This morning I just peacefully sit, like Mary, at Jesus the Master’s feet, to hear what He has to say.
”You have chosen the better way. All the feverish activity, both physical and mental has no value unless it spings from your relationship with Me which starts each day with worship, recognising Me for who I am, flowing to thanksgiving and then becoming quiet to hear what I would say to you. So, yes, listen to my voice and especially as it is written in My Word. However without the presence of the Spirit all that activity will simply be that and will fall short of actually making contact with Me and hearing Me speak to you.”
Please read Romans 7:24-8:3. Having dealt with the role of the law extensively in ch 7, Paul now comes to the great statement in 8:1. “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” Why does he say that at this stage? Well the whole problem, especially with the Jew, is that living a life of trying to follow the law, will leave every person, as they fall short of complete obedience, feeling they are condemned, or lost. However Paul has reached a stage in his argument, in 7:24, where he calls out the great news that Jesus rescues those who recognise their need and come to Him for salvation.
So what is the problem? That lies in the second part of Romans 7:25. Although we have been rescued, we are nevertheless still involved in a battle. A battle between the saved mind and the reality of our sinful flesh. This battle can often feel as if we are failing and still under condemnation. It is to deal with this that Paul now turns to Ch 8. We will take his argument piece by piece.
We should be freed from any suggestion that we are under condemnation, because we can’t meet its righteous requirements: The righteous requirements of the law have been fully met in us ie those who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. V 4. This is what Jesus has accomplished through becoming a sin offering for us vs 3 – that took care of the requirements of the law for salvation or as a means to become “righteous”. That is what he means when he says because through Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.
Paul is trying to get us to understand that, in this battle we should not allow our feelings to tell us that we are condemned when we struggle and perhaps fail in the battle, described in 7:25b we must get our minds and thinking right as we focus on the facts. Paul will build on this in ch 8.
So what does this mean for us in practice? The Christian still lives in a broken and sinful world and although we have been saved spiritually. Nevertheless we still have this natural tendency to follow our own way and the Spirit helps us fight against that. So when we feel we have failed again and maybe even question whether we are really saved, we are to remind ourselves of the fact that Jesus’ death on the cross took care of any possible need to be obedient to the law as a way to be saved.
Two warnings: this does not mean we can go out and live without restraint. We now live by the Spirit who guides us in the way we should be interpreting the law cf Matthew ch 5, and applying it in our lives. But when we fail Jesus’ death has taken care of that. – therefore no condemnation should be felt.
Secondly, Paul repeats almost an aside, that what is being taught here is for those “who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit”. It is only once one has received the Spirit when they became Christian that this teaching applies.
I hope you all had a blessed Easter, see you all again next week.