Formed by the Spirit

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SERIES SET UP

If you have a bible with you, why don’t you meet me in Romans chapter 8. Romans chapter 8. We’ll be in verses ONE through ELEVEN today.

Introduction

On December 26, 1944 a Japanese intelligence officer named Hiroo Onoda was sent to Lubang Island in the Philippines towards the end of World War II. His mission was to disrupt as much as possible Allied activities on the Island—and this is what he gave his life too. All of his attention and focus was squarely placed on what his commanding officers had asked of him.

When the war ended in 1945, leaflets were sent by the Japanese government to Onoda and his other officers to draw them out of hiding…but Onoda thought it was just propaganda…so he continued on his mission often getting in shootouts with local police forces and other residents of the island.

The Japanese army then dropped more leaflets in the area…with pictures and letters from his family urging him to return home. Again, Onoda thought these items were more propaganda from the enemy and continued his work. Finally, exacerbated from trying to convince him, the Japanese government located Onoda’s former commanding officer and flew him to the Island to officially relieve Onoda of his duty—and finally after all this, he actually surrendered. The year was 1974. He had been fighting a war that had been over for almost 30 years.

Why am I telling you this?

Because I think, in some ways, this story about Hiroo Onoda highlights one of realities of the Christian life—sin lingers. And there is an ongoing battle we will have in our lives—long after the war is over…if you know what I mean.

In this series, I we are exploring what I think is a profoundly importation question for each and every follower of Jesus to ask.

Here’s his question in a nutshell: As a Christian, what do you do with the ongoing sin in your life?

We know this question well—and not as theory, but a very personal and real question.

Why is it that we can honestly say that there is something we never want to do again…something we can passionately reject… and almost scream that we want to be done with…and yet at the same time, go back and do it again. Or some other issue pops up to take it’s place?! How do we deal with it? That's the question.

On top of this, let’s add to that the reality that this type of ongoing sin in our lives is often witnessed by those around you - in fact, for some of yo here today the reason you struggle to believe in God or see Christianity as a good thing at all is because you have seen over and over again, people to fail to live out the things the so strongly claim to believe.

In chapter 8, Paul finally gives us an answer. And it’s incredible.

In fact, throughout history, many have seen Romans 8 as the ‘greatest chapter in the Bible’. Not because it is more important…but because in this chapter, Paul masterfully articulates the astounding truth God does not just grant us freedom from sin…He also, by giving us the Holy Spirit, empowers us to live and thrive in freedom from sin!

And if there is anything we’re supposed to walk away thinking about today, it’s this: The Holy Spirit helps us live in freedom. That if YOU are here today and are a Christian…God the Holy Spirit does not only dwell within you, but He empowers you to live the way that God has created you to live; to live in freedom from sin…to live in joyful obedience to our God—so that we would honor Jesus with all that we think, say, and do.

So if you’re not there yet, open up to Romans chapter 8.

I’ll read the text, pray, and then we’ll get started.

Romans 8:1-11

Romans 8:1–11 ESV

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 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 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. 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. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 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. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 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. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 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.

PRAY

Context

Alright, let’s get started.

Let me give just a little bit of context as we jump into a new book.

Romans was a letter written by the Apostle Paul, one of the earliest leaders of the Jesus movement. He would typically go to major cities in the Roman empire and start these communities of Followers of Jesus we now call “churches”. Occasionally, he would write letters back to those churches after he’s moved - and some of those letters compose about 50% of the New Testament; Romans being one of those letters. Now the interesting twist here is that Paul has only heard about the church in Rome; he didn’t start it and as best we can tell, he’s never visited.

And I think that explains why Romans is so long and why it’s so theologically dense! He wants to make sure everyone’s on the same page.

In chapter 6, Paul showed us that the message of the Gospel; Jesus death, resurrection and reign, eradicates any room for complacency over sin in the life of a Christian. Basically, it means that as a follower of Jesus, you cannot just write off sin in your life. It’s not just a no big deal, brush-it-under-the-rug, everybody does it kinda thing! No, God takes our sin seriously.

And just so we’re on the same page, think of it this way: SIN is our failure to live the way God has created us to. It’s when we do anything God tells us not to do OR when we don't do what God tells us to do.

The bottom line, is that complacency is NOT an option for a follower of Christ!

But when you move in to chapter seven, particularly the second half, you see the great tension Paul brings up in describing the Christian life when he says:

Romans 7:22–23 ESV

22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.

It’s like he’s talking about this ongoing battle inside of us. Think of Hiroo Onoda—the WAR is long over, but a battle still continues. On the one hand we know what God wants us to do…on the other, there is this desire pulling at us to do something else…to do what we want to do. That is an undeniable reality, right? Paul says it well in chapter 7:

Romans 7:21 ESV

21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.

How many of you know this law well? Husbands, isn’t it true that so often, when you’re trying to serve your wife…there is the secondary motive hiding just behind your actions…one that you might not even recognize…at least until things don't play out the way you were hoping they would…

And it finally gets to a breaking point—Paul says:

Romans 7:24 ESV

24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

It’s important that we really hear that…because that is strong language. It’s a desperation in a struggle with sin…you don’t say something like that without recognizing what is at stake!

And before we move on, I think it’s worth pausing here for a minute. Friends, do you know that this is the question that we should regularly be coming back to? Because asking this question reveals how insidious we see sin in our lives…in fact, it’s safe to say that to be a Christian and not come to this question often, is an indication that we are recklessly complacent in our spiritual lives!

Let me ask you this…as a follower of Jesus, when is the last time you have been overwhelmed by your struggle with sin like Paul articulates here?

How many of you know the shame of continuing to go back and back and back to the very thing you promised you’d never do again?

You see, this is the tension that Paul has been building up over the last two chapters…but friends, it’s when we feel the true weight of this struggle with sin, that we will truly love the relief offered us in the Gospel!

No Condemnation

Because while there is an ongoing struggle that accompanies the Christian life, look with me at v. 1 (Rom. 8:1), “There is therefore now NO CONDEMNATION for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

We need to hear those words. “No Condemnation.” If you are a Christian…there is no condemnation from God on you over your sin any more. But that’s not because God just gives you a pass or because He decides that for some reason, your sin doesn’t matter any more. No!

Keep reading in v. 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.

This is an incredible thing for Paul to say—that far from God just wanting to blindly punish people who don’t obey Him—God makes a great provision for humanity to have a relationship with Him.

Because there is not just some set of rule and regulations that we are somehow supposed to live by or else….No, far from it! See the beauty of this is that while we have earned condemnation, the Gospel shows us that God did not demand it from us! The reason there is no condemnation for a follow of Jesus is not because God doesn’t care, but because He redirects the condemnation that we rightly deserve on to Jesus!

V. 3 “He sent His Son in the LIKENESS of sinful flesh…so he CONDEMNED sin in the flesh!”

Friends, this is work that Jesus has done on our behalf! This the core of the Gospel message—that Jesus was condemned IN OUR PLACE, FOR OUR sin!

In his death on the cross, he takes on the punishment, the condemnation, we have earned in our failure to live the way God has created us to! Theologians call this Penal substitutionary atonement. The idea that Jesus takes OUR PENALTY, IN OUR PLACE, to ATONE for our Sin before God the Father.

Christian, do you know that you, in no way, need to wait for the ‘other shoe to drop’ with God? That when you become a Christian, there is a fundamental shift that takes place in your life—your standing before God is forever changed! Think back to the story I started with…at moment of Jesus’ death and resurrection, the WAR IS OVER.

And just so we’re clear, Paul says in v. 1 that this is for those who are ”…in Christ.”That means those who believe in Jesus—in his Death and Resurrection from the dead…who pledge their allegiance to Him and to Him alone—available to anyone! (EXPAND)

But here’s what we’ve got to see…this is the foundation of the Gospel message—that Jesus has done for us what we could not do ourselves!

And if you’ve been around here for a while, you know that we talk about this almost every week.

But you see, this is where Paul introduces a new thought for us…something we’ve NOT talked way to much about so far in our series in Romans. It’s not just that God establishes a relationship with us by sending His Son, He sustains a relationship with us by sending us His Spirit.

The Work of the Spirit

We’ll be spending more time talking about this over the next couple of weeks, but here, Paul highlights for us one of the great roles of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Christian.

Look with me at v. 4.

Remember, in v. 3, Paul talked about what Jesus has done on our behalf—that we He was condemned in our place…but in v. 4 then he tells us why.

“…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.”

In other words, the way God has called us to live—what Paul calls the righteous requirement of the law—is fulfilled…it’s met…it’s satisfied not in our own doing, but by walking, or living according to the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit empowers us to live in freedom; helps us lives the way God created us to live.

Hang out here for a second. Because we can easily miss how liberating this idea really is. You see, because of the Holy Spirit, we don’t need to try and figure out what God wants us to do…why don’t have to try and decipher codes and clues for us to figure out how to please Him or making him happy us!

No!

God has not left us alone to figure things out! His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is a great gift to us—empowering us to honor God in all that we think say and do!

Now…let me be clear here. Having the Holy Spirit in your life does not therefore mean you will never sin again. It doesn’t.

Think back to Hiroo Onoda’s story. The war is over, but sin still lingers. We can find countless examples of Christians throughout history who have glaring blind spots in their lives—things that you just wonder how on earth they were okay with…and I guarantee that 100 years from now, a generation of Christians will look back at this time and wonder how we missed certain things.

But here’s the thing, it’s not just that the Spirit helps us…Paul says that as followers of Jesus we are called to live under the influence of the Holy Spirit. And that takes work. That takes intentionality…it’s not something that will just happen. Because again, there is still this kind of ongoing battle with sin in our lives.

The Flesh vs. the Spirit

Think back to the story of Hiroo Onoda. You can think of this way—that ongoing battle—even though the war is over—Paul calls this the ‘flesh’.

Set Your Mind on the Spirit not the Flesh.

Look with me at v. 5 (Rom. 8:5), "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 Spirt. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.”

He's talking about two different mindsets! The flesh—that ongoing battle with sin—and the Spirit.

Formation (What we do shapes what we think)

Paul is saying that you will either set your mind on the Flesh or you will set your mind on the Spirit; and it matters. It has an affect on us.

You know, one of the things I think we often over look in our lives is how impressionable we really are—all of us! We are constantly in the process of being shaped and formed by the things around us…by the things we hear and see. Frankly, this is the very reason why there is so much money in Big Data companies, because they know that we can be subtly but surely influenced by enough of the right kind of adds! The shows we watch, the books we read, where we get our news…all of this shapes our thinking and how we process the world around us. What we are exposed to matters. Paul says this is how it works with the flesh and the Spirit.

He's describing a cycle. You know, like the person who lives according to the flesh, sets their mind on the flesh—so they, in turn, live according to the flesh. And Paul says this cycle of the flesh ends in death!

But here’s the punchline—

Look with me at v. 9, ”You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit…”

Talking to Christians, Paul says YOU ARE IN THE SPIRIT! So set your mind on the Spirit! Because that same cycle is at play…in setting your mind on the Spirit, you will then LIVE by the Spirit! And again, this is not just living a good life…to live by the Spirit is to live the way God has created us to live—it’s to experience the satisfaction, joy, and peace that surpasses anything else we might hope to find! To live in the Spirit is to live life to the full! It’s to live in freedom from sin and the flesh! The Holy Spirit empowers us to live the way we’ve been created to live!

So the question, then, is how do you set your mind on the Spirit so that you live in the Spirit? How do we do this?

Let me give you a couple ways—and some of these will come as no surprise.

Believe the Gospel

Here’s the first one—to live in the Spirit and live the way you’ve been created to lived—this is possible first only by becoming a Christian—by trusting in Jesus and his Death and Resurrection from the dead as the foundation for your relationship with God. Without faith in Christ, Paul says you are stuck in the life of the Flesh--He goes as far as saying in v. 7, ”…the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those in the flesh cannot please God.” If you are here today, and you know you’re NOT a Christian, I urge you to consider the things we’ve been looking at—that apart from faith in Christ—there is condemnation for your sin that will fall on you. But the good news is that if you put your faith in Jesus—you pledge your allegiance to Him and Him alone—God offers you a new and transformed life—promising to give you the gift of the Holy Spirit!

The Word and Prayer

Second, we set our mind on the Spirit as we are regularly engaged in the work of reading God’s Word and prayer. 2 Peter 1:21 tells us that the Bible is not just words thought up by men, but that it is a product of the Holy Spirit! The words we read in this books were written, by the help of the Holy Spirit—and is a way that the Spirit still leads us today! As we are, regularly coming before the Word of God with desire conform our lives to scripture!

Sometimes, when we think about reading the Bible or praying, we think that for it to be time that was worth it, we need to walk away with some profound insight—something we’ve never seen before…you know what I mean. And when we don't have that, it can feel a bit like we’ve wasting our time. But what’s actually happening when we’re reading the word regularly and spending time in prayer is that we are being formed and shaped by what we’re taking in. You usually won’t notice it right away, but certainly over the long haul, we will begin to see and process the world differently because in PRAYER and in the WORD we are setting our minds on the Spirit.

Ash Wednesday is a Formation

Here’s one more example of setting your mind on the Spirit—and this is more on the practical side of something you can do and join in on.

The last couple of weeks, we’ve been announcing in the Ash Wednesday services coming up this week. For those of you who don’t know what Ash Wednesday is—or maybe you’ve gone to a service like that as a kid, but just never understood what it is and why you were doing it…Ash Wednesday is the official start of the roughly seven week season leading up to Easter called Lent.

And the whole purpose of Lent is not for us to put on some kinda of religious show in our lives—but at it’s very core, Lent is supposed to be formative. This is why, for over 1500 years, Christians have used this time for fasting: intentionally giving up something we value…replacing that thing or activity with prayer and time in the Word; focusing on ways to be generous. Essentially, the purpose of Lent is to intentionally creating space to set your mind on the Spirit.

The process of fasting is taking something we value and intentionally giving it up so that we can create room for something else. For a lot of people, fasting involves giving up food—either for a set number of days, or a particular kind of food, or even something like giving up lunch during lent. Doesn’t have to be food though—it could be like a social media fast…or a digital entertainment fast…there are a bunch of different ways to do this. But the point is, whatever you are giving up, is like a trigger. If it’s food, you use physical hunger as a prompt to ask, am I spiritually hungry in my life? Let that drive you to more time in the Word and Prayer—setting your Mind on the Spirit!

Friends, a final piece that we have to see here, is that in pointing to the work of the Holy Spirit, Paul is giving the solution to the problem he began talking about in Chapter seven. What do we do with the lingering sin in our lives. We’ve got see that the POWERFUL encouragement from this text is that if you are a Christian, God helps you…He empowers you…to live in obedience. Sin is NO LONGER the authority in your life! You don’t have to run back to it…you don’t have to give yourself over to it!

Those of you here today who are in a battle with sin…I want you to be reminded that as a Christian, you have been filled with God’s Holy Spirit—and and there’s hardly a stronger way for Paul to say it than how he ends in v. 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.

You can be confident that, as a Christian, God is and will continue to be powerfully at work in your life.

Conclusion

Friends, in the first section of Romans 8—this profound chapter in the Bible, the great encouragement we get, is that as followers of Jesus, God has given us the gift of the Holy Spirit, who empowers us to live the way we’ve been created to live! To live in a way that honor God in all that we think, say, and do…to live in freedom from the Sin, knowing that the war is over!

Would you pray with me?