Essay 19 living in the Lordship of Christ (Romans) - live by the Spirit.
It’s like junk I am throwing in between me and God.
Someone once asked me
‘what does it mean to live by the Spirit’
and I couldn’t articulate an answer in a sentence.
I’m hoping this study will help me get there.
I might know that God has a better thought for me than the one I am acting
on in unbelief. Belief would be the know God’s response and act on it.
We are in the second part of Paul’s letter to the Romans
Part 1. the saving
The kerygma / proclamation – The saving work being accomplished in us and
for us by God through our response to Him.
Moving into part 2 – the salvaging – building Godly lives – experiencing
what God does for us
Part 2. the salvaging – from Romans 8
The parenesis/exhortation - the building of Godly lives and how we experience
all that God has done and is doing for us and through us.Where are we up to – part 1 …. the saving
What God does … or more precisely what God’s love does for us…..
Wanted, chosen, loved, made new, forgiven, given an eternal kind of life of
healing, reforming, strengthening and releasing me equipped to live in the
world and saving me for heaven.
By faith alone…. the saving
We know that by faith in Jesus Christ, this eternal kind of life is available for
us when we die.
How ?
Jesus’ death has removed all the junk that separates us from God –
Forgiveness is making way for the flow of this ‘eternal kind of life’ from God
to us. All we need to do is accept.
What separates me from God ?
that needs removing.
Junk
All the things in me that are
unequal to what God has made
possible for me = iniquities =
junk = unbelief
It’s not a condemnation it’s a diagnosis.
The source of iniquity junk
is unbelief.
Parts of me that God is yet to
reach.
The remedy to unbelief is of
course …… belief.
(not moral reform = tidying
my junk)
Belief = acting on the thoughts that come from God’s heart within me, that
will automatically be equal to what God is making possible for me = living
in the Spirit. (remember Live not by your natural inclinations but by God’s
inclinations, the Spirit Romans 8:9 . lost in translation session 16
As I cease acting on my own thoughts,
which is believing in myself and unbelief towards God,
I begin acting on the thoughts that flow from God’s heart within me.
I am then exercising belief in God so the flow of God’s life into my life
increases and I experience his life in my everyday life = life in the Spirit.
Steps of belief … walking in the Spirit
Paul’s impossible list of how to become the kind of person Jesus is.
Romans chapter 12:9
going
here
Experiencing God’s kind of life,
and transformation
believing
The bad ones
It’s easy to spot in my engagements, irritation, resentment, revenge or hurt.
It’s harder to set them aside. My mind and my body want to keep them. But
the heart of God inside me empowers me and as I set them aside, God gives
me His responses.
The hopeful ones … but equally wrong
It’s slightly less easy to spot engagements that are contrived to produce a
gain. A smile to elicit a smile must be the most innocent. Being nice to you
so you will be nice to me. Showing interest in you to secure your support to
my cause. Flattery. Promoting to convince. Once we see these in ourselves
we must set them aside.
you are
here
faith
Wanted, chosen, loved, made new, forgiven, given an
eternal kind of life that heals, reforms, strengthens
and releases you equipped to live in the world. (saved)
Impossible steps unless of course you take the first step of believing …
An active step we must learn to take constantly. (apprentices)
First step …. v9 Let love be sincere = greek is anhypokritos.
Session 18 – the world is a stage
Paul steps of belief …
Let love be sincere … without any pretence or motive
Our hearts are never free of motive .. even the best of motives.
So Paul is calling us to live from God’s heart within us
And we do this by abandoning the thoughts that come from our own heart,
especially the good ones.
The bad ones are easier to spot and obviously cause damage.
So as I engage with the world around me I must take Paul’s step of
believing and wean off the thoughts coming from my own heart by setting
them aside.
The nice ones … but still equally wrong
It is very difficult for me to see how good things coming from me, might
need to be set aside just because it might be coming from my own heart. My
knowledge, wisdom, guidance, care, support or just my good ideas.
But according to Paul they are from my own heart. An independent spirit
with a God label on it.
It’s like brewing my own wine and sticking Bordeaux labels on it.
The first step in this journey of becoming the kind of person Jesus is
Romans12:9 love must be sincere …. Not from our own heart
Recognising the love that comes from God’s heart in us …
We looked at Pauls list 12:9 But Paul has another list.
This is what love looks like that comes from God’s heart within us.
It’s not so much what we’re striving for
It’s more like what will come through us as we abandon our own best and
worse attempt from our own heart.
Whatever you do, do not insert your own name it will kill you.
1 Corinthians 13:4-8 New International Version (NIV)4 Love is
patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It
does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it
keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with
the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always
perseveres.
As we take steps of belief so we will become more and more the kind of
person Jesus is.