Called to Life in the Spirit

May 12, 2019 Background Scripture: Romans 8 Lesson Passage: Romans 8:1 – 14 This is a perfect follow up to last week’s lesson. Last week’s lesson laid the groundwork for the legal side of salvation, i.e., justification. Last week’s text made clear the need for God to be the justifier and the one to make us righteous. Today’s lesson concerns the life of a saved person. It describes sanctification as an ongoing spiritual process within the believer. God does not merely call us to a title or position—justification being the believer’s position in Christ. God calls us to a lifestyle of spiritual living; which we call sanctification. Why is sanctification so important? Christians have been saved and separated in the world. We have not been removed from the world. For what reason, then, would God save us from the destination of the world but yet leave us in the world? Christians are left in the world to be used by God to accomplish His purpose for the world. The bible states that, God does not desire that any person should perish. How would perishing people know that they are perishing, and that there is a solution to the dilemma that they are in? God works through the life of the believer to communicate with the world. Hence, there is a need for believers to be in the world but not of the world. Christians living in the world are not just here with a verbal message or proclamation. Our lives are to be living testimonies of the grace of God towards us. If Christians live the same defeated lives as non-believers, then why should a non-believer even consider the verbal message of a Christian? Non-believers need to see something different in the life of Christians—even if it is just a calming peace in the midst of life’s turbulence. Through salvation, God has set us free from the law of sin and death. Through the Law we could see ourselves being controlled by our flesh which keeps leading us to act contrary to the Law. Therefore, we are convicted by the Law yet controlled by the flesh to walk contrary to it. This is the misery of the body of sin that Paul described in Romans 7. It is a never-ending cycle. Non-believers know this as “normal” and are not likely to seek to change unless convicted by the Law to repent. Once convicted, the only hope of breaking the cycle of sin and death is to turn to God through Jesus Christ. When we place our faith in the saving power of Jesus Christ, God breaks the cycle for us. That’s the reason sin becomes a choice for Christians. The desire to sin is still in the flesh of a Christian but sin no longer has power over the Christian. That’s the essence of life in the Spirit. This newness of life that comes with salvation empowers Christians to live a life that witnesses to the world concerning the saving grace of God. God calls us to walk in this life victoriously by obeying the Spirit of Christ in us and not yielding to the desires of the flesh. Robert C. Hudson March 1, 2019