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.
Some verses comfort by telling you what's coming. This one comforts by telling you what can't touch you. Paul lists deaths, powers, heights, depths — the whole span of what a life could throw at a person — and says none of it is strong enough to pry God's love loose from you.
There's something worth noticing in how sure Paul sounds. He doesn't say he hopes this is true or thinks it probably is. He says he's convinced. That kind of certainty usually comes from having tested it — Paul's own life included shipwrecks, beatings, imprisonment, betrayal by friends. He wrote this as someone who'd had every reason to doubt it and didn't.
You don't need his certainty to start. You just need to ask whether a love like that is even possible, and whether it might already include you.
It might be worth asking what kind of love could survive everything Paul lists — and whether that's a love you've ever actually considered.
A short video on this is coming soon — for now, read on.