“The Law of the Spirit of Life” is the Romans 8:2 phrase we looked at briefly in our last GraceNotes. This is Paul’s context for declaring that the righteousness of God is now revealed WITHIN US through faith into faith since the just by faith shall live.
Paul’s foundational beginning in Romans one launches us into a genuine quantum leap out from God’s righteous judgment of condemnation into the heights of God’s eternal glory and love in us and Romans eight!
“In Christ Jesus,” we became a Spiritual person, a possessor of God’s Kingdom power in the dominion of eternal life through His glorious grace. This is the foundational identity of each believer’s growth in Christ Jesus, the Spiritual threshold of LIFE is “in Christ Jesus.”
THE LAW of the SPIRIT OF LIFE is describing the Kingdom of God having entered into our jars of clay literally, joining our spirit with THE HOLY SPIRIT, forming a new creation in our loving Lord Jesus Christ. We now are sons and daughters of our Living God!
But this is not all, this grace in which we “stand” is in the SPIRIT OF LIFE; it is God’s Eternal Culture training us to live “in Christ Jesus” rather than being conformed to a worldview of deceptions rooted in temporal concerns. In other words, we are not alone in this new eternal venture. God is now teaching us, through our “in Christ” position, not only about who we now are, but introducing us into a Spiritual culture of grace; we are on an earthly journey, an earthly field trip into God’s eternal culture of agape love, grace, rightlessness, and glory. Our eternal identity in Christ Jesus is established!
It sounds like a contradiction in terms. How can we, living in the flesh, enter into the Spiritual reality of eternal life while still walking around on dirt with earthly sandals and wearing fleshly jars of clay?
Welcome to God’s eternal reality!
We are now, while wearing earthly clothes, a holy, eternal righteous person with resurrection power in the literal family of God almighty! We are now justified through redemption and declared righteous through the blood of Jesus! We not only have Spiritual identity, it is who we are! This world is no longer our home, we are just passing through. We are now Spiritual people living in earthly bodies. Yes, we are!
This sounds more like a fairy tale than our personal reality! How can we, human creatures, become Spiritual beings like God Himself? How can the resurrected Jesus become alive in us personally! How can we human sinners acquire the eternal qualities of our holy God Himself and actually be children in His own family? This speaks to the depth of His agape LOVE, His holy righteousness, His mercy and grace, His power and His glory!
God is our agape loving Father God! It is because Jesus is our redemption! It is because the Holy Spirit is in us working! It is because God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are all One Person who have adopted you and me into their/our family!
“and it is God who establishes us with you into (ειs) Christ, and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” -2Corinthians 1:21.
Our new birth creation licenses and enables us to hear with Spiritual ears and see the Law of the Spirit of Life with Spiritual eyes. “The Law of the Spirit of Life” replaces “the law of sin and death!” We now have God’s Spirit of Life and the law of God’s life officially gifted into us.
God has not only given, but continues giving His grace as we give our Faith! He has done His part by putting us into His kingdom through redemption, through the person of Jesus! It is now our part to take His agape love, righteousness, grace and glorify Him in and with His resurrection power through our Faith working together with Him in us.
While it is true the Greek words for both faith and believe have the same root word, faith gives feet to believe. In other words, faith can be a stronger word because it gives you and me intentional force for believing deeper, so that, our believing produces His grace … knowing Him and becoming like Him by growing in Him … producing fruit thru Him!
On the other hand, faith can also be a belief that does not produce strong results, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” This is why our Spiritual journey in flesh is so very important. God is teaching us, through earthly experience, in our earthly jars of flesh (enemy territory) to grow FAITH through His grace and grow Spiritual knowledge of Him in Him. Paul put it this way, “that I might know Him and the power of His resurrection, and share His sufferings …. I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus made me His own.”
Jesus has actually equipped us to live in His kingdom now, here on earth! The best way for us to learn to trust in Him is via faith, using His resurrection power in our normal, physical, created domain. Can you think of a better way to understand who we are in Jesus Christ than to apply His grace to our normal common human life? We are spiritual babes learning how to produce spiritual fruit in fleshly bodies working in worldly darkness!
We are now walking with Jesus in our Spiritual journey on earth with and in the Holy Spirit learning about human corrupt biases within ourselves AND our new heavenly resurrection power in Him. We are now learning to walk in faith as His workmanship is being formed in us. He is teaching us to walk in Him as we also learn discernment, separation of ourselves from the desires of the flesh. Whatsoever is not of faith is sin.
We are being called to reconcile ourselves to God because God has already reconciled us to Himself, “He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.” God has called you and me to be His channels of reconciliation to those around us in the world!
His living dynamic in us is our testimony of Jesus’ living presence within this scanty jar of clay which we occupy! The Holy Spirit of God Himself is alive within us, in His resurrection power, leading us into the fulness of Himself, even now, while living in jars of clay! How quantum, yet, how precious!
This is all part of our eternal salvation that has already happened! But in order for us to participate, and exploit these unbelievables, requires our intentional choice! It is not merely a believing faith, it is a faith driven by our decision to act with intentional purpose! We must desire to have in us what God is already providing for us, so that, we may consume His reality. We must want it enough to take it, we must desire to know Jesus personally!
“Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.”
- John 6:35.
Eat the bread and drink the water!
Unless we eat the flesh of Jesus and drinks His blood we will suffer loss when we see Him face to face! This means we must live Spiritually while on this earth because God has chosen to live in man. We must be serious about who we are in Christ Jesus and consume His grace and agape love! This is required if we are to be who God intends for us to be! We are to love as He is agape love.
This means we need to take our secrets into our closet and lay them out before Him. We must be honest with ourselves and with Him. We must read daily His logos word so that the Holy Spirit may reveal His truth into us on a personal basis. This is our daily drink of milk!
“When sharing his thoughts about answered prayer, Spurgeon preached on Psalm 34 and how David cried out to God as he was on the run from King Saul. When David was in danger from his foes, he ‘sought the Lord,’ who delivered him (Psalm 34:4). David spoke of himself in the third person when he said, ‘This poor man called, and the Lord heard him’ (v.6). God was faithful.
Like Spurgeon, we might experience a time of waiting for answers to our pleas and requests. The wait can be long, and we won’t receive something contrary to God’s purposes. But as we seek God in prayer, we too will grow in our faith. As Spurgeon said, ‘God moves us to pray; we pray; God hears, and answers: this is the process of grace.”
Seek our heavenly Father in both prayer and His written word. Read the whole New Testament letters in one sitting. Read Romans 8 daily as Martin Luther is said to have done!
“You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with your whole heart.”
-Jeremiah 29:13.
God is now provisioning His human creation with knowledge of Himself, sharing His absolute glories in righteousness, truth and love plus all those holy unknowns contained within Himself. God’s eternal culture of grace opens heaven’s door into eternal fellowship with God the Father, Jesus His Son, and the Holy Spirit who abides within us forever … when we are IN HIM!