What can separate us?

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?  He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?  Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.  Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?  As it is written:
  “For Your sake we are killed all day long;
 We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”
   Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.  For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come,  nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 8.31-34

There are some well meaning folks who try to tell us that it is possible for us, once adopted into God’s family and under the full protection of His love to somehow been torn asunder from His love.

What would it take though to separate us from God’s love?

Tribulation?
Distress?
Persecution?
Famine?
Nakedness?
Peril?
Sword?
Death?
Life?
Angels?
Principalities?
Powers?
Things present?
Things to come?
Heights?
Depths?
Any created thing?

That’s really quite a list isn’t it? There is not a whole lot more we could come up with. There is nothing ever going to happen that could take us out of God’s love. No matter what I am going through or how bad it seems God’s love is always there in every circumstance. His love is there. His love cannot be worn out. We can’t exhaust the treasure trove of His love.

Andrew Peterson is a wordsmith and songwriter. Here is how he describes it:

 After the last tear falls, after the last secret's told
After the last bullet tears through flesh and bone
After the last child starves and the last girl walks the boulevard
After the last year that's just too hard

There is love
Love, love, love
There is love
Love, love, love

There is love
After the last disgrace, after the last lie to save some face
After the last brutal jab from a poison tongue
After the last dirty politician, after the last meal down at the mission
After the last lonely night in prison

There is love
Love, love, love
There is love
Love, love, love
There is love

And in the end, the end is oceans and oceans of love and love again
We'll see how the tears that have fallen
Were caught in the palms of the Giver of love and the Lover of all
And we'll look back on these tears as old tales

'Cause after the last plan fails, after the last siren wails
After the last young husband sails off to join the war
After the last, this marriage is over
After the last young girl's innocence is stolen
After the last years of silence that won't let a heart open

There is love
Love, love, love
There is love

And in the end, the end is oceans and oceans of love and love again
We'll see how the tears that have fallen
Were caught in the palms of the Giver of love and the Lover of all
And we'll look back on these tears as old tales
'Cause after the last tear falls there is love