©2001 Larry Huntsperger Peninsula Bible Fellowship

4/22/01

From Flesh To Spirit

Romans 8:5-8

4/22/01 From Flesh To Spirit

We return this morning to our study

of the 8^th chapter of the book of Romans.

And with this return

we come, too, to a passage that will challenge our ability

to hear accurately

what our God is really saying to us.

We all have hearing problems

when it comes to the voice of God in our lives.

The truth is,

most of the time

we simply do not hear what He is saying

because we are already so certain we know what He is going to say

that what we hear

is not what He has said at all,

but rather it is what we expected Him to say.

Take, for example,

something so clear,

and simple,

and straightforward

as our God’s affirmation that He loves us.

He repeats it over and over and over again.

But most of the time

most of us don’t hear it

because we simply can’t allow ourselves to believe it is true.

And because we don’t believe it,

we skillfully reinterpret His words

so that they seem to make more sense to us.

By the time we get done with what He has said

what we have heard is,

“I will love you if...”

or “I might love you when...”

or “I could have loved you if only you hadn’t...”

Or we simply assume that the word “love”

when used by God

doesn’t really mean that He likes us,

or that He enjoys us,

or that He is deeply satisfied with us as His special creations.

We assume “love” to God

must mean something more like

he is eternally committed to our best interests,

and as such His primary concern

is shaping us up so that we act better.

And our flawed hearing

has the potential of getting us into trouble

with the passage we will be studying today as well.

Let me read the verses we’ll be getting to in a few minutes

just to show you what I mean.

ROM 8:5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.

ROM 8:6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,

ROM 8:7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,

ROM 8:8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

I think when most of us hear those verses

we just automatically assume

that the primary thrust of God’s communication to us here

is that we really should try a whole lot harder

to avoid those nasty little flesh things in our lives,

because there is no way we can please God when we are involved in them.

In other words,

what we hear our God saying to us

is that there is nice Christian behavior

and naughty flesh behavior

and we should all try hard

to do the Christian stuff

and avoid the flesh stuff

so that God will be more pleased with us.

And if that’s what we’re hearing

when we read these words in Romans chapter 8,

everything Paul has been saying to us

in chapters 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 has been wasted.

For nearly 5 chapters

Paul has been preparing us

for the verses we just read.

And understanding these verses correctly

can only happen

when we have at least some grasp

of what Paul has said to us in those 5 chapters.

You see,

the truth Paul is presenting to us here

is one that he learned from the teaching of Christ Himself.

When Paul tells us that “those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit...and those who are in the flesh cannot please God...”,

it is his way of saying the same thing that Christ said in John 6:63

when He told his disciples,

“It is the Spirit that gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.”

Both Christ and the Apostle Paul

are seeking to introduce us to the central growth principle of the Christian life -

the understanding that when we come to Christ

He truly does recreate us at the heart level,

and our calling now

is not to try to become more like the people God wants us to be,

our calling is to learn how to act

more and more consistent

with who we really are.

And step one in that process

is coming to grips

with this remarkable new identity

that we receive through Christ.

That is why

throughout the past 5 chapters of Romans

Paul has been carefully, systematically revealing to us

the truth about who we are in Christ.

1. He has told us that through Christ

we have been justified, made holy,

solely on the basis of our faith,

apart from any works of the law.

We truly are now God’s holy ones,

with spirits that are as pure

and as holy

and as righteous as Christ Himself.

2. He has told us that,

having now been justified by faith,

we have peace with God.

The trial is over,

the verdict is in,

and through our faith in Christ

we stand forevermore innocent before our Creator -

not just forgiven,

not just declared not guilty,

but innocent.

3. He has told us that through Christ

we have already received

our entrance into what Paul calls “this grace in which we stand”.

He didn’t just wipe the slate clean,

He threw it away altogether.

4. He has told us that we are now new creations in Christ,

with hearts that love God

and long to please Him.

And then when we offer a protest

about why there is no way

we can seriously buy into this business

of our being His holy ones,

pointing to all these very unholy impulses

that continue to surface daily in our lives,

Paul went on to explain to us

why those impulses are there

and where they come from.

5. He told us that this holy, recreated inner man that is the true us

is now temporarily living in a physical body

that was completely mistrained

by an inner spirit that was in absolute and utter rebellion against God.

6. He explained that we now live every day of our lives

with a spirit that loves God

and a body that wars against that love.

7. And then, so that we understand

just exactly how God views

this bent toward sin

that continues to dwell in our physical bodies,

he told us that there is now no condemnation

for the presence of all of those faithless impulses

that are imbedded in our physical bodies.

And the last time we were in this Romans study

we ended with Paul’s powerful summery statement

of the way things really are

in the life of the child of God.

In Romans 8:2-4 he said,

ROM 8:2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

ROM 8:3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,

ROM 8:4 so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus

has set us free from the law of sin and of death.

We are now those

who have entered into a walk with our God

not on the basis of our fleshly ability to submit to and obey

a long list of duties given to us by our God,

but rather on the basis

of His having created within us a new heart that loves God,

and then His pouring out within us

a growing awareness of the love of our God for us

and our new heart then responding to that love.

And the change that God seeks to accomplish within the mind of a Christian

is just a little bit like this.

Picture a 16 year old boy.

He comes home from school one afternoon

and his dad meets him in the driveway.

Next to him is a 10 year old Ford Escort.

He recognizes the car as one that belongs to a neighbor who lives down the street.

The car is about as dirty as a car can get,

both inside and out.

It hasn’t been washed in months,

and it hasn’t been waxed in years.

The dad has a bucket,

a hose,

a shop vacuum,

and a bunch of cleaning supplies next to him.

All he says is,

“Son, before you do anything else,

you need to clean that car, end-to-end, until it shines.

Now get to work!”

That is a little bit like our old life under the law.

The demands we see God placing upon us

are simply miserable little duties dumped on us,

duties that keep us from the things we really want to do,

a duties we perform because we fear the consequences of not doing them.

In the end,

we very likely invest as little time and effort as we possibly can

and still get by.

Now, picture this same 16 year old boy

coming home that same afternoon

with that same 10 year old Ford Escort in the driveway.

It’s just as dirty,

just as big a mess as before.

And dad is once again standing in the driveway to meet him.

But this time there is no bucket in dad’s hands,

no pile of cleaning supplies surrounding him.

All dad has is a set of keys.

And all he says to the boy is this,

“Here are the keys to your new car, son.

It’s all paid for, and it’s all yours.

It’s a bit of a mess,

but it runs great,

and a 16 year old boy needs a set of wheels of His own.”

Now, what do you think that boy will do?

If he’s anything like I was at 16,

I think he’ll spend the next 6 hours

scrubbing,

and waxing,

and vacuuming,

and cleaning every inch of that car until it shines.

Why?

Dad didn’t even tell him to.

He does it because he has a heart for it,

and because all of the sudden

a ten year old Ford Escort is the nicest car in his world.

Now, that illustration has a lot of holes in it,

but my main point is simply this -

the whole foundation of the walk with God

that our Creator has established for the Christian

rests upon two things:

1. God creates within us a heart that longs to please Him.

2. He then seeks to develop within us

a growing ability to hear His love

and respond to it.

Nothing else will work.

Nothing else has the ability

to transform our lives.

No set of rules ever written,

no religious system ever devised,

no amount of fear,

or guilt,

or shame, can ever produce the work within us that needs to be done.

Only the personal discovery

of the love of our God for us

that comes through Jesus Christ

can get us from where we are

to where we really want and need to be.

And just so that there is no misunderstanding

about what God is offering us,

and what He is asking of us,

the next thing Paul does

in this letter to the Romans

is to take this glorious truth of life with God in the center of His love,

and set it right next to the very best the flesh can offer

so that we can see the contrast.

He says,

ROM 8:5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.

ROM 8:6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,

ROM 8:7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,

ROM 8:8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Nearly all of the teaching I do here at PBF

is aimed at the Christian

with the hope that it will better equip the people of God

to walk effectively with our God.

But I know, too,

that in a group this size

there are very likely some here

who have listened to my words this morning

and can’t make any sense of them at all

because you have never placed your life

into the hands of the King of Kings.

You’ve listened to me talk this morning

about the way in which God creates within the Christian

a new heart,

a longing deep within us,

at the core of our being to live a life that pleases and honors our God.

It doesn’t mean any of us do it perfectly,

or even close to perfect,

but we long to.

But you know that right now

there is no such desire within you.

You feel guilty about some of the things you’ve done,

you may even feel a sense of shame,

and a genuine fear about what would happen

if you were to suddenly stand before your God this day

and be asked by Him

to give an account of your life.

The truth is,

the very thought of it

makes you feel really uncomfortable.

You’ve heard me talk this morning

about the way in which, through Christ,

we have true, eternal peace with God,

about the way in which

through Christ the battle between us

and our Creator is ended for ever.

But you know nothing about any such peace.

In fact,

the only thing that has made any sense to you at all this morning

is some of the phrases in that final passage I just read from Romans 8,

ROM 8:5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh...

That you understand.

That’s all you know.

Your entire life has been consumed

with survival,

and success,

and some kind of happiness here and now.

But all your best efforts to find that happiness

have left you feeling empty,

and longing for something more.

And when you heard Paul say,

For the mind set on the flesh is death..

something inside you agreed.

Everyone else in your world

might be thinking you’re doing great,

but you know the truth.

The only thing you’re filled with

is emptiness

and pain.

If any of that describes what’s been going on inside you

I want you to know

that what you’re longing for

is the knowledge of the love of your Creator.

Nothing else is ever going to satisfy.

All your best efforts to be good,

or to change your ways

are going to fail miserably.

You see, the truth is, we cannot change ourselves,

and, as Paul put it, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

But there is good news from our God,

better news than you’ve ever dreamed possible.

God doesn’t want you to try to change yourself.

He doesn’t want you to try to clean up your life,

or make a new start.

He knows you cannot change yourself.

What you need

is what He’s offering,

a whole new life.

And all He asks of you

is your willingness

to admit defeat,

to place your life into His hands,

taking all of your sins,

all your failures,

all those things that are causing you

so much guilt and shame

and give them to your God.

And if you do,

rather than condemning you for them,

He will take them all

and nail them to the cross of His Son, Jesus Christ,

and He will tell you

that the debt for all those sins

has already been paid in full.

And then He will do

what only He can do -

He will create within you

a new heart that loves Him,

a new heart that will begin changing you from the inside out.

Placing our lives into the hands of our God

is not complicated.

There is no secret formula,

no mystery,

no special religious ceremony required.

All you have to do is tell Him.

If you would like me to suggest some words,

these will do fine:

“Lord, I need your forgiveness.

I’ve been running my own life,

being my own god,

and I don’t want that any more.

I want You, I need You to be my God.

I place my life into your hands,

and give you the right

to do with it whatever you will.”

Amen.”

If you want to talk with me personally

about what I’ve just said,

I’d love to talk with you.

Or, even better,

if you’ve got a friend that you know is a Christian,

ask them to talk with you

about how they came to Christ

and how you can do the same.

I know this passage we’ve just read in Romans

describes well the life we lead

prior to our submission to Christ.

But remarkably,

in context Paul seems to have another group of people in mind as well.

He is also addressing his comments

to Christians who should be living out the life of the Spirit,

but who are actually attempting to live the Christian life in the power of the flesh.

And next week

we’ll look at how this happens

and Paul’s simple solution to it.