Category: Romans

Spirit of Holiness

Today’s verse is found in the letter from Paul to the Romans.  What an amazing letter that reveals the righteousness of God.  If you haven’t read through Romans in its entirety lately I would recommend it this week.  It not only talks about His righteousness but how God has revealed it to the world.  It also tells us how the good news of the Lord should be revealed to the world.  Guess who that involves? Yes, you and me. Chapters 12-16 provide directives for those who have responded to God’s righteousness and how we can demonstrate these directives in our daily walk.

Our focus today is on the Spirit of Holiness. Romans 1: 4 and who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in power by His resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. 

What I’ve reflected on while thinking of the Spirit of holiness is how wonderfully amazing that this Spirit that was living through Jesus has now been placed in us.  As we pray daily to submit to God’s will it is the Spirit of holiness that helps guide us in our daily decisions in our own walks.  This includes obedience to the will of God.  Alone in this mission, we will miss the mark every time.  But, when we call on the Holy Spirit the work of the Third Person in the Trinity is to make God’s holiness ours. A. W. Tozer wrote in Knowledge of the Holy that this Holiness is made available to us through the blood of the Lamb.

The Holy Spirit, being the Spirit of Christ, is the Spirit of holiness. Hebrews 12:14 says Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

It’s estimated we make 35,000 decisions a day. We need the spirit of holiness in every one of them.  The Holy Spirit doesn’t work on us, He lives in us.  Let’s look at 1 Peter as a reminder about our calling.

 

1 Peter 1:13 – 25 Called to be Holy 

13 Therefore, preparing your minds for action,[b] and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” 17 And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, 18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. 20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you 21 who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave Him glory so that your faith and hope are in God.

22 Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, 23 since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God; 24 for

“All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass.
The grass withers and the flower falls, 25 but the word of the Lord remains forever.” And this word is the good news that was preached to you.

Let the Spirit fill you with this awesome song of praise by Upperroom! 

Love Well

Today, we are reading Romans 13 together.  This chapter is relatively short – only 14 verses – but it is full and rich in content.  I’d like to focus on the second half of the chapter, in which Paul encourages us to love God, each other, and ourselves well.

Romans 13:8 reads, “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.”  When I first read this, I was confused by the idea that we owe each other our love.  After I thought about it a bit more, though, I remembered a conversation in which   Jesus answers a scribe’s question regarding which commandment is most important.  Jesus says,  “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel:  The Lord our God, the Lord is one.  And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’  The second is this:  ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’  There is no other commandment greater than these.”  (Mark 12:30-31) To love, therefore – God first, and then our neighbor – is the greatest commandment, and it is by loving that we fulfill the law.

But doesn’t the fact that Jesus died on the cross in our place mean that we are no longer slaves to the law?  Yes:  Jesus’ death on the cross put an end to the ritual sacrifices that we read about in the Old Testament.  However, Paul is writing AFTER Jesus’ death on the cross, and Paul tells us to continue to love each other.  Why?  We are to love each other BECAUSE Christ sacrificed Himself for us.

Whew!

But wait – there’s more.  Did you see the end of the commandment in Mark 12:31?  We are to love our neighbor as ourselves (emphasis mine).  That might be the most difficult part of all, right?  I know that I am harder on myself every single day than I am on those around me.  So how can we practice loving ourselves well?  I’m convinced that one of the best ways we can do this is to cultivate rest.  We are a culture that extols busyness – we often wear our busy days as a badge of achievement or of honor.

Instead of perpetuating the culture of busyness, I’d like to encourage you to practice pausing each day.  If you’ve never done this before, start small.  Just a few minutes, five or ten – go for a slow walk outside, read a few pages of a book, or simply sit and be still.  I know that this can be hard.  It is hard for me to remember to even take that pause – and then it can be difficult to actually be still, or to read, or to walk slowly in the middle of a busy day.  But I can also tell you from personal experience that it helps.  Traditionally, Sunday afternoons have been my rest times.  But I rarely took the time to rest at all during the week, at least until it was time to go to sleep.  I’m finding, though, that taking even one short pause during the day resets my brain and renews me, allowing me to finish the rest of the day in a more peaceful state of mind.  It helps to slow the tide of busy back to a more manageable, healthy pace.  When we walk through life unrushed and unhurried, we have more margin to love those around us well.

Will you try this with me?

On Our Side

I love Romans 8 for a lot of reasons, but one of the main reasons is the fact that this chapter includes a few of my favorite verses of all time, Romans 8:38-39. To get some context, read Romans 8:31-39 in the Message with me:

“So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn’t hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing himself to the worst by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn’t gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God’s chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture…”

Some days, I just need to remember that God is on my side. What about you? I think that one of the enemy’s greatest tricks is whispering the lie in our ears that God must actually not mean what He says. In fact, it’s one of the oldest tricks in the book… literally. Genesis 3:1 (emphasis mine) says,

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

The line, “did God really say,” gives me chills, because I know I have heard this lie time after time. “Did God really say He loves you, despite the ways you mess up daily?” “Did God really say that life lived Jesus’ way is the fullest kind of life?” “Did God really say it was a big deal if you did that just once?” “Did God really say He’s on your side?”

Yes, He did. And not only did God say that He is on our side, but He means it. Our God is a God who keeps His promises and Whose words are true and able to be trusted. God is on our side, and just like Romans 8 says, with Him on our side, we simply cannot lose.

I want to live from this place: A place of waking up every morning and knowing that not only does the Lord fight for me, but with Jesus, I cannot be separated from that fierce kind of love by anything that comes my way. I want to look at life with complete confidence in this truth. And I want to invite other people into this place of complete peace in the fact that Jesus, our King, is literally fighting for us every single day. And I can’t imagine a better outlook for this normal Thursday morning.

A Believer’s Battle with Sin

Sanctification is the separation of the believer from his sin.  This separation is a believer’s ongoing struggle and a battle with himself.  It is internal.

In chapter 7 of Romans, Paul’s internal struggle with sin reveals how sin wages war against the Christian.  Do you struggle with sin?  (God’s word says you do. Romans 3:23, 1John 1:8, Isaiah 53:6)  If you are ready to admit that, the next step is to accept it.

The peace that comes with accepting how we relate to God (we are sinners that have turned away from Him and if we believe in Jesus our sins will be forgiven) will feel like a heavy load being lifted from you.  Remove the expectation that you need to be perfect to become a Christian or that once you become a Christian you will no longer battle with sin.

It is not about you being perfect – it is about Jesus being perfect.

Those who follow Christ hate sin because they remember what it did.  It crucified Christ.  In a way when we sin it is like taking part in that.  This is the Christians motivations to hate sin and flee from it.

Those who follow Christ hate sin because they remember what it did.  It crucified Christ.  In a way, when we sin it is like taking part in that.  This is the Christian’s motivation to hate sin and flee from it.

Here are some notes from a sermon (first link in the resources below) on how sin battles with a believer:

  1. It is within us. James 1:14-15
  2. It is a battle of the mind, of our thoughts. Romans 7:23, 1Peter 1:13
  3. Victory is in Christ.
    1. Confess your sin to the LORD and ask his forgiveness. (1John 1:9, Proverbs 38:13)
    2. Ask the LORD for the strength to refuse to entertain sinful thoughts.  (2Corinthians 10:5, 2Timothy 1:7)
    3. Avoid evil. (Psalms 1:1-6, Matthew 18:7-9)
    4. Draw nigh to the LORD, pursue His Word.  (Philippians 4:8, Romans 8:6)

Here are three great sermons that will arm you with the truth regarding separating from your sin:

  1. Sanctification and Sins of the Mind
  2. Spiritual Stability, Part 5: Godly Thinking
  3. Breaking Sin’s Grip