For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 8:38-39

Today’s Scripture Reading (January 5, 2015): Romans 8           

Handley Moule, the Bishop of Durham from 1901 until his death on May 8, 1920, once wrote about a night that he arrived in Rome with a group of English friends. As Moule describes it, it was a cloudless January night, and the group gathered in the middle of the ruins of the Roman Coliseum. The constellation Orion, the great celestial Giant that stands guard in the sky with his sword drawn and read for a fight, stood over them as the group remembered the lives that had been lost in the city during the foundational days of the faith. Among the ones who had died in Rome during those early days included both the apostle Peter as well as Paul. Tradition holds that Peter was crucified upside down, while Paul, because he was a Roman citizen, was able to escape the pain of crucifixion and was executed by the headman’s sword. But beside these prominent men, countless Christians were executed right there in the Coliseum. Some were crucified, others were beaten; still others lost their lives as they were torn apart by wild animals or dragged to their deaths by having their feet tied to the tails of wild horses. There were many ways execute a person in the Coliseum, but the end result was still the same – the people died.

On this night, in the relative quiet of the ancient place, Moule and his friends gathered and under the light of the stars they read these words of Paul – affirming for the friends that nothing can separate us from Christ. As Paul wrote the words, the situation that he faced must have, at times, seemed overwhelming. Could even Paul have imagined that one day a cross would stand in the Coliseum, placed there by Pope Benedict XIV in 1749 as a memorial of the Christians who had died in the Coliseum and in greater Rome? In fact, Benedict XIV would go even a step further and make the site a public church, forbidding anything to be removed from the Coliseum as well as declaring that the site needed to be cared for – and locked at night. (Unfortunately, in spite of all of this the looting of the Coliseum has continues even today.) But the current state of the Coliseum might be proof of the words of Paul – nothing will separate us from the love of God. What seemed like a great barrier to love, now stands tall as a testament to love

As Moule stood in the Coliseum on that January night, hearing the words that had been written centuries earlier by the Apostle Paul, he must have recognized that his circumstances were so different from that of the Apostle, yet his need was the same. Even he needed the assurance that nothing can separate him from the love of his God.

Over the past 100 years, our circumstances have changed in ways that neither Paul nor Handley Moule could have dreamed. And yet, we stand alongside both of these Christian greats and admit that our need remains the same. We need to be reassured that there is absolutely nothing that will separate us from the love of our God. That separation is something that not even we can accomplish.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Romans 9