A Sermon Based Upon Romans 8: 2-17.
By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin
Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership
Sunday, September 28th, 2014
“But you are not
in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you...” (Rom 8:9a NRS).
During my seminary days in the early 1980s, I took a summer-long class on
pastoral education, which including working as a chaplain at large, regional
teaching hospital. My work included
working in different areas of the hospital, but I spent most of my time
visiting patients on the cancer floor along with being on call over the entire
hospital several times that summer.
On one occasion, while on call, a doctor requested that I come to visit one
of his patients. To have such a request
was a rare event. Most doctors were
trained in Science, not theology. They seldom
understood what we were doing and had little time to think about it. Most thought only they had 'gifts' of
healing, but this particular doctor was stumped. He told me that he had a certain patient who
would not respond to his medical treatment.
Since the doctor had ruled out anything seriously physical or
psychological, he wondered if there might be anything that might be connected
to a ‘spiritual’ problem.
Sure enough, after several visits together along with hour-long spiritual
discussions, the patient’s sense of well-being began to improve, so that he began
to respond to treatment. As we talked,
there were things in his life he had difficulty coming to peace about. In
order to be free to heal, he needed to find freedom in his soul. I can’t remember all the things we talked
about, but I do remember that much of our conversation had to do with letting
go and trusting God with things in his life he could not control. Several weeks later, when I attempted to
make another visit, I realized the patient had been discharged. Seeing his doctor in the hallway, I asked
about him. The doctor said he left
doing remarkably better. He told me,
that from now on, he needed to take the work of hospital chaplains more
seriously.
The human person not only has a body, but theologically speaking, a person
also has a soul and/or a spirit. Some
of you may remember the American drama film back in 2003, entitled 21 Grams. The title of that movie was based upon the early
20th century research of Dr. Duncan MacDougall in Massachusetts, who
believed that he could measure the change of body weight at the time of a
person’s death. The result which Dr.
MacDougall felt was most accurate was that when a person dies, they lose
“three-fourths of an ounce”, hence, “21 grams; the calculated ‘weight’ of a
human soul (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duncan_MacDougall_(doctor) .
MacDougall’s research is considered ‘flawed’ and ‘unscientific’, but I do
think that he was on to something that can’t be measured by scientific means. The spiritual side of life and love belongs
to a different way of knowing; a way of knowing that is not directly
observable, but still can be quite obvious.
I love the final line in the novel, “The Book Thief”, by Australian writer, Markus Zusak, which has the
narrator death contemplating the worth of humans, saying, “A last note from your Narrator: I am Haunted by Humans”. It is exactly this ‘spirit’ within humans,
which is capable of choosing good or evil, which confuses and confounds any who
would contemplate it.
In the ancient, biblical world, Paul took this “spiritual” side of humanity
for granted. He even goes on to suggest
that God’s Spirit connects with our
own spirit (8.16). Along with the ancient Greek philosophers,
Paul believed that the spirit is the
mark of the eternal within us. Still
today, there is a return to spirituality
for the sake of healing and mental, emotional and religious health. In our text today, Paul begins his discussion
by saying the “law of the Spirit” which
flows from Jesus Christ gives us eternal life, not just when we die, but now,
when we will “walk…not according to the
flesh, but according that the Spirit”(1.4).
Whatever angle we take on this,
Paul’s most basic idea is that the Christian life is a life lived from the
inside out, from within, and from the heart being “led by the Spirit.” This
“Spirit” cannot be measured, but can be known and must be followed if we hope
to overcome the power of sin, the world, the flesh and the devil.
THE SPIRIT THAT LIBERATES
It is the
“….Spirit of life in Christ Jesus”
that ‘sets you free from the law of sin
and of death” (8.2). The Spirit of
Jesus is a liberating Spirit. Jesus
says, ‘the truth shall set you free’
(John 8.2) and it God’s spirit is also known as ‘the Spirit of truth’ (Jn. 4.23; 14:17; 16:13). Truth brings freedom and liberation from
sin. But what kind of ‘truth’ can do
that? This ‘freedom’ or ‘liberation’ in
the Spirit comes through the truth about God’s forgiveness and grace, rather
than condemnation. If you are forever condemned
by your sin, you can never get free of it.
But if you are forgiven, you are set free for a new way of life.
But here
we must not misunderstand Paul’s meaning.
The “Spirit of Life” does not
liberate for the sake of freedom alone but the Spirit liberates for the sake of
living a whole new quality of life. This
is what Paul means when he speaks of those “who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit (vs. 4).
It is for the sake of “life” that
the Spirit liberates. The Hebrew idea of
‘walking’ in the Spirit is an idiom
that of how a person lives each and every day.
In other words, to ‘walk’ in the
Spirit means that we are to ‘live’ in the Spirit---the Spirit of Christ, that
is.
Unfortunately,
not all who claim to follow Christ realize this. It is said that the Russian writer Leo
Tolstoy claimed to have been converted to Christianity, but he failed to understand
that he also needed to be Christ-like in his daily life. Even after he affirmed Christianity as the
true faith, he continued to have a terrible temper, was rude to people, held grudges,
and sought vengeance. Tolstoy was not
‘liberated’ from his sin. He came to
believe in Jesus’s moral teachings, but he did not believe Jesus to be divine,
nor allow the Spirit of Jesus to free him of all his old, bad habits. He just could not trust and believe enough to
practice real Christianity.
This is
not an unfamiliar problem. Any of us can
come to believe something with our mind or heart, but still fail to change our
actions and behavior. I might want to be baseball player, but if I
don’t practice baseball, I’ll not become good at it, no matter how much I
believe in it. In the same way, I might
want to be a better husband or father, but if I don’t work to change my bad
habits, it will be very difficult for me to be the person I want to
become. The Spirit might ‘liberate’
from our past, but this does not necessarily change us for the good we want to
become. The work of the Spirit may indeed
be miraculous, but it the work of the Spirit does not come in a single instant
or moment. If we want to live in the
Spirit, we have to be liberated for the purpose of living a whole new way of
life. But how do we do that?
THE SPIRIT THAT ENLIGHTENS
“Those who live according to the Spirit set
their minds on things of the Spirit…” (8.5).
In
Paul’s discussion about the liberating Spirit, his major emphasis is the there
is a great difference between the ‘mind
of the Spirit’ and the “mind of the
flesh”. The ‘mind of the flesh leads to death’, he says, but the ‘mind
of the Spirit leads to life and peace’ (8.6).
Here, we
must not misunderstand what Paul means.
Paul is not against the ‘flesh’ of our bodies nor the ‘earthly’ reality
in which we live. It the misuse of the flesh and the limited focus
upon the ‘earthly’ that can mislead and destroys. A
healthy focus on the spiritual and the eternal can help us live a more
constructive, positive, and beneficial life here on earth. As the great evangelical thinker C.S. Lewis
once said, “If you read history you will
find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who
thought most of the next… It is since Christians have largely ceased to think
of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown
in’: aim at earth and you will get neither (Mere Christianity by
C.S. Lewis, p. 134).
The point
we most need to take from Paul’s discussion here is that we are what we
think. The life of a Christian begins in
the heart and in the mind so that we eventually become what we set our hearts
and mind upon. Writing to the Philippians,
Paul wrote, “Have this mind in
you which was also in Christ Jesus’
(Phil. 2: 1-5). In his letter to
the Colossians, Paul writes even more directly and specifically about the
Christian mindset, saying: “Set your minds on things that are
above, not on things that are on earth…” (3:2).
Another translation read, “Keep thinking about things that are above…”
(Net Bible). The things Paul tells us to ‘keep thinking
about’ are things like ‘having a heart
of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing one
another, and forgiving one another.’
These are all things we must do “with” our flesh, but we can’t do them “in the flesh” alone. To do these things we need the Spirit’s
help.
Also, when
Paul wrote to the Ephesians he also speaks of having the ‘eyes
of the heart enlightened’ (Eph. 1.18) to know ‘the greatness of his power toward those who believe.’ In the New Testament the contrast between
living in the light and living in the dark is similar to what Paul means by
living in the Spirit verses living in the flesh. Paul is no more against the physical flesh
than he is against the physical dark, but both are powerful pictures what can
go wrong in human thinking and what needs to go right.
For, as
we all know too well, our minds can play tricks on us. We all know this. When Comedian Robin Williams took his life, Dr.
Phil said in an interview that he wished that he or someone would have been
there to talk Robin out of it. Something
dark was going on in his mind and thinking (clinical depression), and Robin could
not get out of it alone. Paul says that
this is part of the work of the Spirit, which works through people to bring the
‘truth’ of God’s love not only to liberate the soul, but also to ‘enlighten’
the mind so we all can live a more fruitful and abundant lives, no matter what
demons we are struggling against.
One other
point to ponder is that Paul also says that those who have a ‘mind set on the flesh’ have a mind that
is ‘hostile toward God’ (8.7). Again, the point is not that we shouldn’t care
about the flesh, or use our God given minds, but the point is that our minds
and our bodies need the ‘law of God’
which is both the law of love and the law of the Spirit. God
loves the world, and is not against the world.
But this ‘fleshly’ world God has created needs the rule, guidance and
redeeming power of God to overcome the negative impluses of “sinful flesh”.
This ‘power’
over sinful flesh comes through the Spirit, aka, ‘the Spirit of Christ’ (8.9) now made available to all through the
death (8.3) and resurrection of Jesus (8.11). As Paul writes, “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you,
He who raised Christ Jesus….will also give life to your mortal bodies through
His Spirit who dwells in you….” (8.11).
Here again, the point not that this world is all evil, or that you only
get God’s power to go to heaven when you die, but when the Spirit of Christ is
in you, you get the power in “your
mortal bodies” before you die. This
is the reason the Spirit ‘enlightens’ our minds, so we can live “life” now, in
this world and in our mortal bodies ‘through
His Spirit who dwells in you.”
THE SPIRIT THAT LEADS
The
conclusion of all things ‘spiritual’ is not merely to move us beyond our ‘flesh’, nor to make us so ‘heavenly minded that we are of no earthly
good’ (C.S. Lewis), but the Christian life as a spiritual life is a life
that empowers us to ‘live’ fully and freely in our ‘flesh’ now so that we obtain
the ‘glorious’ hope of outliving our
own fleshly, earthly lives. “Indeed” Paul concludes, ‘we suffer with Him so that we may also be
glorified with Him” (8.17). This is
where Paul is going, and he hopes we will be going in that direction too. But it is a direction of life and living that
is impossible without the work of the Spirit in our lives. This
work of the Spirit is the Spirit who ‘leads us’ (8.14), Paul says, to be ‘children of God’, by adopting us, testifying within us, and making us all “heirs of God and fellow heirs of Jesus
Christ” (15-17): “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God” (8.14).
To be ‘children of God’ means that we are
fully alive human beings, people who not only granted the gift of life after we
die, but we also are given the gift of life and power to live before we die. This is so wonderfully illustrated once more
by C.S. Lewis, in his children’s book, The Lion, the
Witch and the Wardrobe. The White Witch had turned many of the inhabitants of
Narnia into stone, but Aslan, the Christ figure, jumps into the stone
courtyard, pouncing on the statues, breathing life into them. Lewis writes: The
courtyard looked no longer like a museum; it looked more like a
zoo. Creatures were running after Aslan and dancing round him till he was
almost hidden in the crowd. Instead of all that deadly white, the courtyard was
now ablaze with colors: glossy chestnut sides of centaurs, indigo horns of
unicorns, dazzling plumage of birds...” (As quoted by Brent Younger).
Surprisingly,
Lewis’ summary of what was happening in Narnia is a description of what a
church should look like: "The
courtyard no longer looked like a museum; it looked more like a zoo." The church of Jesus Christ should be so alive
in God’s Spirit, that people ‘in the Spirit’ have lives marked by
God-given liveliness, soul, joy, Spirit.
I know that sounds scary (I’ve
even heard recently that a Lutheran Pastor got fired for even mentioning the
Holy Spirit). It especially to some who
have a misunderstanding of what it means to be ‘spiritual’ or filled with the
Spirit. To help clear that up, once and
for all, I’d like to end with how the late Johnny Cash expressed the reality of being
‘spiritually’ or ‘heavenly minded’ with his Christian song, “No Earthly Good.”
Come heed me, my brothers, come heed, one and
all
Don't brag about standing or you'll surely fall
You're shining your light and shine it you should
But you're so heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
Don't brag about standing or you'll surely fall
You're shining your light and shine it you should
But you're so heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
If you're holding heaven, then spread it
around
There's hungry hands reaching up here from the ground
Move over and share the high ground where you stood
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
There's hungry hands reaching up here from the ground
Move over and share the high ground where you stood
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
The gospel ain't gospel until it is spread
But how can you share it where you've got your head
There's hands that reach out for a hand if you would
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
But how can you share it where you've got your head
There's hands that reach out for a hand if you would
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
If you're holding heaven, then spread it
around
There's hungry hands reaching up here from the ground
Move over and share the high ground where you stood
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
There's hungry hands reaching up here from the ground
Move over and share the high ground where you stood
So heavenly minded, you're no earthly good
(http://www.metrolyrics.com/no-earthly-good-lyrics-johnny-cash.html)
and listened to at:
What
Paul wants us to understand is the exactly where Johnny Cash was going with his
song, but said in an opposite way. Paul
wants us to be so ‘heavenly minded’ that we overcome ‘deeds
of sin’ in our bodies and are empowered to be of great earthly good. When you live that way, you know you’ve got
the right Spirit. Amen.
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