More than Conquerors

More than Conquerors

Romans 8:28-39

Predestined

If Paul had not already dropped his argumentative tone in favor of eloquent, powerful, inspired rhetoric, he might have once again interrupted himself in the middle of verses 28-30 of Chapter 8 to clear up any confusion there might be over his use of the word “predestined”. As he asked himself previously when discussing the issue of the gift of grace: “Shall we go on sinning, so that grace may increase?” (6:1 NIV) he might now ask how it could matter what we do if we were predestined for the call of God. In fact, is there anything we can do of our own free will if the outcome is predestined?

As we consider this issue of our own free will, we should first note that there is no contradiction at all between the issue of our choice and the fact of God’s foreknowledge. In this world, we understand the issues of cause and effect, and the constant law that the cause must come before the effect. We might ask ourselves, then, if our actions are foreknown, how can they be free, and if they are not free, how can we be held accountable?

In fact, the only conflict there can be between our free will and the foreknowledge of God is manufactured when we try to limit God to the sequential, cause and effect reality of our world. The creator of this world is not limited to the reality of this world. In this world, things come to be and then later are no more. This is not so with God, who always has been, and always will be. God can know our actions before they happen because God exists outside of time. In this world of instant access, where it often seems that nothing, even in the remotest corner of the globe, happens without being recorded and almost instantly disseminated for our consumption, still we have only the vaguest understanding of why events occur and what their impact will be. But what we vaguely understand as cause and effect, before and after, God understands whole and complete. God’s knowledge does not limit our choice; it is only through the love of God that we have any choice at all.

But Paul does not only speak of what God foreknew, he also speaks of what God predestined. Paul also uses this idea of God’s predestination in 1 Corinthians 2:6-9 and in Ephesians 1:3-14. If foreknowledge of God is no threat to our free will, what can we say about this issue of predestination? We must ask ourselves what it is that has been preordained.

Though the love of God is the simplest thing there is, we often understand it as something very complex. Again, this happens when we try to impose our understanding of the way things should happen onto the will of God, or try to impose the logic of this world onto the mind of God. One of the traps we fall into is to think of the Old Testament God as distinct from the New Testament Christ. In contrast to this, we have the witness of Paul, of John, and of Jesus himself.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is also before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. (Colossians 1:15-20 NIV)

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was the life. And that life was the light of men. (John 1:1-4 NIV)

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me… I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know the Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.” (John 14:1, 6-8 NIV)

The love of God made available to us through Jesus Christ has always existed; it is not some bargain that is now available for a limited time. God is not like that. What is beyond time is also beyond change. The provision for our salvation was predestined in the sense that it has always existed and always will. It is this security that Paul refers to when he says “in all things God works for the good of those who love him.” (8:28 NIV) No matter what has happened to us, or what we have done to ourselves, in whatever situation we may find ourselves, God has provided for our salvation through “the Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the world.” (Revelation 13:8)

Who Is He that Condemns?

Verses 31-34 begin one of the three most recognizable passages in all of Paul’s writing. Together with the “love chapter” of 1 Corinthians and the description of Christ that Paul either wrote or quoted in Philippians (2:5-11) this section of Romans is one of the most often quoted sections of the Pauline letters. These beginning verses of the section are often quoted in the sense of the Might of the Right: with God on our side, we cannot be defeated. But this sense is not the central meaning from Paul, as we can tell from the context. Paul has just been speaking (in verses 26-27) of the way in which the Spirit intercedes for us even when we have no words to pray. Here, he goes further to say that that Jesus is also at the right hand of God interceding for us. Lest we see this picture as one in which a stern, judgmental God is tempered by the influence of the Spirit and of Jesus, who represent us, Paul reminds us that it is God himself who gave us his only son in order that we might be saved.

Paul was an Old Testament scholar, and it is certain that when he used the phrase “He who did not spare his own Son” he was thinking of Abraham and Isaac. Though Abraham was willing to give his son (Genesis 22:15-18) he was not called on to do so. But God himself, without being asked, and while we were still sinners (Romans 5:6-8) gave his only son. Though the judgment of God will fall upon the ungodly at his appointed time, the salvation of God is available at all times. God is not waiting to condemn us, but to redeem us.

If God is for us, who can be against us? It is God who justifies, who is he that condemns? (8:31b, 33b, 34a NIV)

More than Conquerors

There is so much power in the very words of this closing passage of Chapter 8 (verses 35-39) that they are a comfort simply to hear over and over again. As we hear them, we may imagine poor Tertius, the scribe who wrote down the letter (16:22) struggling to keep up and keep his amazement in check as Paul, caught up in the Spirit, paced the floor in front of him, pouring forth the words of his inspiration. There is nothing that any commentary can add to the power of these words. Even so, we might spend a moment considering what Paul means when he says that we are “more than conquerors.”

Certainly, if we consider the list of perils that Paul presents, they are formidable, and if he says that these things cannot separate us from the love of Christ, he does not mean that we will not experience them, but that they cannot overcome the promise of God, which was predestined from the foundation of the earth. Having participated in the death and resurrection of Christ (6:5, 8) the life and death of this world no longer has any claim on us. If God himself does not condemn us, then we have nothing to fear in this world or the next.

But Paul does not say we are conquerors, or even the epitome of conquerors, but that we are more than conquerors. How can this be? We are neither winners nor losers if we do not play the game. Nothing can be taken from us that we give up freely.

For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. (Matthew 16:25 NIV)

I have told you these things so that you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world. (John 16:33 NIV)

Sighs too Deep for Words

Sighs too Deep for Words

Romans 8:15-27

Joint Heirs with Christ

In previous chapters, Paul has used many analogies to describe our condition with respect to the law, our sin, and our redemption from sin. He has used the illustrations of death, marriage, and slavery to describe the Christian’s current relationship to his or her former self. In Chapter 8, Paul speaks, not in analogy, but of our true state, which is that we are children of God. In verses 15-18, Paul uses another analogy as he describes us as having the spirit of “adoption” or of “sonship”, depending on which translation you read. The word used in verse 15 is huiothesia, which literally means to “make as a son”. Both the Jewish and Greek societies were entirely male-dominated and patriarchal, and the idea of adoption only applied in the sense of inheritance, in both material goods and social stature. It is in this spirit that Paul makes the bold claim that we are no longer slaves, but joint heirs with Christ.

Of course, Paul is not the author of this idea. In John, 15:14-17, Jesus tells us that we are no longer servants, but friends if we do as he commands, and his commandment is that we love each other as he has loved us. Also, it was Jesus who taught us to pray, crying out “Abba, Father” (Mark 14:36). Paul was very much a product of both Jewish and Greek patriarchal societies, and his Jewish background forbade that he even speak the name of his God. It is surely the witness of Jesus through the Holy Spirit that taught him to speak of God as a loving parent.

But what is it that Paul speaks of as our inheritance? Certainly, a major part of it is our victory over death, which means victory over all of this life. The writer of Hebrews uses this same line of thought in Chapter 2, verses 10-15, where he says that through the life and death of Jesus, we are all one family, and by his sacrifice, we are no longer slaves to the fear of death.

But to share in his life, we must also share in his suffering. Even for those of us who are quite privileged, this life is not long or easy. But we have already been born again, as Peter says in 1 Peter 1:23-25. The things of this world are not permanent, but the promise of God has no beginning or end.

Pains of Childbirth

Though his most eloquent words are later in the chapter, in verses 18-25, Paul has dropped all his argumentative, doctrinal discourse and speaks in flowing words of praise and adoration, but these are not empty words, and though they are uplifting words by their very sound and spirit, they also hold truths to be carefully considered.

It is said that J. R. R. Tolkien helped convert C. S. Lewis to Christianity. Both men were great lovers of myth, and it is said that in their pre-conversion discussion, Lewis remarked that that the stories of the Bible were myths like any other. Tolkien is supposed to have replied, “Yes, except that they are true.”

It is in that sense of “true myth” that the stories in Genesis teach us of the plan of God, the choice of the human race, and the effect that this choice had on all creation. After Adam and Eve sinned, and God confronted Adam with his sin, Adam replied “The woman you put here with me – she gave me some fruit of the tree and I ate it.” (Genesis 3:12 NIV) If we can imagine Adam standing as he said this, with one finger pointed towards God and the other to his wife, we get a picture of the fallen relationships that result from sin, relationship with each other and with God.

But the story goes further. In verses 17-19, God tells Adam that all of creation is cursed because of man’s sin. It is this idea that Paul is thinking of when he says that all of creation awaits the day when it will be “liberated from bondage and decay.” The Greek word Paul uses for “creation” is ktisis, and this is the same word that Jesus used when he commissioned us to “Go into all the world and preach the good news to the whole creation.” (Mark 16:15 RSV) Certainly, this means that every kind of human being is included, but we must remember that we serve a God who looked at all of creation and said that it was good (Genesis 1:31) and who loved the world (Greek kosmos) so much that he gave his only son, that the world, through him, might be saved. (John 3:16-17)

Hope

But it is not only creation that waits this day, but we ourselves. Paul says we have the “firstfruits” of the Spirit, meaning that what we have now is just the beginning of what we will see in the latter day, the day for which we hope. In perhaps his most memorable passage, quoted even by non-believers, Paul speaks of that day.

Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love, and the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:12-13 NIV)

In our everyday conversation, the word “hope” is very weak. We hope for things that we fear will not come to be. We hope because we are uncertain. It was not so for Paul. Earlier, in Chapter 5, verses 1-5, Paul goes from faith to hope, a hope that will not disappoint. Faith is proof. It is not scientific proof that can be reproduced in a laboratory. It is personal proof. We have faith in the present, because God poured out his love into our hearts. We have hope for our very certain future, when we shall see face to face, and know fully, as we are already fully known.

Sighs too Deep for Words

In the mean time we have the comfort of the Holy Spirit. When Jesus promised the coming of the Holy Spirit, he spoke of the Spirit as “another Counselor” (John 14:16) meaning that the Spirit would be a counselor like himself. Indeed, just as Jesus and the Father were one, so it is with Jesus and the Holy Spirit, for Jesus goes on to say “I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you.” (John 14:18) In verses 26 & 27, Paul speaks of the work of this Counselor – one whose mind is known to God, and who knows our hearts and minds – who helps us in our weakness. There are many aspects of human frailty, but what Paul speaks of is our inability, at times, even to tell our loving God what it is we need. There are many times that we can do no more than cry “Abba, Father,” and sometimes we fail even that. In those times, the Spirit intercedes for us, with “sighs too deep for words”.

The Spirit of Life

The Spirit of Life

Romans 8:1-14

Therefore

Paul begins Chapter 8 with the Greek word ara, which is translated here as “therefore”, indicting yet another conclusion drawn during his extended argument in which he has at times taken both sides, the side of the Gospel on one hand and the side of various objectors on the other. If we look at the “road” behind us we can see the highlights of the argument so far.

Paul has said that the glory of God is no secret, as it is made known through all creation, and because of this we are all without excuse (1:19-20). This is not just a matter of whether or not we are ignorant, but in fact we are all sinners (3:23). Despite the fact that we are sinners, God loves us, and gave his son to die for us (5:8). Though we deserve death, not simply physical death, but eternal separation from God, instead we have been the free gift of life in Christ (6:23).

As he has made these and other arguments, Paul has continually inserted the voice of one challenging or misunderstanding his statements, and he has spent a great deal of energy in trying to clear up misunderstandings about the law in particular. And, indeed, Paul says many things about the law that are easy to misunderstand. We must always remember that what Paul has to say about the law, he says in the context of salvation. The law is not a means to salvation, and was never intended to be. We are saved by the grace of God and no amount of dedication to the law, or anything else that we ourselves attempt to do, can save us.

Paul concludes the previous chapter with a confession that is a summary of the human condition:

So, then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. (7:25b)

Spirit and Flesh

It is this statement that is most directly addressed by Paul’s “therefore” in verses 1-8. If we want in our minds to obey God’s law, but are prevented by our very nature, what is our condition? How can we be saved? Paul also asks this question at the end of Chapter 7: “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (7:24b)

We may be “wretched”, we may be sinners, and we may think of ourselves as worthless and irredeemable, but we are not condemned by God. How is this possible? Paul says it is because of another kind of law, the law of the Spirit. While the “law of sin” brings death, the law of the Spirit brings life.

In this passage, Paul contrasts the idea of the Spirit with the idea of “the flesh”, as his words are correctly translated by the KJV. In the NIV, it is most often translated as “sinful nature”. This is to try to convey the meaning of Paul’s use of the word, which is to express an idea of the worldly, self-centered nature of man without God. In verse 5, he says that those who live “by the flesh” have their minds occupied by the appetites of nature. Now, we have to be careful in interpreting what Paul says here in complete context. Paul has addressed many possible traps in our thinking, and one of them is to view nature, including our nature, as irredeemably corrupt: it does not matter what we do, because we are only human, and therefore corrupt by our very nature. Paul himself says in verse 8: “Those controlled by their sinful nature cannot please God.”

Paul, however, did not see humanity as worthless, nor, to our great advantage, does God.

The Obligation

In verses 9-14, Paul says there is an option. We do have a choice. There is a way for us to please God. We do not have to be controlled by the appetites of this world. We can, instead, be lead by the Spirit. Where our efforts apart from God lead us to death, the Spirit gives us life. Paul cannot mean mere physical life and death. We will all die. Paul is talking about something else, something that surpasses our life and overcomes our death. He calls this the Spirit of Life.

And, we have an obligation, Paul says, which is not to this life. In fact, we have an obligation to lay down this life.

Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. (Matthew 10:37-39 NIV)

What does it mean? How, on the one hand can Paul say that we are sinners by nature, and on the other that we must be led by the Spirit? If it is our nature to sin, how can we follow the Spirit? And what can Christ mean when he says that we must lose our lives in order to find them?

There may be many ways to address this question, but Paul has been struggling to show that it matters how we live our lives. Separate from God (“in the flesh,” as Paul puts it) we are self-centered pagans; our lives mean nothing because we can achieve nothing. We can struggle all we want against nature, but nature will ultimately win. We can achieve all the wealth we want, but we will lose it. We can build buildings, write songs, dream dreams, but it will all be for nothing.

Children of God

But we have another option. We can become children of God. If we are as hopeless as Paul has described us, why would God have us as his children? If we have no value in this world, why would God, in the form of Christ, give himself to save us?

The answer is not to be found in us, or anywhere in this world. Our value comes from the love of God. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with our nature, with the way we were made, but we were not made to live apart from God.

Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name. For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations. (Psalm 100:3-5)

The Law of Sin

The Law of Sin

Romans Chapter 7

The Spirit and the Letter

Chapter 7 is an important transitional chapter for Paul’s ongoing argument of the status of the law. The argument actually concludes in Chapter 8, but it is Chapter 7 that shifts the focus from the status of the law (and, as a result of that, our status with respect to the law) to a focus on us as individuals, and our status with respect to the righteousness of God.

To begin the chapter, in verses 1-6, Paul uses yet another human analogy to describe our status with respect to the law. Jewish society was unquestioningly patriarchal. By the time of Jesus and Paul, the clause of the Mosaic Law which concerned divorce (Deuteronomy 24:1) was taken very literally to say that a man could divorce his wife for any reason and without any intervention. All he was required to do was to give her a bill of divorce. There was, however, no provision (other than death) that would allow a woman to separate herself from her husband. As long as they both were alive, she was bound to him to serve him.

Paul, in a twist on this analogy, says that we are no longer bound to the law, not because the law has died, or because the law has released us, but because we ourselves have died to the law. This idea that we have died to the law, having participated in the death of Christ, has already been established in Chapter 6 (see, especially, 6:8-10) and this analogy of a woman, completely liberated from her former attachment to her husband, is presented here as further argument for our current status. We are no longer bound to the law, but instead bound to God through faith in his Christ.

Of course, we must always remember to take Paul’s attitude toward the law in context. When speaking of the effectiveness or applicability of the law, Paul is always referring to the law as it applies to salvation. Paul’s final word (in Romans) on the ultimate value of the law will be found in the coming verses. Here, he speaks of the “sinful passions aroused by the law” that we experienced in our former, sinful nature. Paul refers to this former nature as “the flesh” or the work of our “members”, that is, our bodies. As he has used so many other terms metaphorically (slavery, circumcision, baptism, etc.) so he does with this idea of the flesh. It is not simply the literal appetites of the flesh that Paul refers to, but that within us that desires the things of this world rather than the things of God.

In a first glimpse of an idea that he will develop in Chapter 8, Paul here says we are released from the law in order to serve “in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.” It is this idea of serving the spirit of the law, rather than the letter that Christ preached in the Sermon on the Mount. When he said “You have heard that is was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth,’” (Matthew 5:38) Jesus was referring to the idea of fair reciprocity that is advocated in Exodus 21:24, Leviticus 24:20, and Deuteronomy 19:21. But Jesus calls us to a righteousness that “surpasses that of the Pharisees” (Matthew 5:20). The Pharisees religiously followed a strict, literal, interpretation of the law, but Jesus calls us to follow a higher, Spirit-led, interpretation. Though Paul appropriately says we are liberated by this interpretation, this liberation only applies to the sentence of death provided by the law. Though the law no longer applies to every detail of our outward appearance and action, the interpretation of the law that Jesus gave us applies to our inward attitudes and prejudices as the source of our outward behavior.

Is the Law Sin?

Still worrying about the possible misinterpretation of his words, Paul again in verses 7-13 takes on the role of the dissenter to his argument, and asks the rhetorical question “Is the law sin?” The immediate answer is “Certainly not!” Far from it, Paul says the law is holy. Actually, he says that both the law and the commandment are holy. It is not certain what Paul refers to when he makes this distinction, but it is possible that he refers to both the Ten Commandments on the one hand, and the broader collection of Mosaic Law, and perhaps including the Rabbinical tradition on the other. In any case, though one could interpret Paul’s earlier statements to indicate a failure in the law, here he makes the positive aspect of the law clear: the law was given “in order that sin might be recognized as sin.” In other words, the law provides instruction on righteous living, but is not itself a means to righteousness.

The rest of Paul’s argument in this passage is harder to follow. He speaks of having been alive apart from the law, which may refer to the sate in which we all exist before we know right from wrong, and then of the our state once we are aware of the law, which is that sin sprang into life and we died. Once we are aware of the law, we become subject to the judgment of the law, and we are as good as dead; no amount of adherence to the law will make us righteous. Righteousness cannot be achieved, but it is freely given.

The Law of Sin

In verses 14-25, Paul drops his former theological argument concerning our state in relation to the law, and instead presents a very personal account of our state as sinful creatures of a righteous God. It is a very powerful personally testimony, but in order to understand it fully, we must first consider Paul’s apparent separation of mind and body, desire and action, or what he refers to as himself verses the sin which lives within him.

As we have considered previously, when Paul refers to the body or the flesh, he is speaking metaphorically of that within us which desires the things of this world. Here, when Paul speaks of the body as apposed to the mind, or the sin living within him that separates his desire from his actions, Paul is not introducing a theology of dualism that would separate our actions or our physical bodies from our spiritual life and obligations. Instead, he is trying to address the question of how we, having been freed from sin, continue to lead sinful lives. In this respect, he is not saying anything any different from what he has said about law and salvation: no matter how much we desire it, we cannot attain righteousness; it is only available by grace.

This, Paul says, is the law of sin. God’s law is good, but by ourselves we will never attain it. Whatever we attempt on our own, however noble the attempt might be, we are still putting ourselves first and supplanting the grace of God. What then can we do? We can give thanks to God for Jesus Christ, who will rescue us from the law of sin and the body of death.