July 6, 2008 at Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK
Zechariah 9:9-10 + Psalm 145 + Romans 8:1-13 + Matthew 11:25-30
With this Sunday we begin to hear one of the most important chapters in the New Testament: the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. Five consecutive weeks will allow us to explore how Christian Spirituality draws one into “Life in the Spirit.” As I said last weekend on the Feast of Peter and Paul, the Holy Father has declared this to be the year of Paul, and he has called us to deepen our knowledge, refresh our spirituality, and enjoy the wisdom of Paul. Some have said that the Eastern and Orthodox churches are the church of John; that the Western Roman Church is the church of Peter, and that the Protestant churches are the church of Paul. While stereotypes ought to always make us uncomfortable and suspicious; this one at least gives us reason to wonder if there might be some tiny element that gives reason for such a sweeping idea. Celebrating and living through a year of Paul ought to challenge that idea for us who assemble week after week and hear Paul proclaimed more often than any other New Testament writer. So it is to Paul’s Roman Epistle that I turn your attention today and in the four weeks to come.
Paul is not writing to a church he has visited or founded, but to a church he hopes to visit in the future. He is not writing to correct or address some difficulty in a local church; but to lay a foundation for their lives in Christ and his future ministry among them. What we get is the most systematic treatment of spiritual life in all the New Testament. Fear and threats are not his tools for motivating obedience and holiness of life, but rather gratitude for what God has done and for what God will do is uppermost in his mind.
In this eighth chapter, the word “Spirit” occurs 18 times. If that doesn’t tell you what the point is, nothing will. You have just heard what may well be the most powerful, most important, and most comforting yet challenging words in the whole bible: “Brothers and Sisters, You are in the Spirit!” In several other epistles, he says: “Do not quench the Spirit!” But look at us……. is there enough evidence of that Spirit to confirm the truth of what Paul says? The Spirit that Paul speaks of nurtures a spirituality that is the consequence of an invasion, not an imitation. We are not called to be imitations of the saints because the implication of an imitation is that it is a fake! We are called to be real to be Spirit filled and Spirit living. The Spirit as Paul sees it invades us. It takes us over and lifts us out of the ordinary into the heavenly world. That Spirit transcends the mundane and gives us a way of looking at this world and it’s challenges and limitations with an eye to the future.
What does it mean to be a child of God? That’s the issue Paul raises in the letter to the Romans. For a Pauline Christian, Jesus Christ is an event. While he has some interest in the historical person of Jesus of Nazareth, his focus is what happened to us because of Jesus Christ. Three things he suggests: We have knowledge of God
We know an appropriate way to live. We know God’s will for the future of the world. When Paul contrasts the law and the spirit, what he teaches, and reveals is that only the Spirit can redeem and save. The law cannot do this. The Law cannot defeat sin, it can only detect it. Just keeping rules does not redeem and save. It takes more. It takes a life in the Spirit.
Paul speaks of obligation that springs from privilege. We are children of God. We are in the Spirit. This is privilege. It is the privilege of believers, the privilege of faith. That Spirit leads us still today. It is not a spirit that drags us, but induces, entices, perhaps even seduces us to seek the things that are above, to value only that which gives life, not pleasure. The flesh, Paul says, is death – it is separation from God. The Spirit on the other hand is Life. Those who live in the Spirit live with the mind of God. If we understand Paul correctly, we do not need to receive the Spirit; we need to respond to the Spirit. We must be free to let that Spirit lead us with trust, faith, and obedience. The Spirit that dwells within us is the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead.
We all face two problems here: the problem of sin and the problem of righteousness. Our problem with sin is that we do it. Our problem with righteousness is that we do not and cannot. God solved the first problem with Calvary. Now in Romans chapter eight, we discover how to solve the second problem: Live in the Spirit as Children of God.