New Life in the Spirit

Who are you? Not just what is your name, but who are you? We identify ourselves by our name, but that is not our whole identity. Our identity is composed of our beliefs, thought patterns, strengths, weaknesses, preferences, and other traits. Nowadays, identity is a big topic for lots of people. I hope that for many of you that you are not in an identity crisis. That you understand your identity is in Christ.

When we identify ourselves with Christ it will change the way we live. In Romans 8:37 it identifies us as more than conquerors for we have the victory in Jesus. When Bartlett composed the hymn “Victory in Jesus,” he shares that Jesus brought to him the victory. That victory happened when Christ defeated death. For us, it’s hard to grasp the implication of victory over sin from the resurrection. We don’t always see, feel, think, or experience that freedom.

Sin, death, and evil have been conquered in Christ, but we still must fight our battles and temptations. Movies like The Karate Kid (1984), Star Wars (1977), Rocky (1976), and many others describe victories of underdogs. We are underdogs in this battle of the flesh. Satan has been devising schemes since the beginning of time and he knows just how to cause you to stumble in this life. Just before this passage Paul described his battle of good and evil. Unfortunately, on our own we cannot conquer evil.

We are powerless to do so because it is such a fundamental part of us. We were born with it, and it seems hopeless for us. Who is going to save us? To that, Paul answers, thank God for Jesus, and that is where this passage picks up.

When we are in Jesus, we don’t have to sit condemned. We don’t have to wallow in our self-pity. We don’t have to live in fear that we are not good enough. We are not abandoned by God because of the evil that lives within us. Through Jesus, we are set free from sin and death and are given new life in the Spirit of Christ.

God had a law that showed us what was right and wrong, but it couldn’t free us from our sins. So, God sent his own son down to this earth to take the punishment for us. Jesus was the perfect person who never sinned, but he died so that the requirement of the law could be fulfilled and sin itself would be condemned and not us. This happens because we identify ourselves with Jesus. When we live according to the flesh, we identify with sin, but when we live according to the Spirit, we identify with Jesus.

Take for example a child who goes to the store and sees something they really want, but their parents tell them no. What happens? They have a fit.

When we live according to the flesh, we always focus on the fleshly desires, and we act like kids when we want something. Sometimes, those desires start to define us.

When we are caught up in ourselves, it is hard to think of anything else but our own desires and nothing else matters. We must see that this could be anything but hostile to God? We don’t want to listen to him, and we follow our own limited way regardless of if it is good for us to do so or not. There is no way for us to please God.

However, since you are here, I assume you have some curiosity about pleasing God. So, Paul gives us some hope that if you accept Jesus and what he has done for you then His Spirit comes to reside in us. Because Jesus is in us, we have life, even though we still struggle with our sin, the evil that lives within us. We don’t have to live like we are walking on eggshells, worried about any small sin we might commit. If we are alive right now, we will still sin, but it is no longer our identity because Christ now lives within us.

Our identity is now found in Christ. Because of his Spirit living within us, we can use that Spirit for biometric access to life. It’s like Touch ID or Face ID on your phone. It is Spirit ID. With Spirit ID, we unlock eternal life because Jesus was able to rise from the dead to a life everlasting. Spirit ID opens the door, and we can follow Jesus because the Spirit shows that we are identified with Christ and belong to him.

What that means is that we become like Christ, a child of God. The passage says, “For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” (14-17)

When we have God’s Spirit, when we are led by it, we become children of God. That is our identity, children of God. It is an identity that is not driven by fear. But being a child of God means that we can call him Father.

We can come to God like a child comes to his daddy. A young child has no fear but just wants to be with their daddy. They want to please their daddy and come to him with open arms. That is the type of relationship that we can have with the creator of the universe. One of the things that it means to be a child of God is that we become heirs of God and co-heirs with Jesus. Jesus becomes like our brother and what he inherits, we too have a claim on. We will not only have a residence in heaven, but we will have a stake in ownership of heaven and all things. We will have a share of his glory.

Now, to have a share of his glory means that we will also have to share in the sufferings of Christ. Our life on earth, even as believers, is not going to be easy and rosy. This world is still a broken world, but the pain that we may feel is like the pain of childbirth. It is temporal and it leads us to hope in the coming future, one where there is no pain or death, when we come into our inheritance. We have a hope that our frail, broken human bodies will be redeemed when we are fully brought into his glory. As a child of God, we know that we will conquer ourselves. We conquer our fear, pain and doubt. The limitations that we have will fade away and we are protected by the great love of God.

Because God becomes our daddy, everything he has in mind for us is for our own good. He protects us from all sorts of evil. The world waits for us to stumble and fall, and it laughs at our pain and doubt. The world mocks us for believing in God, thinking that we are fools for putting our hope in God, but God protects us and uses all that scorn to build us up. It strengthens a believer’s resolve and helps conform us to the image of his Son.

Being a child of God means that we start to look like God, just like a child looks like their parents. Children also take on many of the personality traits of their parents. As we are growing up, we never want to turn into our parents, but inevitably we find ourselves acting like them. In Christ, through Christ we start being remade in the image of Jesus. We start acting like him.

What that means is we grow in love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, because those are the very attributes of God. We gain God’s strength and his power. We gain his compassion and love. We gain his righteousness and sense of justice. We gain his humility and we gain his victory.

We all have an identity. Usually, we think that our identity is what makes us special, what makes us unique. Sometimes, what we think is our identity is not what other people see. There may have been one thing that happened to us and that is what people remember. Sometimes that is a good thing, but other times what people remember is something embarrassing. Who ever wanted to be the kid that wet his pants in class or cried publicly? Who ever wanted to be the weirdo that wasn’t like everyone else? Who ever wanted to be known as the kid from a broken family? Those are horrible identities, but those are identities that get put on people, because that is what they remember. There are other people that don’t feel special, and so they don’t think that they have an identity. They don’t feel very unique, so they go searching for something to be. They live confused by trying to find their worth in things that make no sense.

I’m a quirky person and have often felt estranged from others. I have felt alone and thought that no one can understand. How I see the world is different, and how I think is different. And many of you probably can share these same sentiments. You will never meet someone just like you and that is okay. Your identity cannot be tangled up in labels that you place on yourself or what others may think of you.

Paul writes, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (38-39) When we accept Jesus as our Savior. When we invite his Spirit in us, when we seek God and Christ dwells within us, we are children of God and nothing can take that away, nothing. We have victory, but more than that, we have life and a life that never ends. We don’t have to be ashamed of who we are. We don’t have to be fearful or alone. We are not merely someone that knows God, but we are his children and his heirs.

I want you all to repeat after me:

I am a child of God. I am more than a conqueror and I am more than what this world says I am. I am who God says I am, and no one can tell me otherwise.