Romans 8:1-11
“Flesh or Spirit?”
July 10, 2011 - Fourth Sunday after Pentecost

         How did you celebrate the Fourth of July? Some of you went out to the Shepherd home and enjoyed good food and fellowship and the firing of the potato gun. After being away for over a week, our family needed to stay home, barbecue some sausages, and just listen to illegal fireworks explode around our neighborhood. Others took the long weekend to go to the coast or to the mountains, while some braved crowds and traffic to view a public fireworks display at a community park.

         Throw a big social event or get out of town or spend a quiet evening at home. One of the blessings of America is freedom to decide which it will be. In other words, in the process of celebrating our freedom we use the occasion to actually exercise that freedom in choosing how to celebrate.

         You might say Romans 8 is Paul’s Fourth of July, his great celebration of the blessing of freedom which believers enjoy in and through Jesus Christ. This chapter is the high point, the peak of this epistle. Here all the theological work about sin and faith and law and righteousness that’s been building up from the beginning suddenly explodes out into Paul’s excitement about what God has done for us.

         Romans 8 is also, as I’ve been saying, the culmination of a kind of Christian “Exodus.” After an “Egypt” of slavery to sin and death discussed in chapter 6 and a “Mt. Sinai” of encounter with God’s Law found in chapter 7, we arrive now in chapter 8, after a little wilderness wandering, at a “Promised Land” of rest and victory given to us in Christ. Verse 1 is the first glorious statement of that rest and victory, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

         You may have been outraged and angry at the verdict in the Casey Anthony trial. Or you may feel our American legal system did its work and that we must accept the verdict it produced. Please put either feeling aside for a moment and put yourself in Casey Anthony’s place as she heard those words “not guilty” read by the jury. Imagine her huge relief and sense of freedom as she received that “no condemnation.” The law of trial by jury set her free from the law of Florida just as Paul says in verse 2 that “the law of the Spirit of life has set you free from the law of sin and death.”

         But we weren’t able to set aside our outrage at the Anthony verdict, were we? Some of you are thinking, “That’s a terrible sermon illustration! How dare we compare Jesus Christ to faulty deliberations by a dozen human beings? It’s obvious that Anthony was guilty. She didn’t deserve that verdict!” Exactly. Neither do believers in Jesus Christ.

         Paul reminds us in verse 3 of what he’s already said more than once. Romans 2, verses 9 and 10 told us that “all, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin, as it is written, ‘There is no one righteous, no not one.’” Chapter 3 verse 23 says, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” And in chapter 7 last week we heard Paul tell us how law, whether God’s law or natural law, only makes it that much clearer that we are slaves to sin and unable to do the good we want to do.

         No one deserves the verdict of verse 1. No one is worthy of that wonderful announcement of “no condemnation,” that proclamation of freedom from sin and death. Casey Anthony is not worthy of it, but neither are you and I.

         Verse 3 reiterates what Paul said to us last week in chapter 7, “God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do.” A law against murder, even a divine commandment, can’t by itself change the fact that people murder. We are weak. We are “flesh,” says Paul. I’ll explain more in a moment, but for now just get his idea that to help us God had to give us more than law. He had to deal with our weakness by “sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh.”

         Sin needs to be dealt with, whether it’s murder or theft or adultery, whether it’s lying or jealousy or gossip. Sin needs to be dealt with, and law by itself can’t deal with it. If Casey Anthony is truly guilty, then the law of Florida couldn’t deal with it and, Paul would say, neither could the law of God. The flesh is too weak. We are too weak. All that law can do is condemn us to a verdict of eternal death.

         So God sent His Son to take on our weak flesh for Himself. God sent Jesus to become like us, even it says in II Corinthians 5:21, “become sin for us,” even though He Himself never sinned. There are all kinds of pictures in God’s Word to describe how He did that, but it remains a mystery. Jesus who didn’t deserve it, took our sin on Himself, became sin, so that in Him, on the Cross, God could condemn sin the way sin deserves to be condemned. And now whoever is in Christ Jesus is freed from sin and condemnation in a way we don’t deserve.

         But we can’t stop there. God’s grace is more than the idea that a person can just ask Jesus into her heart, or pray the “sinner’s prayer,” or repent and be baptized, or make a decision for Christ, or accept Jesus as his personal savior, or convert to Christianity—however you want to put it—and that’s all there is to it. Believe in Jesus and you are scot-free, like Casey Anthony, guilty but not condemned. No, that’s not quite the Gospel.

         Verse 4 completes the picture, “so that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us…” The work of Jesus Christ, what theologians call the Atonement, is not just freeing you and me from condemnation, from God’s righteous and eternal judgment on our sin. Jesus came to free us from condemnation and from the sin that brought condemnation. Jesus came and died and rose so that we might be transformed, changed into people who can do what the law asks, who really are set free from the sin working in us.

         In the rest of our passage today Paul talks about the power that makes that transformation possible. It is the power of God’s own Spirit, standing over against and in opposition to what Paul calls “the flesh.” Those in whom the righteous requirement of the law is being fulfilled are those, “who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.”

         Now let’s talk about what “flesh” does not mean here. It is not the fact that you and I are physical creatures. Our problem is not our bodies. Yes, our bodies are weak. Yes, our bodies are sometimes the sources of our temptations. But for Paul, “the flesh” is something bigger and different from physical bodies. In the end, in verse 11, Paul says the Spirit will give life to our mortal bodies, but the Spirit has nothing to do with what he calls “the flesh.”

         The flesh, for Paul, is more like an attitude or mindset than anything else. That’s why the New International Version some of you may be reading translates it “the sinful nature,” but the literal meaning is “flesh.” In some churches you may hear talk about someone being “carnal.” This is what they mean, a person who is living in what Paul calls the flesh, rather than living in the Spirit of God.

         For Paul “the flesh” is mental rather than physical. Verse 5 says those “who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.” Being “in the flesh” is a mental state more than it is our physical condition. Part of that flesh mindset may be focusing too much on physical pleasures, but it’s bigger and worse than that.

         To be in the flesh rather than in the Spirit is to be opposed to God. Verses 7 & 8 say “the mind set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed it cannot, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” You’re not living “in the flesh” just when you’re feeling lust or eating too much or sleeping too late. Those are three of the deadly sins, but “the flesh” includes the others: anger and pride and envy and greed, what we might call sins of the soul rather than the body. To Paul it’s all flesh. It’s everything we think or do when we go our own way instead of God’s way. That’s the flesh.

         Jesus came to replace that flesh mindset with the mindset of God’s Holy Spirit. He didn’t come to take us out of our bodies. He came to call us out of that condition of heart and mind and body which leads to sin and death, and call us into the life of His own Spirit.

         Let’s go back to the beginning for a moment. Look at the first words of verse 1,  that great celebration of freedom we started with, “There is therefore now no condemnation…” How did we get there? Back up to where we ended last week in the last verse of chapter 7 and Paul says, “but with my flesh I am a slave to sin.” How does he make the leap from being a slave to sin to the glorious verdict of “no condemnation” in very the next sentence? Remember there were no chapters or verses in the original.

         Paul gets there because he starts with the conclusion he’s proving right now by talking about Spirit versus the flesh. He’s showing us that the reason there is no condemnation is exactly because through Christ and in Christ we are in the Spirit and not in the flesh. That’s why verse 9 insists, “But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.”

         It’s often not a popular message today, but there is no other way out of condemnation. There is no other way out of sin and death, because there’s not other way of the flesh mindset that opposes God. The only answer is Christ, to have the Spirit of Christ dwelling in you.

         The flesh is death. Remember, this is not just about bodies. Yes, our physical bodies are mortal. They die. But to live in the flesh, focused on yourself and on your own way instead of God’s way, leads to sin and sin leads to spiritual, eternal death. The flesh is a mind that gets distracted from what truly matters and directs itself to petty, insignificant desires and goals that lead away from God and life and fall toward sin and death.

         You’ve probably seen a photo or even watched a video of baseball fan Shannon Stone falling out of the stands to his death at a Texas Rangers game on Thursday. He was trying to catch a ball tossed to him by the Rangers’ Josh Hamilton. His focus was all on that catch and he lost track of his balance and where his feet were. That’s what it means to live in the flesh. It’s to become unbalanced, to focus on things of little consequence and to lose yourself to sin and death in the process.

         There is no condemnation in Jesus Christ, but it’s more than that, it’s deeper than that. Salvation in Christ is far more than just a not-guilty verdict to save us from God’s judgment. It is a whole new life planted in Christ’s own life and growing up in the power and strength of His Spirit. If we live in the flesh and not in the Spirit we won’t be deep enough, we won’t stand firm enough.

         Our Lord’s parable in Matthew 13 echoes what Paul is teaching. Jesus talked about people who hear the Gospel and start out well, but fail to grow, like seeds planted in shallow or rocky or thorny ground that get eaten by birds or burned by the sun or choked by weeds. It’s a warning to grow deep and live in His Spirit and not by the flesh. The flesh is exactly that lack of understanding, that fear of persecution, that worry about wealth and worldly cares, which prevents us from living and growing in the Spirit. It’s not just getting forgiven by the grace of Jesus, it’s getting rooted in the grace and Spirit of Jesus.

         If you believe and trust in Jesus, you are in the Spirit. That’s what Paul says in verse 9. He wants you to remember that. “But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit.” Remember where you really live.

         My neighbor and I were talking about fishing and I told him about the muddy, swollen rivers I saw in the mountains of Colorado where the snow was melting. He said, “It’s the same here. The fishing is lousy right now.” But then he stopped and said, “But I’d still rather be here. It’s better than floods in the Midwest and 118 degrees in Phoenix. We live in the best place in the country.” He’s right.

         Paul is right too when he wants us to see that our place in the Spirit is the best place for us. Even if we live in bodies that are going to die, even if sometimes struggle with sin as we heard last week, we still live in the Spirit in Christ. And verse 10 says, “But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.” The Spirit of Christ is the place to be, no matter what.

         That beautiful image from Isaiah 55 we read today shows us God’s rain and snow watering the ground and bringing both life and growth to the earth, along with joy and peace to human beings. Verse 12 sang, “For you shall go out with joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.” That’s life in the Spirit rather than in the flesh.

         In our psalm this morning, Psalm 65, I like verse 9 because I’m a fisherman, but I love it because it says what Paul says about living in Christ, about living in the Spirit. “You visit the earth and water it, you greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water.” “Full of water”—that’s life in the Spirit, life in Jesus Christ. It’s abundant life, life green and growing because it’s rooted deep and drawing up what God pours out in His Spirit.

         Back to Romans and verse 11, where Paul says, “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.” That’s it. Life is the result when our minds are turned away from the flesh, away from the fears and cares and pleasures of the world, and turned toward the Spirit, toward the peace and love and grace of Jesus Christ.

         It’s not only a promise for the future. Yes, God will resurrect our bodies when Christ comes again, but the promise is for life in the Spirit in these bodies. We’ve prayed for our new friend Carla. Her body is dying, but those who are close to her would tell you that even now she is wonderfully alive in Christ her Lord. That’s the life Paul invites us to enjoy now, the life of His Spirit rather than the death of our flesh.

         Where will you live? In the Spirit of Christ where there is life and peace, or in the flesh, where there is sin and death? I invite you to exercise the freedom which God gave you on the Cross. Live in the Spirit and not in the flesh. There is no condemnation, there is only life for those who are in Christ. Let’s live in His Spirit.

         Amen.

Valley Covenant Church
Eugene/Springfield, Oregon
Copyright © 2011” by Stephen S. Bilynskyj