Romans 8: 5
Life in the Spirit

Now, Paul turns to the second characteristic of that godly life.  In other Pauline passages it is described as "walking worthy of the Gospel," or, as we might say, "exemplifying the fruit of the Spirit" and as it is described in the Johanine letters, "walking in the light."  Here, it is described as “walking in the Spirit,” “being in the Spirit,” and as "setting the mind on the Spirit."  (Don't for a moment, confuse this with the other use of these words as religious people acting like a bunch of escaped inmates from a mental hospital.)  Here, Paul sees the godly life as an inevitable outcome of the true work of the Holy Spirit in personal regeneration and sanctification.  It is inevitable.  It will be there in some significant degree if the individual has truly accepted Christ.

I. THE FIRST ASPECT OF THIS SANCTIFICATION, THIS "LIFE IN THE SPIRIT," IS A LIFE WHICH DEMONSTRATES OBEDIENCE TO GOD.

1. I have told you what I thought, and what the great majority of the commentators of Reformed persuasion thought, was the point of chapter 7, that it is a dramatic depiction of the intense struggle within the Christian, of his "old nature" against his "new nature." 

Chapter 7 suggests this as it depicts the negative side of the Christian life, which, as Alexander Whyte said, "is falling down and getting up and falling down and getting up, all the way to heaven."  That is one side of a paradox.  Here is the other' side.  It is a substantial measure victory over sin, and some serious growth in grace.  It is important to see that the "normal Christian life" is not just "falling down and falling down" but “falling down and getting up."  It is going somewhere!  It is making progress in godliness.  If we do not see this, and balance off Romans 7 with this truth, we are in a danger of a flat contradiction with major portions of the New Testament. 

2. The normal Christian life is one where there are large and growing areas of obedience -- what Paul calls here in v.4 "walking according to the Spirit,” and where there is lessening and minimizing "walking according to the flesh."  Paul says here that there is a difference in the general quality of the Christian's life contrasted with his former life.  

Paul's way of putting it is in "vv 5-9(a)."  He assures us that no truly justified person will give his life over to the flesh, because "he is in the Spirit!” -- by which Paul presumably means "indwelt by the Holy Spirit." 

And in the case of us all: is there a general godliness about our life being lived in the light of God's Word, even in the midst of the paradoxical Romans 7 experience of falling down and getting up and falling down and getting up?

Now, you who are young will not want to accept what I am about to say as being true.  But as an historian and as a person who has lived in American history for more than 3/4 of a century, it is surely true that our Christian sense of right and wrong and of basic morality in the sexual realm is being challenged in our society in a way that has not been challenged ever before.  We must be driven by the Word of God, so that we do not overreact by adding to the Word of God as a standard for our obedience in a time when all standards are being lessened and erased.  This is a time for utmost seriousness about heroically obeying God, if there ever were a time.

Now, notice that this obedience to God, this "walking in the Spirit," as Paul calls it, is not just a matter of the individual trying harder:

II. THIS OBEDIENCE FLOWS OUT OF THE CHANGE WORKED IN REGENERATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL BY THE HOLY SPIRIT.

1. "You are not in the flesh," Paul says in v.9, "You are in the Spirit, if the Spirit dwells in you." 

2. At precisely the same time as the individual is justified, he is also regenerated, and the Holy Spirit does a "remake" of his mind, and soul, and habits.  He is made a "new creature;" He is given a "new nature" that initiates the struggle between what chapter 7 calls his "flesh" and his "mind," as we see in that chapter. 

The Holy Spirit is there -- in that individual's life -- prompting him, pushing him, urging him.  The Spirit is a source of joy and peace, but when the Christian is disobedient and inattentive, the Holy Spirit is like a "stone in the shoe" or a "thorn in the flesh."  

Perhaps there is someone here this morning who has gotten lax and has let up in the struggle against sin, and is right now being spoken to by the Holy Spirit, who indwells you.  If you are undergoing a bit of discipline over this, don't be unhappy and resentful, like a spoiled child, but give thanks and praise to God that he keeps after you!  It is just like it was when you were a little child, your mama slapped your hands when you were eating pudding with your fingers and wiping them on the table cloth.  Because she did that, you have civilized dining habits to this day.  But this is a much more serious and weighty matter.  The Holy Spirit sometimes slaps your hands, for a very good purpose and very blessed outcome.

3. The plausibility of your belief that you have been justified is, to some extent, dependent upon this.  Your justification is, of course, mainly dependent upon the Gospel promises that God will indeed have justified you when you trusted in Christ, and even if you had not been justified long ago when you responded in some way to an invitation, or had some kind of a spiritual experience, you would have been justified just a second ago when you believed in a truer, fuller sense.

But an objective, outside check on all of this is the evidence that God has done a remake of your life.  No one actually experiences justification.  It is an act of God, in which he changes the way he looks at the individual.  He declares him righteous, having imputed the individual’s sins to Jesus and Jesus' personal righteousness from his days upon the earth, to the individual.  The justified individual does not necessarily sense that -- in his experience.  It is a declarative act of God, outside of the individual's actual experience.  But the individual experiences the change in his life and behavior that is concurrent with that justification, as a result of that justification and his belief in the promises and teaching of the Word of God. ("v.7. v.9., v.11") 

4. We are not left alone!  We have the Holy Spirit, who empowers us with resurrection life.  So often in history, Christianity has been taught as a moralistic religion, like Islam -- a mere set of rules and directions, as in: "Yours is not to reason why, yours is but to do or die." 

But Biblical Christianity -- though it has the rules -- it also has God the Holy Spirit within us, changing, leading, urging, empowering his charge, who is very dear to the Father, because of accomplished justification. 

And because of this truth, Paul says in v.12: "We are not debtors to the flesh!" i.e., "We do not have to live lives that are characterized by sin and disobedience to God and are no better than those of the average non-Christian. 

Would you, this morning, utter a silent prayer of thanksgiving that, even in your frailty, God's grace is magnified in the freeness of his salvation by justification, and in the power of God that he exerts over your life, since you have trusted Christ.  Would you do so?  Would you thank God for this?

In 1099, one of the most amazing things that ever happened in Christendom came to pass.  Times were tough.  Christianity was debased.  Western civilization was threatened by numerous dangers, not the least of which was the invasion of western Europe by the Seljuke Turks.  The great majority of professing Christians lived wretched lives.  It would have been a time for heroic living for God on the part of true Christians, in the midst of a nominally Christian society.  Some people got the stupid idea of a military attack on the Turks in the Holy Land, in an operation called a "Crusade" (giving evangelists and mission boards 900 years later a term with which to rally the public imagination.)

Peter the Hermit and Walter the Penniless preached the idea of a Crusade all over France.  And everywhere they went the multitudes, challenged by the idea of doing something significant and heroic for God, cried out: "Deius vult! Deius vult!" -- "God wills it! God wills it!" The times seemed to demand it.  They were needed in the service of God.  They sewed red cloth crosses on their coats or hats and were said to have "taken up the cross."  And 12,000 people from France gave themselves to the venture.  And 5,000 from Germany; and thousands more came from all over Europe to give themselves to the cause (and in many cases to eventual death, in conquest of their goal).

Today, we are living in times when other Peters and other Walters are preaching equally futile crusades, based upon equally erroneous theology, calling upon people to make great sacrifices for utterly stupid causes.  But One, greater than all human organizers, continually challenges his people to a crusade of holy living, with lives dedicated to the glory of God.  And some few Christians here and there, cry out  

"Deius vult! Deius vult!  "God wills it!  God wills it!"  The times demand it!  They call for radical action to counter the decreasing fortunes of Biblical Christianity.  May we ourselves be the receptors of that challenge in small or in large ways!