“Brothers and sisters: What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” This might be the passage for me. It has always been difficult for me to point to a particular verse or passage and say that this is the one that I turn to in a time of need or speaks to me most deeply. In fact, a couple of years ago I heard my students joking about how every Gospel or Epistle I was teaching was “certainly my favorite.” In my defense, at that point, the particular Gospel or Epistle I was teaching was my favorite. Scripture is like that – its depths can never be fully plumbed or its graces exhausted. Blessed is the woman or man who is able to teach Scripture for a living. Yet, a couple of years ago I did notice that reading this passage, even in an academic setting, made me tremble. I noticed that when I needed comfort, I turned to this passage. When I thought of the suffering of those close to me, I went to read this passage. I am not certain what sort of exegesis is necessary for Romans 8:35, 37-39: to me the profound sense of Christ’s love for us overwhelms any other reading and defies explanation. When you read the passage, this love washes over you. This love is available constantly and without fail, but when I find myself separating myself from God’s love or getting caught up in the trivial (and genuine) concerns of day to day life, I return to this passage. What will separate us from “the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord”? Absolutely nothing. Not only is this my favorite passage, but that sense of God’s eternal love is my true comfort. Free to all in spite of persecution, famine, anguish, death, life, powers and principalities. Spread the Word. John W. Martens

John W. Martens is an associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minn,where he teaches early Christianity and Judaism. He also directs the Master of Arts in Theology program at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity. He was born in Vancouver, B.C. into a Mennonite family that had decided to confront modernity in an urban setting. His post-secondary education began at Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kansas, came to an abrupt stop, then started again at Vancouver Community College, where his interest in Judaism and Christianity in the earliest centuries emerged. He then studied at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, and McMaster University, with stops at University of Haifa and University of Tubingen. His writing often explores the intersection of Jewish, Christian and Greco-Roman culture and belief, such as in "let the little children come to me: Children and Childhood in Early Christianity" (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2009), but he is not beyond jumping into the intersection of modernity and ancient religion, as in "The End of the World: The Apocalyptic Imagination in Film and Television" (Winnipeg: J. Gordon Shillingford Press, 2003). He blogs at  www.biblejunkies.com and at www.americamagazine.org for "The Good Word." You can follow him on Twitter @biblejunkies, where he would be excited to welcome you to his random and obscure interests, which range from the Vancouver Canucks and Minnesota Timberwolves, to his dog, and 70s punk, pop and rock. When he can, he brings students to Greece, Turkey and Rome to explore the artifacts and landscape of the ancient world. He lives in St. Paul with his wife and has two sons. He is certain that the world will not end until the Vancouver Canucks have won the Stanley Cup, as evidence has emerged from the Revelation of John, 1 Enoch, 2 Baruch, and 4 Ezra which all point in this direction.