Life in the Spirit

  Posted on October 9, 2018  by   No comments

Rom_8:9-11

This is comforting. This morning my body feels a little better. I don’t have elbow pain and I feel pretty good. For the most part I don’t have a lot of aches, but in recent years God has been so gracious to me to allow me to begin to feel some of the aches and pains, the trials and tribulations of being mortal. He has been so gentle. I am so thankful. We all must eventually give in to the wearing out of our bodies. Perhaps it will be sudden. Perhaps early in our years or late, but we all must lose this mortal body, and after that to be home forever with our Father and Maker. Still, it is encouraging to know that the God of the universe is not just a fanciful breathe like conception to comfort us for a distant someday, but a flesh and bone, blood and guts type of God who cares about our existence in the here and now as much as He does our future with Him. He could have left it with, “if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.” But He didn’t, He added. “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies“. Really. The language he uses here is all about the body that is liable to die. If God was just concerned about reuniting us with Him in some metaphysical fashion He could have stopped with the first half and we would have been eternally blessed. But God our God is interested in us having life to the Full now. (Joh 10:10) Not only did He empty Himself and take on the form of a servant to be spent as the price for our eternal drawing to Himself, but He steps back out of this mortal time that we might receive the promised Spirit that Teaches and Guides us (Joh_16:13), Gives us the very words to speak in trials (Mar_13:11) and keeps us from speaking when we should not (Act_16:6). Comforts us (Act_9:31), Bears witness of God in us (Act_11:16), Appoints our Overseers (Act_20:28), Gives us glimpses into the future (Act_20:23, Act_21:11, Act_19:6) and fills us with the power to Abound in hope (Rom_15:13). Gloriously He removes shame by pouring out God’s love into our hearts (Rom_5:5), Making pure and acceptable our offerings to God (Rom_15:16) and giving us the ONLY way to say “Jesus is LORD” (1Co_12:3). What a blessing that He Washes, Regenerates and Renews us (Tit_3:5), Reminds us that there is no longer any shame or guilt or payment for our failures and transgressions (Heb_10:15), and Delivers to us prophecies through men of God (2Pe_1:21). Like all of this is not enough, now he “gives life to our mortal bodies”. These corrupt and corruptible shells that give action to our sins as well as our good intentions. Why He would ever breath more life into this frame so “Prone to wander” is beyond me, but He does. He gives me life and not only renews the replaces the spirit in me but invigorates my very body and renews my strength as all I do is wait up on Him (Is 40:31). Oh LORD, my God, I am undone.

Psa_8:3-9 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas. O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!