Epistle to the Romans
Chapter 08 – The Spirit
Romans 8:1-11 Theology
The primary purpose of this chapter is to discuss the nature of the victorious life. One of the first realizations in this new life is a feeling of guilt. We are only aware of our condemned status when we become conscious of God and his moral demands. A man of low standards does not experience this condemnation. His emphasis is on what man can achieve rather than what God designed this world to be. The realization is often a specific event but it remains an ongoing process. After forgiveness we are still imperfect and will continue to sin. We will continue to fall but we are much less likely to fall utterly. The old law could not restore our relationship with God. The law of the Spirit of life through Christ finally frees us from the condemnation of the law alone. God has done what the law could not do. The Spirit allows human lives to be transformed on the evidence of what God has already done. God accomplished this redemption of mankind by sending Christ in the likeness of sinful flesh to overcome the sins of the flesh. The doctrines of the Incarnation and of the Atonement are implicit in this process. The resurrection proved God the Son’s defeat of death through the intervention of God the Father.
Again, Paul compares things of the flesh to things of the spirit. Those who live according to the flesh set their minds on things of the flesh while those who live according to the spirit set their minds on things of the spirit. Serious pursuit of fleshly interests will allow alternative interests to atrophy and eventually spiral downward unto death. Those who pursue spiritual things will allow alternative interests to atrophy and eventually achieve life and peace. The mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God because he thinks he can be his own God. Those who think they can love God and pursue fleshly things are not submitting to God’s design and cannot please God. Paul reiterates that the material basis of man’s life is neutral by nature. It can be good or bad. It depends on the choices made by man’s spirit. Often, those who break the habit of regular church attendance allow other interests to command their attention and eventually allow their spiritual interests to atrophy. If instinct is the highest power we obey, we are living in the flesh. But, if the aimlessness of appetite is replaced by the spirit of God, it becomes the motive power of a new quality of life. This quality of life distinguishes between those who are Christ’s and those who are not. One is either a Christian or is not – ye will know them by their works. Our feeble attempts to slice and dice God’s requirements to suit our desires may well be our exclusion from His kingdom.
Romans 8:12-17 Debtors and Heirs
Life as it ought to be requires a delicate balance between body and spirit, in which the former serves the latter in a relationship of fruitful subordination. To imagine that our physical nature can dictate the terms on which life will be lived is to deny our creation in the image of God. He creates the physical to serve the spiritual purpose. We are debtors to the spirit of life we received from God. To reiterate the earlier analogy, life lived on the lower plane diminishes the impact of the upper plane. The fullest possible life requires discipline to keep the lower plane in its proper place.
If we are successful in bringing our physical lives under the control of God’s Spirit, we become Sons of God. It is significant to be a son as opposed to simply one of the household. Isaac was considered a son whereas Ismael was considered a child of the household. Members of the household can be servants or slaves. Kinship presupposes an insight, understanding and devotion to the relationship. Each relationship has its appropriate emotional atmosphere. In slavery it is fear. In sonship it is confidence and grateful joy. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. It is this intimacy of fellowship between God’s Spirit and ours that allows us to discover more fully what God is. It helps us appreciate the kind of assurance that is possible in the religious life.
Being children of God has another benefit, we also becomes heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ. All things are ours if we are Christ’s. We are fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may be glorified with him. Experience teaches that nothing worth having is received until we have paid the appropriate price. Great spiritual gifts are received only after meeting exacting requirements. There will be suffering. Beyond it, there will be a new quality of experience, a new measure of power, a new awareness of our partnership in God’s purpose and a new consciousness of the splendor which surrounds even the daily lives of those who are “risen with Christ.”
Romans 8:18-27 Suffering and Expectation
No one looks forward to suffering but then no mature person expects to avoid it altogether. We consciously take on suffering only when we expect a gain at the end of the road. Sometimes, the gain is simply the confidence of being able to handle a new level of discipline. In this case we are heirs of a greater destiny than we can really understand. We know that this world has gone radically wrong. There is unity in the universe. What happens in one area will have repercussions in many areas. Nature suffers for man’s indiscretions and man suffers from nature’s reaction.
Our experience of sonship is genuine but incomplete. From what we already know, we can anticipate something of what is coming. But religious hope, fixes its expectation on the things that are unseen, not on those that are seen. We have seen the first fruits of the Spirit – the standard by which we judge ourselves. We must pray for further fruits of the Spirit. We are not good at discerning the difference between what we need and what we desire. The Spirit will direct our uncertain prayers and the result will be a growing understanding of God’s purpose.
The gospel declares that a new relationship is open to all men. For some this possibility has begun to be an actuality. But it is not inevitable. Some decline the opportunity. Our volition is necessary but more is involved than merely our effort. We must be transformed by the love of Christ. The redeemed community is not the expression of man’s gregarious instincts; it is the product of God’s creative act in Christ. We sometimes use the word “spiritual” as if it meant a completely disembodied form of existence. The Spirit finds the appropriate form through which to express himself at all levels of our physical existence. Future levels of our physical existence are unimaginable, but we know the influence of the Spirit will transform us into a greater appreciation of the Glory of God.
Romans 8:28-39 Assurance of Salvation
Paul affirms that God co-operates in all things for good with those who love him. This is not an attempt to persuade us that evil things are actually good. They remain what they are; but though bad in themselves, they have no power to defeat us. Not everyone will profit by this. The power to transform evil events into beneficent influences is given to those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. We need a new relationship to God if we are to achieve a new attitude to adversity. A relationship is always reciprocal and can be viewed from two sides. It is impossible to understand the New Testament so long as we think merely in terms of human efforts to achieve human betterment, even when we appeal to religious insights as the effective motive. Paul insists that God has a purpose which is operative in the world he has made. That is what gives meaning to the process of which we form a part. Our efforts are always a response. They are not our act but our answer to God’s act. The common understanding, the unity of purpose, the intimacy of fellowship – all the things that are inseparable from a true family – will mark the community in which God intends us to share.
There will always be difficulties, but they will lose their power to defeat our spirits because of the sustaining assurance that our resources will always exceed the demands upon them. Having Christ, we have it all. Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies; who is to condemn? Christ died, rose again, is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us. Our complete dependence is upon Christ: a) on a Christ who is not dead, but who lives; b) on a Christ who is not impotent to save, but who is throned in power; c) on a Christ who is not indifferent to our needs, but who in unfailing and effective sympathy makes known our concerns to God. Adversity has the power to embitter and to defeat the weakened participant. Nothing created can overthrow the good God designs for us except our refusal of His gifts. Our hope is based on knowing that nothing in this world will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.