Owing to the length of this epistle we have made our remarks briefer and more condensed than usual. It will therefore be more than ever necessary to refer to the Scripture itself as you read this article.
AS we draw near to the end of chapter 7 it is important for us to notice that in this passage the word law is used in two senses. In the great majority of instances it refers of course to the law of God formulated through Moses. In verse 2 and 3 however we get “the law” of a husband; in verse 21, “a law”; in verse 23 and 25, “another law,” “the law of my mind,” and “the law of sin.” In these cases the word is evidently used to signify a power or force which acts uniformly in a given direction: in just the sense in which we use the word when we talk of “the laws of nature.”
If then we read again the above verses, substituting the words, “controlling force” for the word, “law,” we may gain a somewhat clearer view of what the Apostle is saying. Take verse 23. The controlling force with each of us should be our minds: our bodies should be held in the subject place. This should be so in a very special way with those whose minds have been renewed by the power of God. But there is sin to be reckoned with, which exerts its controlling force in our members. The terrible fact has to be faced by us, and experimentally learned, that if left to ourselves, sin proves itself the stronger force, assumes control and we are held in captivity.
No wonder the Apostle in the remembrance of it cries out in anguish, “O wretched man that I am!” We too know something of this wretchedness, surely. Have we never felt ourselves to be like a wretched seagull bedraggled from head to tail with filthy oil discharged from passing motor-ships? The law of its mind, the law of air both without and within its feathers, is totally overcome by the horrid law of sticky oil! And who shall deliver it? It has no power in itself. Unless someone captures and cleanses it, it must die.
Verse 24 contains not only the agonized exclamation but also that important question, “Who shall deliver me?” The form of the question is important. Earlier in the story, when the speaker was passing through the experiences detailed in verse 14 to 19 for instance, his question would have been, “How shall I deliver myself?” He was still searching for something within himself which would accomplish it, but searching in vain. Now he is beginning to look outside himself for a deliverer.
When not only our self-confidence but our self-hope also is shattered, we have taken a big step forward. We inevitably then begin to look outside ourselves. At first perhaps we only look for help, and consequently look in wrong directions. Yet sooner or later we discover it is not help that we need, but rather a positive deliverance by a power that is not of ourselves at all. Then, very soon, we find the answer to our cry. Deliverance is ours through Jesus Christ our Lord, thanks be to God! He is as able to deliver us from the slavery of sin as He is from the guilt of our sins.
But how does this deliverance work? How is it accomplished? We find an answer to these questions when we commence to read chapter 8. At the end of chapter 7 the law of sin and death proved itself far more powerful than the law of the renewed mind. In the opening of chapter 8 the law of the Spirit, who is now given to the believer, proves itself far more powerful than the law of sin and death. The Apostle can exultingly say, It has “made me free.”
Not only have we life in Christ Jesus but the Spirit of that life has been given to us. Thereby a new force enters our lives. Coming under the controlling power of the Spirit of God we are released from the controlling power of sin and death. The greater law overrides the lesser.
The point may be illustrated by many happenings in the natural world which surrounds us. Here, for instance, is a piece of iron. It lies motionless upon the ground, held to the spot by the law of gravitation. An electric magnet is placed above it and the current is switched on. Instantly it flies upward, as though suddenly possessed of wings. A new controlling power has come on the scene which, under certain conditions and in a limited sphere, has proved itself stronger than the power of gravitation.
The Holy Spirit has been given to us that He may control us, not that we may control Him. How does He exert His influence? He works within the believer, but it is in connection with an attractive Object without—Christ Jesus our Lord. He is here not to speak of Himself or to glorify Himself, but to glorify Christ. He indwells us, not that He may foster the old life, the life of the first Adam; the life of which He is the Spirit is the life of Christ, the last Adam. We are “in Christ Jesus,” as the first verse shows, and we are that without any qualification whatever, for the words which close the verse in our Authorized Version should not be there, having evidently crept in from verse 4, where they rightly occur.
There is nothing to condemn in Christ Jesus, and nothing to condemn for those in Christ Jesus. The reason for this is two-fold. verse 2 and 3 each supply a reason, both beginning with “for.” verse 2 gives the practical or experimental reason. The believer under the control of the Spirit is set free from the control of that which formerly brought the condemnation in. Being a statement of a liberty which has to be experimentally realized the Apostle speaks still in a personal and individual way “hath made me free.”
Verse 3, on the contrary, is a statement of what has been accomplished by God in a judicial way at the cross of Christ. The law had been proved to be weak through the flesh, though in itself holy and just and good. It was like a skillful sculptor set to the task of carving an enduring monument—some thing of beauty intended to be a joy forever—out of a great heap of dirty mud. A heart-breaking, a hopeless task, not because of any defect in the sculptor but because of the utterly defective material with which he had to deal. The law could condemn the sinner, but it could not so condemn sin in the flesh that men might be delivered from servitude to sin and, walking after the Spirit, be found fulfilling what the law had righteously required.
But what the law could not do God has done. He sent forth His own Son, who came in the likeness of sinful flesh—only in the likeness of it, be it noted, for though perfectly a Man He was a perfect Man, without the slightest taint of sin. God sent Him “for sin,” that is, as a sacrifice for sin; so that in His death sin in the flesh might be condemned. Sin is the root principle of all that is wrong with man; and the flesh is that in man which furnishes sin with a vehicle in which to act, just as the electricity generated in a power station finds a vehicle for its transmission and action in the wires that are carried aloft.
We know that sin had its primary origin in the heavens. It began with Satan and the fallen angels, yet Christ did not come to die for angels and consequently it was not sin in the nature of angels which was condemned. He died for men, and it was sin in the flesh that was condemned. It was condemned, you notice, not forgiven. God does indeed forgive sins, which spring forth as the fruits of sin in the flesh; but sin—the root principle—and the flesh—the nature in which sin works―are not forgiven but unsparingly condemned. God has condemned it in the cross of Christ. We must learn to condemn it in our experience.
We are to judge as God judges. We are to see things as He sees them. If sin and the flesh lie under His condemnation then they are to lie under our condemnation. Sin and the flesh being judged in the cross, the Holy Spirit has been given to us that He may energize the new life that is ours. If we walk in the Spirit then all our activities, both mental and bodily, will be under His control, and as a consequence we shall be found doing what the law requires.
Herein, of course, is a marvelous thing. When under the law and in the flesh we were struggling to fulfill the law’s demands and continually failing. Now that we are delivered from the law, now that we are in Christ Jesus and indwelt by the Spirit of God, there is a power which can enable us to fulfill it. And as we do walk in the Spirit and not in the flesh, and according to the measure in which we so walk, we do actually fulfill what the law has so rightly demanded of us. This is a great triumph of the grace of God. As a matter of fact though, the triumph may be even greater, for it is possible for the Christian “so to walk even as He [Christ] walked” (1 John 2:66He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. (1 John 2:6)). And the “walk” of Christ went far beyond anything that the law demanded.
We may sum up these things by saying that the Christian―according to the thoughts of God—is not only forgiven, justified, recoiled, with the Spirit shedding abroad in his heart the love of God; but also he sees the divine condemnation of sin and the flesh in the Cross, he finds that his own vital links before God are not with Adam fallen but with Christ risen. Consequently he is in Christ Jesus, with the Spirit indwelling him, in order that, controlling him and filling him with Christ, as an Object bright and fair before his eyes, he may walk in happy deliverance from the power of sin and be gladly fulfilling the will of God.
Nothing less than this is what the Gospel proposes. What do we think of it? We pronounce it magnificent. We declare the whole scheme to be a conception worthy of the mind and heart of God. Then our consciences begin to prick us, reminding us how little these wonderful possibilities have been translated into actualities in our daily experience.
The Apostle Paul, you notice, did not lay down his pen nor turn aside to another theme when he had written verse 4. There is more to be said that may help us to gain a real and experimental entrance into this blessed deliverance so that we may be living out the life of Christ in the energy of the Spirit of God. verse 5 to 13 continue taking things up from a very practical standpoint.
Two classes are considered. Those “after” or “according to” the flesh and those according to the Spirit. The former mind the things of the flesh: the latter the things of the Spirit. The mind of the flesh is death: the mind of the Spirit life and peace. The two classes are in complete contrast, whether as to nature, character or end. They move in two totally disconnected spheres. The Apostle is of course speaking abstractly. He is viewing the whole position according to the inward nature of things, and not thinking of particular individuals or their varying experiences.
We may very rightly raise the question of our own experiences. If we do, what have we to say? We have to confess that though we are not after the flesh yet we have the flesh still in us. Hence it is possible for us to turn aside from that minding the things of the Spirit, to mind the things of the flesh. And, in so far as we do, we come into contact with death rather than life and peace. But let us make no mistake about it; if we go in for the things of the flesh, we are not seeking things which are properly characteristic of the Christian, but rather wholly abnormal and improper.
The things of the flesh appeal to the mind of the flesh, and that is simple enmity against God. This saying which occurs in verse 7 may seem hard, but it is true, for the flesh is essentially lawless. Not only is it not subject but it cannot be. Do we believe that? Let the flesh be educated, refined, religionized; let it be starved, flogged, restrained; it is just the old flesh still. The only thing to do with it is to condemn it and set it aside, and this is just what God has done, as stated in verse 3. May we have wisdom and grace to do likewise.
It is clear that since the mind of the flesh is simply enmity against God, those “in the flesh” cannot please Him. If we would see a complete contrast with this we must turn to 1 John 3:99Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. (1 John 3:9). There we find that the one born of God “cannot sin.” All who are not born of God are in the flesh; that is, their state is characterized by the flesh and nothing else. There is no new nature with them, and hence the flesh is the source of all their thinking’s and doings, and all is displeasing to God. The one who is born of God partakes of the nature of Him of whom he is born.
But not only is the believer born of God, he is also indwelt by the Spirit of God, who seals him as Christ’s. This great reality entirely alters his state. Now he is no longer in the flesh but in the Spirit; that is, his state is characterized by the presence and power of the Spirit of God, who is also called in verse 9 the Spirit of Christ. There is but one and the self-same Spirit yet the change in the descriptive title is significant. Christ is He from whom we derive our origin spiritually, the One to whom we bong. If indeed we are His, we are possessed of His Spirit, and consequently should be Christ-like in our spirits, so really so that all may see that Christ is in us.
According to verse 10 He is in us if His Spirit indwells us, and hence we are not to be ruled by our bodies. They are to be held as dead, for acting they only lead to sin. The Spirit is to be the Energizer of our lives and then the outcome will be righteousness. To do the will of God is practical righteousness.
Our bodies are spoken of as “mortal bodies” in verse 11. They are subject to death, indeed the seeds of death are in them from the outset. At the coming of the Lord they are to be quickened. The God who raised up Christ from the dead will accomplish this by His Spirit. In this connection we have a further description of the Holy Spirit. He is “the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead.” Indwelling us in this character, He is the pledge of the coming quickening, whether it reach us in resurrection of the body or in the change to be wrought in the bodies of saints who are alive and remain to the Lord’s coming.
The conclusion to be drawn from all that we have just been considering is that the flesh has no claim upon us whatever. It has been judged in the Cross. It is antagonistic to God, irreconcilably so, and we are not “in the flesh.” We are indwelt by the Spirit, and “in the Spirit.” We are therefore in no way debtors to the flesh that we should live after it, for life according to the flesh has but one end—death. The Spirit is in us that we may live according to Him. That means putting to death the deeds of the body, refusing practically its promptings and desires. That is the way to what is really life according to God.
What great importance all this gives to the indwelling of the Spirit of God. He produces an altogether new state or condition in the believer, and He gives character to the state that He produces. He is the power of Christian life in the believer, the Energy that breaks the power of sin and sets us free. But He is more than this for He is an actual Person indwelling us, and so taking charge of us.
In the bygone dispensation the Jew was under the law as a schoolmaster or tutor. It took him by the hand as though he were a child under age, and led him until such time as Christ came. Now Christ having come we are no longer under the schoolmaster but like sons of full age in our father’s house. Not only are we sons but we possess the Spirit of God’s Son. All this we find in Galatians 3 and 4 verse 14 of our chapter refers to this truth.
Those who were in the position of minors were put under law as a schoolmaster, and were led by it. We who have received the Spirit of God and are led by Him are the sons of God. Christ is the Captain of our salvation, gone on high. The Spirit indwells us on earth, as our Leader in the way that goes up to glory. Praise be unto our God! Our hearts should indeed be filled with everlasting praise.
F. B. Hole.