Romans, Part 29

There is therefore now no condemnation (κατάκριμα)[1] for those who are in Christ Jesus (ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ),[2] Paul continued.  I want to list some of the things that are true for those in Christ Jesus:

In Christ Jesus…

1) …born of water and spirit…What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.

John 3:5, 6 (NET)

2) …the flesh has desires that are opposed to the Spirit, and the Spirit has desires that are opposed to the flesh, for these are in opposition to each other, so that you cannot do what you want.

Galatians 5:17 (NET)

3) I delight in the law of God in my inner being.

Romans 7:22 (NET)

4) I know that nothing good lives…in my flesh.

Romans 7:18a (NET)

5) I want to do the good, but I cannot do it.

Romans 7:18b (NET)

6) I do not do the good I want, but I do the very evil I do not want!

Romans 7:19 (NET)

7) Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer me doing it but sin that lives in me.

Romans 7:20 (NET)

8) So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

Romans 7:25b (NKJV)

9) There is therefore now no condemnation…

Romans 8:1a (NET)

For the law of the life-giving Spirit in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.[3]  All of this was achieved by God.  For God achieved what the law could not do because it was weakened through the flesh. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and concerning sin, he condemned (κατέκρινεν, a form of κατακρίνω)[4] sin in the flesh[5]

Only God knows how much sin is condemned in my flesh.  I have a general sense that while I’m preoccupied (and frustrated) with the opposition of the flesh that keeps me from the perfection I want (and think I should demonstrate by the righteousness of God through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ)[6] less and less of the sin (that is the desire of the flesh) sees the light of day.  It is not expressed in the world.  It is confined, trapped, condemned in dead and dying flesh.

I am the resurrection and the life, Jesus said.  The one who believes in me will live even if he dies, and the one who lives and believes in me will never die.[7]  This was a difficult saying for Martha to believe, many years before Paul wrote to the Romans.  Jesus asked her, Do you believe this?[8]  Martha’s answer was a model of tactful diplomacy, Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who comes into the world.[9]

Jesus knew Martha’s brother was sick, but deliberately waited two more days until he died.[10]  Our friend, He told his disciples, has fallen asleep.  But I am going there to awaken him.[11]  His disciples were not eager to return to Judea.  Rabbi, they said, the Jewish leaders were just now trying to stone you to death!  [Jesus had claimed to be Yahweh, John 8:58, 59 NETAre you going there again?[12]  Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.[13]  So Jesus told them plainly that he was dead, and said, I am glad for your sake that I was not there, so that you may believe.[14]

Jesus had deliberately contrived this situation as an object lesson for his disciples, but then Mary, Martha’s sister, came and fell at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died:”[15]

When Jesus saw her weeping, and the people who had come with her weeping, he was intensely moved in spirit and greatly distressed.  He asked, “Where have you laid him?”  They replied, “Lord, come and see.”  Jesus wept.[16]

It was a profound moment.  Only He knows how many people He killed as Yahweh, sinners, yes, but people.  He planned the death of Martha’s and Mary’s brother.  He knew what He intended to do in the next few moments.  And yet He wept.  To say that Yahweh was not empathetic with human death would be false.  I’m particularly affected by the implications of Genesis 18, that before the omniscient, omnipresent Yahweh decided to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah he took physical form and walked its streets.  But there is something even more affecting about Yahweh, born of the flesh of Adam as Jesus, standing before the tomb of a friend weeping human tears from human eyes.

Take away the stone,[17] Jesus said.  Martha, ever the proper hostess, protested, Lord, by this time the body will have a bad smell, because he has been buried four days.[18]  Jesus responded (John 11:40-44 NET):

“Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you would see the glory of God?”  So they took away the stone.  Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you that you have listened to me.  I knew that you always listen to me, but I said this for the sake of the crowd standing around here, that they may believe that you sent me.”  When he had said this, he shouted in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”  The one who had died came out, his feet and hands tied up with strips of cloth, and a cloth wrapped around his face.  Jesus said to them, “Unwrap him and let him go.”

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord[19]who will rescue me from this body of death.[20]  The ultimate condemnation of sin in the flesh is the death of the body.  The one who believes in me will live even if he dies,[21] Jesus promised everyone born of the flesh and of the Spirit.  To those who already consider themselves dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus,[22] who accept their new identities, with the mind [they themselves] serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin,[23] Jesus promised, the one who lives and believes in me will never die.[24]  To them the well-deserved demise of the body of death is a welcome relief, not a cause of apprehension.

Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, [Jesus] likewise shared in their humanity, so that through death he could destroy the one who holds the power of death (that is, the devil), and set free those who were held in slavery all their lives by their fear of death,[25] is the way the writer of Hebrews put it.  Paul concluded, so that the righteous requirement of the law may be fulfilled (πληρωθῇ, a form of πληρόω)[26] in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.[27]  The righteous requirement of the law is fulfilled by the righteousness of God [apart from the law[28]] through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ for all who believe,[29] the love that is the fulfillment (πλήρωμα)[30] of the law,[31] the fruit of the Spirit[32] of God, in other words, to walk accordingto the Spirit.  As Jesus said, Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.  I have not come to abolish these things but to fulfill (πληρῶσαι, another form of πληρόω) them.[33]

Paul continued (Romans 8:5-11 NET):

For those who live according to the flesh have their outlook shaped by the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit have their outlook shaped by the things of the Spirit.  For the outlook of the flesh is death, but the outlook of the Spirit is life and peace, because the outlook of the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to the law of God, nor is it able to do so.  Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.  You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you.  Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, this person does not belong to him.  But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is your life because of righteousness.  Moreover if the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will also make your mortal bodies alive through his Spirit who lives in you.

Peter’s Way?

Romans, Part 30

Back to Romans, Part 31

Back to Romans, Part 32

Back to Romans, Part 35

Back to Son of God – John, Part 5

Back to Saving Demons, Part 1

Back to Romans, Part 45


[2] Romans 8:1 (NET)

[3] Romans 8:2 (NET)

[5] Romans 8:3 (NET)

[7] John 11:25, 26a (NET)

[8] John 11:26b (NET)

[9] John 11:27 (NET)

[10] John 11:6 (NET)

[11] John 11:11 (NET)

[12] John 11:8 (NET)

[13] John 11:12 (NET)

[14] John 11:15 (NET)

[15] John 11:32 (NET)

[16] John 11:33-35 (NET)

[17] John 11:39a (NET)

[18] John 11:39b (NET)

[19] Romans 7:25a (NET)

[20] Romans 7:24b (NET)

[21] John 11:25b (NET)

[23] Romans 7:25b (NET)

[24] John 11:26a (NET)

[25] Hebrews 2:14, 15 (NET)

[27] Romans 8:4 (NET)

[33] Matthew 5:17 (NET)