Romans 8 part 1

Read Romans 8.1-11

So this is a bit late in coming, busy doing work for school lately trying to do a theology based on Amos which is fun but time consuming. Anyways, let's get started. Romans 8 is one of the deepest chapters we can read. I know I said something similar about Romans 6, an while chapter 6 is difficult, chapter 8 is deep. So let's dive in.

We left off with Romans 7 in which Paul gets horrible confusing, but ultimately says, "Even though we're saved and know what sin is, we're still going to sin because we know what sin is." Paul ended 7 on a fairly depressing note, but chapter 8 begins with one of the greatest phrases we may ever hear, and it truly speaks grace in it's entirety.

"There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus."

What Paul says here is, "Yes, we are still sinners, and yes, sin still leads to death. But, though we are still sinners there is no condemnation against us because we are in Christ Jesus!" The Law has been fulfilled in Jesus, and we have died with him and have come alive with him as well. By dying on the cross Jesus had confined sin to the flesh, and we who have died with him are no longer considered according to the flesh but instead by the Spirit, and the Spirit which resides in us now is the Spirit of God himself. But having the Holy Spirit in us, we are then in Jesus. And by being in Jesus we are free from the law of sin and death. 

What this leads to then is that we ourselves fulfill the Law. We are righteous. Not by our own works though, but because we are in Jesus who has already fulfilled the Law. Confusing? Let's think about this.

When I was in Cleveland my parents came up once to visit. One day for lunch we go out to eat with the people that I was staying with. We sat around, ate, talked, got to know each other, and by this point I had lived with these people for a month or two. Afterwards my parents leave and I get a ride back with the people I was staying with. We get back to the house, are sitting around and the wife looks at me and says, "You and your dad have a lot of the same mannerisms." I never noticed before, but how could I? I'm a part of it. An egg never looks around and says, "I'm a part of this balanced breakfast." I couldn't look around and say, "I'm a lot like my dad in actions and speech." But by spending 20 years around my dad, I became like him. In the same way, by being in Christ we grow to be like him without thinking about. But that is only if we are truly in Jesus. 

What I mean by that last statement is this. As Paul writes in Romans 6.1, "Should we continue in sin so that grace may increase? No!" If we continue to purposefully sin trying to please only ourselves then we have not really been saved, we don't know the weight of sin, and we don't have the mind of God with us. But we realize what our vices are, we open ourselves up to Jesus and the Holy Spirit, allowing them to flow through us. We imitate Christ in all we do. We live as if we are saved. This is what it means to truly be in Jesus. 

And by imitating Jesus, we, like him fulfill the Law. But it is not us, as Paul writes in chapter 7, but the Spirit of God working in us. Verse 5 tells us that if we have our mind on things of the flesh: material possessions, sex, money, mind altering substances, etc. then we are still in the flesh. But if we are in the Spirit then our minds are on the things of the Spirit: righteousness, worship, God, the spread of the gospel, the caring to those around us. So I have to ask you this: Are you in the Spirit or the flesh? Lie to yourself if you wish, that's your call. God knows and will judge accordingly. I'm just here to get you to think about it. 

We see in the next verse, 6, that to set our mind on the flesh is death, where as setting our mind on the Spirit is life and peace with God. This is because in the Spirit we may please God, but in the flesh we cannot. 

9-11 ends with us reading that God dwells in us, making us the temple (1 Corinthians 3). If we do not have the Spirit, then we don't belong to God. We're not his children, heirs, disciples, or followers. We are his enemies at that point. But if we are in Christ, then even though our body is dead because of sin, our spirit is alive because of the righteousness of Christ which is given to us. And if we have the Spirit of God in us, then that spirit, which raised Jesus, shall raise us as well.

The Law

Read Romans 7

This is one of the most confusing chapters we find in Romans. When we get the point of it, it makes sense. But if we don't then we'll be saying, "Go home Paul, you're drunk!" What it comes down to is Romans 7 gets confusing, depressing, and very round-about. It's all about Paul's take on the Law.

What it comes down to is this: We are no longer under obligation to fulfill the Law, but we fulfill it anyway by being in Jesus.

As long as we are alive we are under the Law, and as we saw in chapter 5, before the Law the people were not bound by the Law, only the commandments of God of listen to him and have good relation with his creation. But, we died didn't we? Isn't that what chapter 6 was about? How we have died to sin and come alive with Jesus? So we have therefore since we are no longer alive, but instead resurrected, we are no longer under the Law. Before we died we belonged to the Law, now we belong to the one who fulfilled the Law: Jesus. Because we have been raised with him we are to bear fruit for God.

If we live in the flesh, we live according to the Law. But if we live in the Spirit, we are no longer under the Law, but the only response to living in the Spirit is to produce fruit for God.

So the big question at the moment is are you busy trying to jump through the hoops? Or are you producing fruit? Are you trying to save yourself or are you acting like you've already been saved?

Then we get into the second half of the chapter, which is where Paul gets confusing. I'll try to make this easy.

-Is the Law sin? No!
-Without the Law though we would not know what sin is.
-The Law is the canon, the measuring stick which says, "This is what is wrong, this is what is right." So without the Law, we wouldn't know what was wrong or right.
-We don't know that we have a desire to sin until we know what sin is. I never wanted to have sex until I knew what sex was. I never wanted to drink until I knew what drinking did. I didn't want to sin until I found out what sin is.
-So there are two forces working in us who are saved. That of the flesh and that of the Spirit.
-The Flesh wants to sin, which is what I don't want to do
-The Spirit doesn't want me to sin, which is what I want to do
-But my body betrays me, and I do what I don't want to do, agreeing with the Law that yes, this thing is bad and the Law is good.
-When my body betrays me and I sin, it is not be who is sinning, but the sin that is in me because in my flesh there is nothing good.
-I cannot do what is good because it is beyond my ability.

There is a war raging in each and every one of us, that sin is crouching at our door, waiting to take hold of us. And no only that buy it's killing us and we can't stop it. Sin dwells in us, making us sin, do evil, and we can't stop.

Who is going to save us from this evil?!

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the Law of God with my mind by with my flesh I serve the Law of sin.

We cannot escape sin on this earth, but God's grace is enough.

We end chapter 7 on that note, and turn the page to chapter 8 where there i hope and good news.

Slavery

Read Romans 6.15-23

So I've been slacking on this blog for a while now, I know. To be honest Romans tends to get difficult to write about at times because it's so thick. I've also had time slipping away from me as well, which is my own fault. But if you could please forgive me, I'll get started and we'll get back into Romans.

The first part of Romans 6 is about how we have died to sin, and come alive in Christ, really good stuff. Now Paul continues in this train of thought and writes about our slavery.

Christians love to talk about "the freedom we have in Christ." We have a number of worship songs and hymns about freedom. We always hear sermons on freedom surrounding the Fourth of July, Veteran's Day, and Memorial Day. Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful and respect the men and women who have served our country on behalf of our freedom. My girlfriend's dad being one of them. But even if they didn't answer the call to fight the Nazi's, communists, or terrorists, and the US was taken over by a power other than our own government, I would still be saved by Christ, my true hero, my true savior, the one who gave me true freedom. I may make some people upset with these statements, and as I said I have nothing but respect for the men and women who served this country, but Jesus is my true savior. I could continue to go on a rant about how I'm a Christian before I'm an American, and how the Christian flag should be to the right of a preacher and above the American flag, but maybe I'll save that for a holiday. What truly matters is, I am a child of God, saved by his son from the death that is my sin. And that goes before all else in my life. That there is freedom in Christ from sin.

But there is not only freedom, but also slavery. Which is ironic because slavery is the opposite of freedom right? But this slavery leads to life, not death.

Before we were saved we were dead in our sin and could not help by sin because of the broken nature of man. Paul writes that we are all slaves, either slaves to sin or slaves to God, to righteousness. One is disobedience, the other obedience. Can you guess which is which? But as Paul writes, "Thanks be to God" that even though we were once slaves to sin, we have died to sin and come alive in Jesus, becoming slaves to righteousness. Now why is Paul writing that we need to thank God for going from one slavery to another?

Because our new slavery leads to life. Someone had saved us from an awful, brutal, dehumanizing slavery. And now he asks if we want to work for him. No wages, but the work is easy, and is a natural response from accepting his invitation. Jesus delivered us from the evil one, bringing us into his house, feeding us, clothing us, making sure that, while times get rough, we are still cared for, loved, and taken care of. We may not get everything that we want, but HE WILL TAKE CARE OF US. Not only that, but he brought us back to life. We were dead and he brought us back to life. How can we not work for him?

In verse 19 we see Paul write, "I am speaking to you in human terms, because of your natural imitations." Now he's not calling the Romans stupid here, he's writing that this is difficult stuff to understand, and the best way he can help us understand it is by writing about it like this. And I'm trying to clarify it even more. To sum up the idea of being a slave to righteousness, we are to present our members, our bodies as slaves to righteousness which leads to sanctification, or the process of being made holy, separate from the world. And this is the very thing that Jesus prayed for us in his prayer in John 17, that we would be in the world not of it, that we would be holy, sanctified, slaves to righteousness, not sin.

In Matthew 6 we see Jesus talk about laying treasures in heaven, and how man cannot serve both God and money, but can only choose one. Switch money with sin, though we can say they're one in the same. If all you care about is money, then you're not bound by the laws of God, and he doesn't matter to you. If your primary focus is, "I have to make money" then God means nothing to you nor do his riches. In short, if you're going to be a pagan then be a pagan and don't try to coin yourself off as anything else. But that road leads to death. You have been set free from that road and have become a child of God and there will be fruit from your labors, and you will be rewarded in the end with eternal life.

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life with him.