READ: Rom. 8:1–4: … God did by sending His own Son …
Rom. 8 is sometimes called the Song of Songs of God’s grace. Paul writes that true believers may be assured that, through faith in Christ, they are delivered from God’s curse.
At the same time, the Spirit now works in them so that they increasingly live according to the law that the Spirit writes on their hearts. No, the law does not rule over them, but the Spirit of Christ! Doing the law is therefore by no means a personal achievement, but a fruit of the Spirit.
It is the Spirit who has the power (in verse 2: “law”) to bring us to the point that we are no longer under the condemning power (“law”) of sin and death, but henceforth live in and through fellowship with Christ Jesus.
The law could not bring us this far, because of our sinful flesh. But God Himself intervened by sending His own Son to this earth as a weak human being. He bore the transgressions of God’s law, and underwent God’s punishment for them (v.3). In this way Christ broke the power of sin.
At the same time, He restored the law—God’s entire revealed will—to its rightful place in our life with God, as God has always intended. God’s law is therefore not a thing of the past for believers. Neither are the Ten Commandments, which summarize God’s whole will.
On the contrary, the saving work of Christ brings us, through rebirth, to the point where the requirement of keeping God’s law—which God rightfully demands—has become possible again. We will want to do this out of gratitude, not partially, but in our whole life.
Christ works this out through His Spirit. Through Him we hate sin and love God and then we do not walk according to the flesh (the old self), but according to the Spirit, who renews us. It remains a matter of falling and getting up again, but is a small beginning.
Time and again, we need to discover the sins that still remain in us, ask forgiveness for them referring to the atoning sacrifice of Christ, and pray for the working of the Spirit—to the glory of God.
How can you recognize that you “walk according to the Spirit”?
Sing: Hymn 37:3 (1984) / 48:3 (2014)