What does Romans 8:18 mean?

This much-loved and often-cited verse is about Paul's perspective. He has previously written that all who are in Christ are heirs of God's kingdom with Christ, since all who are in Christ will share in His suffering before sharing in His glory.

This begins a powerful passage in which Paul discusses living, as a Christian, through the suffering that comes with this life on earth. Some Bible teachers suggest that Paul is referring "only" to suffering caused by persecution for faith in Christ. Based on the full context of the passage, however, there is every reason to understand Paul to include the everyday suffering that comes with living on this sin-stained planet. He will be clear that it is experienced by all creatures (Romans 8:20), but that only those who are in Christ look forward to sharing in the glories of God's kingdom afterwards.

Paul's perspective is that our present sufferings are not even worth holding up in comparison with the glories that will be revealed in us. Some readers might be tempted to hear Paul glossing over the enormous pain, physical and emotional, that comes with human existence. He is not. Instead, Paul is elevating the much more enormous glory to come. Paul understood pain very deeply. Second Corinthians 11:23–29 contains a small sampling of his experiences: hunger, thirst, danger, imprisonment, torture, and persecution. And yet, he says all of that suffering cannot compare to the glories that will be revealed at some future time to saved believers as God's heirs with Christ. Truly, those endless glories must be incomprehensibly wonderful, satisfying, and meaningful.

Without Christ, we could never participate in God's glory because of our sin (Romans 3:23). In Christ, as God's fully adopted heirs, we will fully experience His glory forever (Romans 6:23). This verse does not minimize the pain we experience—it simply puts it into an eternal perspective.