The Life-Giving Spirit

I. Introduction

In the Mid AD 50s, the apostle Paul wrote what most consider to be one of the greatest treasures of Scripture ever to be inspired.

Paul’s letter to the church at Rome proclaims God’s power to save through the gospel and shows us that only through faith in Jesus is righteousness given to anyone.

Today we want to joyfully consider Romans 8:1-11 to see the Holy Spirit’s involvement in human salvation as we glorify the Lord for the assurance that we as believers have of eternal life in Christ.

II. No Condemnation

Romans 8:1 ESV

1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

BDAG Condemnation Def: (In this and the cognates that follow the use of the term ‘condemnation’ does not denote merely a pronouncement of guilt [s. κρίνω 5], but the adjudication of punishment.) judicial pronouncement upon a guilty person, condemnation, punishment, penalty (s. three next entries; freq. of fines: Dionys. Hal. 6, 61 κατακριμάτων ἀφέσεις; POxy 298, 4 [I a.d.]; CPR I, 1, 15ff; 188, 14f; Mitt-Wilck. I/2, 28, 12; Dssm., NB 92f [BS 264f]) οὐδὲν κ. τοῖς ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ there is no death-sentence for those who are in Christ Jesus Ro 8:1 (William Arndt et al., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 518.)

III. The Spirit Gives Us Life!

A. Life in the present

Romans 8:2 ESV

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

The Spirit breaks us free from the authority and power of sin and death.

It is God’s Spirit, coming to the believer with power and authority, who brings liberation from the powers of the old age and from the condemnation that is the lot of all who are imprisoned by those powers. (Douglas J. Moo, The Letter to the Romans, ed. Ned B. Stonehouse et al., Second Edition., The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018), 498.)

Romans 8:3 ESV

3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,

In executing the full sentence of condemnation against sin, God effectively removed sin’s ability to dictate terms for those who are “in Christ” (v. 2). The condemnation that our sins deserve has been poured out on Christ, our sin-bearer; that is why “there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (v. 1). (Douglas J. Moo, The Letter to the Romans, ed. Ned B. Stonehouse et al., Second Edition., The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018), 504.)

Romans 8:4 ESV

4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

The Father sent the Son to do the work necessary to put us in a position of righteousness!

Romans 8:5–8 ESV

5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. 8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Fleshly outlook brings death but the outlook of the Spirit brings life and peace.

“To walk according to the flesh,” then, is to have one’s life determined and directed by the values of this world, of the world in rebellion against God. It is a lifestyle that is purely human in its orientation.947 To “walk according to the Spirit,” on the other hand, is to live under the control, and according to the values, of the new age, created and dominated by God’s Spirit as his eschatological gift. (Douglas J. Moo, The Letter to the Romans, ed. Ned B. Stonehouse et al., Second Edition., The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018), 508.)

Romans 8:9 ESV

9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

You are in the Spirit because He dwells in you.

Without the Spirit, no one belongs to Christ!

Romans 8:10 ESV

10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

B. Life in the future – Eschatological Life!

Romans 8:11 ESV

11 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 through his Spirit who dwells in you.

Acts 2:23–24 ESV

23 this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. 24 God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.

1 Corinthians 15:3–4 ESV

3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,