Romans 6, 7 & 8 part 10

When I was looking through my notes on this, my notes for each verse now are about as long as what I have been posting each time. That would mean looking at each verse one at a time. That is fine but I get impatient and tell myself we will lose the continuity of the passage as a whole if we break it down too much. But then I think, well this is important stuff, we have taken 9 posts to get this far, don't blow it all in one go so the point doesn't actually sink in! Anyway, on balance, I'll post a verse at a time and have a good chew!

"4so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit."

Here is a glimpse at the “how to.” The question we need to ask ourselves is, “How do we sanctify ourselves if we do not sanctify ourselves by the law?” Let’s backtrack and look at what has been said so far. In Romans 6:10 we are told that Jesus “Lives to God.” In 6:13, we are told, “present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.” The point is to live to God. In isolation I could do a talk on what it means to live to God and get it completely wrong.

I remember a guy telling me that he was fixing his car. He needed to put a bolt through the floor of the car. However, he couldn't hold the bolt and put the nut on at the same time. He called his 6 year old son and asked him to hold the bolt in the car while he went underneath and put the nut on it. He slid under the car and noticed the bolt wasn't there! He called to his son, but no answer! He looked out from under the car to see his son skipping down the garden path towards his wife who was hanging out the washing. The boy was waving the bolt in the air and singing, "I'm helping daddy, I'm helping daddy!"

Likewise, we can kid ourselves we are living “to” god when we are doing great works of charity, or even studying His word day and night, There are plenty of people like Jehovah’s Witnesses who are very misguided. Unless we are actually living in the full knowledge that we are doing exactly what God wants us to be doing, then we are just like that boy. We think we are helping but we are only really making ourselves happy.

Living to God was the glimpse Paul gave us in answering the first question regarding sinning. In the answer to the second Question in Romans 6:16, we are told we can either sin or obey. In 6:22 we are told that we are enslaved to God. So, the second glimpse at “how to” is, Obedience to God. Again in isolation we could do a whole talk on that and get it completely wrong! For example, clearly there are two very different ways to be obedient to God: "The word" and "the Spirit!" (Not counting church tradition and "God gave us a brain to work it out for ourselves" liberalism!)

If I follow the Spirit and do not test it against the word with integrity then I am a Charismaniac! If I am using my intellect to follow the word and do not take my leading from the spirit then I am an evangelegalist! Here in Romans 8:4 Paul has just said we “do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” Here is the glimpse of how we "do" sanctification! We live to God, We obey God by walking by the Spirit. We take our leading from the Spirit and test it against the word.

If we remember that the relationship we have with the law was through the flesh, then to live according to the flesh brings us under the law. However, through the spirit, we have died to the law. This takes us back to what I said about Joseph working for Potiphar. When he was thrown into prison he was dead to Potiphar, when he worked for the king, he now kept Potiphar but was no longer obeying his commands. In the same way, when we are obedient to the spirit, the spirit will not cause us to break the law. In the same way that Abraham believed God and obeyed him, that was counted to him as righteousness, so when we believe God and obey Him, it is counted to us as righteousness. How do I know it is the Spirit and not deception? By testing it against the word!