will be replaced by exuberant worship. 


Who wouldn’t? It’s better by far!


But you must see this – I hope you see it: the world groans because it longs for a substantive hope; we groan because we have that hope and are longing for it to be satisfied. 


We both groan.


We have something in common with the very worst of sinners, the most hard-working of migrant workers, the most workaholic of entrepreneur, the most voracious of hedonist, the most spiritual seeker.


They all want something more, something better. So they grown because they don’t have it.


But we have it. And we know it feels to groan because we long for its completion.


We have something in common.


We both groan.


But we groan for a much better reason. 


What if we invited them to groan with us for the same thing?


So we have seen, then, that both Creation and Christians groan. If nothing else, that ought to encourage us to get out of our Christian ghettos and stop behaving like either we’re weird or everyone else is weird.


But there is one other entity that groans. And that entity might surprise us: Christ’s Spirit Groans.


Christ’s Spirit Groans

Romans 8:26-27 NIV

[26] In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. [27] And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

One of my jobs when I was a missionary, particularly in my latter two years, was to act as an interpreter for visiting speakers who couldn’t speak Romanian. That was quite an eye-opener. There was an ‘in-joke’ among interpreters. Sometimes a preacher would come and he would be organised, with clear notes, and you could follow his train of thought with ease. I even managed to interpret for one speaker before he spoke because I could understand what he was going to say before he said it!


On other occasions, a speaker would show up with little or no notes, would be poorly organised, would speak bad English and kind-of fumble around in the pulpit, seemingly hoping that somehow inspiration would strike. When that happened, the poor interpreter would have a terribly hard time. They would often have to backtrack and correct what they had said once the train of thought became clearer. 


Sometimes they could barely understand the speaker at all. 


When that happened, they would joke with us that ‘I preached a good sermon today’ instead of the preacher!


It’s often hard to explain someone else’s thoughts and emotions. I have seen a few people do it absolutely perfectly, totally in synch with their speaker. I’ve seen others struggle badly.


The Holy Spirit does it perfectly. These verses picture Him in the courts in Heaven, representing our groans before God in prayer. He is our Advocate.


Have you ever had to go to court? I have a few times. It’s not a pleasant experience I would wish to repeat too often. There both sides will normally come with a representative – a legal counsel – who will interpret and explain their case in a way that is acceptable to the court and is more likely to get a positive result.


That is what Jesus said the Holy Spirit does for us:


John 14:15-18 NIV

[15]  “If you love me, keep my commands. [16] And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— [17] the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. [18] I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 

I don’t believe this is in the sense that we would understand it from the courtroom. There a judge who does not have the full picture of what happened faces arguments from at least two people with different perspectives who try to persuade him or her of the value of their case. God is not like that. He already knows all. 


No, I see this as the Holy Spirit interpreting our situation into the language of Heaven.


And how does He do it?


He groans!


That is the astonishing part: He groans. He groans our groans before the Throne of God Himself!


Now, if you were unjustly charged of a criminal offence and all your defence lawyer did was stand in front of a full courtroom and groaned, I’m pretty sure you’d be raising an objection to the judge and sacking your counsel. 


But that is not what is happening here. The Holy Spirit is not trying to get us off with a serious offence. That is not His job. Jesus paid the price for us on the cross (Galatians 3:13).


No, what is happening here is that the Holy Spirit is echoing our groans – our aches and pains and frustrations and troubles – before the Throne of God for us, and He is doing it by groaning.


And there is more. As we saw on a previous study, all of Heaven falls silent to hear our prayers (Revelation 5:8, 8:1-5). How much more the intervention and intercession of the Holy Spirit Himself! So He groans our groans and the whole of Heaven inclines their ears to listen.


Hallelujah!


Wha a huge benefit we have! The rest of creation wrestles with existential despair because they hope there’s something more, but there’s nothing to substantiate that belief. And so they try to fill their lives with everything that God means, but ultimately fail. They are like people trying to slake their thirst with dust and sand. It will never work.


But we as Christians have a similar longing, only this time for Heaven. And we are absolutely not alone in this longing. God not only understands our situation, but His Holy Spirit, who is in us, takes our groans and pain to the very Throne of God in Heaven. 


The search for the ultimate reality and the sense of needing something more is something we share with everyone else in all creation. Yet we have the assurance they don’t have: that there is something more, and that something more is God Himself.


Yes, the wait for salvation is often painful. Yes, it is hard. Yes, there are days when we wish it was already over.


But we already have everything we need to get through it.


Should we not share it with those who need it?


Conclusion

Romans 8:18-28 NIV

[18] I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. [19] For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. [20] For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope [21] that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. [22] We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. [23] Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. [24] For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? [25] But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. [26] In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. [27] And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. [28] And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 

Waiting for public transport can sometimes be tricky. Sometimes even anxiety-inducing.


Waiting for it in a place you know is fine enough. Waiting for it in a place you don’t know, or where fewer people speak your language, can be interesting.


Waiting for it in rural areas where even the printed timetable can’t really be trusted is very tricky. Especially if you are on your own. Especially if the sky is darkening towards evening.


Waiting for transportation when you know it will soon be finishing and you’re worried that you might be too late?


Now, that’s really quite something.


I can honestly say that I’ve done all of the above. It’s much easier now with GPS and smartphones, when you can see when your transport is coming.


But the same cannot be said of Jesus.


Acts 1:7 NIV

[7] He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/act.1.7.NIV)


Heaven awaits us. It’s a place of utter fulfilment. Complete peace. An end to pain and suffering. Where sin is defeated. Where evil is vanquished. Where we are restored better than we ever were.


Where we will experience happiness unbound.


And we long for it. Obviously we do.


Or we should.


But we also wait for it. 


We don’t know when it will come. We simply believe that it will come because God has told us it will come.


While the rest of creation longs for everything Heaven represents, we are assured that it will come. So we groan. Like the rest of the world, we groan. But we groan for something we know will happen. They groan because they feel the lack, but they do not know what it is that they lack.


We groan, despite lacking nothing when the Lord is our Shepherd (Psalm 23:1), because we yearn for a better life which we know one day will arrive.


These verses give us amazing comfort as we wait. We wait because we know that what we need will come. That is a tremendously strong position to be in.


But we also see why we need to share this message with others. They wait without knowing what they are waiting for. They yearn without knowing what they are yearning for. This yearning leads to symptoms with which we are all too familiar: angst, frustration, a sense of chronic unease, and, when we find ourselves feeling like we should give up, existential despair, depression, nihilism and empty, mindless hedonism.


Do you recognise them at all?


Yet these verse state that, because of Jesus Christ, we have the answer to them all. We have a hope that will bear fruit. We have a God who works for our good while we wait. We have a deep conviction that our best days are always ahead of us.


Isn’t this good news more than worth sharing?


Prayer

Lord Jesus, I often groan for a better life. I know You made me like this. Help me to seek that better life in You and nowhere else. Help me to share that better life with others. Amen.


Questions 

  • There is a lot of groaning in these verses. Why is that good news?

  • What do we have in common with everyone else? How can this help us as we share the Gospel?

  • What makes us as Christians different to everyone else? Do you have these things? How can you have them?

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