2017 40 Days of Prayer, Day 6
The Abiding Presence of God:
A Life of Complete Dependence
Day 6
“For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace.” Romans 8:6
The Mind Set on the Flesh is Death
The word “death” immediately invokes images of funeral homes and cemeteries. Most of us have childhood memories of a family pet that died. Many of us have memories of the first significant loss in our lives, a grandparent, an aunt or uncle, a parent, or close friend. The finality of these types of events remain in our minds for a long, long time. In scripture, “death” goes beyond mere physical expressions. In Matthew 8:21-22 Jesus responded to one of his followers, “Another of the disciples said to Him, ‘Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father.’ But Jesus said to him, ‘Follow Me, and allow the dead to bury their own dead.’” That is a strange way of speaking. “Allow the dead to bury their own dead?” Jesus clearly had some category for death other than mere physical death. One way of helping us distinguish between spiritual and physical death is to use the word “separation.” When someone dies physically, their soul is separated from their body. When people die spiritually, they are separated from God. Jesus spoke of dead people burying dead people. In doing so He provided for us a category of physically alive individuals who are simultaneously spiritually dead. They look and act alive, digging graves for others, but inside they are spiritual dead. They do things that give evidence of life, but in reality, they are separated from a relationship with God. Paul described it this way in Ephesians 2:1, “and you were dead in your trespasses and sins…” Again, we have this category of those who are spiritually dead while simultaneously being alive physically. We know that the spiritually dead are physically alive in this verse because we see that these dead ones are actively involved in “trespasses and sins.” In considering these two categories of death and life, let’s reflect on Romans 8. Though we are reading one verse for each day of the 40 Days of Prayer, it might be helpful to read today's verse in context. As you read verses 1-8, notice that there are two types of people in the world. First, there are those who are living according to the sinful nature (the flesh). These individuals are outside of a relationship with God through faith in Christ. Second, there are those who are living according to the Spirit. Those who are alive in the Spirit have a relationship with God through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ.
“Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. 3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. 6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, 7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, 8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” Romans 8:1-8
“Paul’s purpose in pursuing this series of contrasts is…contrasting two groups of people: the converted and the unconverted. Paul’s main purpose is to highlight the radical difference between the flesh and the Spirit as a means of showing why only those who walk, think and are after the Spirit possess everlasting life.” (Douglas Moo, NICNT Commentary on Romans, page 486) The ones living according to the sinful nature live under the condemnation of the Law of God because they are unable to fulfill its requirements. The ones living according to the sinful nature have their minds set on the sinful nature and they cannot please God. Those living according to the sinful nature are hostile toward God and are unable to subject themselves to God’s Law. These spiritually dead individuals were described in Jesus’ words “let the dead bury the dead” and in Paul’s words in Ephesians 2, as those who “were dead in trespasses and sins.” Now, contrasting the ones who are living according to their sinful nature with those who are now living according to Spirit, Paul informs us that those living according to the Spirit have been set free. Those in the Spirit are living free from bondage of the Law. Those living in the flesh are under obligation to fulfill God’s Law under their own power, but are unable to do so. The Law of God can only produce sin and death in them. However, those in the Spirit have the Law completely fulfilled through their relationship to Christ Jesus. Those in the Spirit have their minds set on the things of the Spirit of God and are able to live a life that pleases God. If a person is not in Christ then they are spiritually dead: separated from God, under God’s condemnation, lost, hopeless, helpless, and under the dominion of sin. Spiritually dead individuals have their minds focused on satisfying their own sinful desires for they are incapable of anything else.
Life and Peace
Spiritually alive individuals have their minds focused on the desires of the Spirit. The mind set on the Spirit, which in this verse is Paul’s way of describing believers in Christ who are seeking spiritual things in their thinking, produces life. Paul contrasted the life of those in the Spirit with a life controlled by sin’s natural consequence, spiritual death and ultimately eternal separation from God. The mind set on the Spirit produces life and peace.
The term “peace” carries two connotations. Peace depicts that end of hostilities, such as the declaration of peace that brings an end to a military conflict. Peace also describes an inward sense of well-being, a peaceful soul, a soul at rest. Both of these realities belong to those who have put their faith in Christ Jesus. Romans 5:1 and Romans 5:10 state, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ…For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son…” Romans 5 describes the cessation of hostility between God and us. We were enemies but God declared terms of peace by transferring our just punishment to Christ. God made peace with His enemies through His Son. We do not deserve the end of the hostilities, a war we declared on God, a war we initiated against Him. God initiated the terms of peace. He crafted the peace treaty and carried out the necessary steps to fulfill all of the terms of the peace accord. We simply believe in Christ and the terms of peace are ours in Christ. We have been reconciled to God.
The other aspect of the term “peace” is also true for believers in Christ. When Christ spoke to His disciples on the night of His betrayal by Judas and His subsequent arrest by the religious leaders, He told them that in the midst of a turbulent world that He had granted them peace. Jesus said this in John 14:27, “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.” Fear and a troubled heart are the natural responses to a difficult world. Christ told the disciples to not allow their hearts be troubled because He had given them His peace. The soul rest, the soul satisfaction in Christ produces peace even in the midst of life’s storms. Soul rest in Christ takes the fear and foreboding troubles of this life and overwhelms them with His peace. This peace comes from Him. It comes from our relationship with Him, trusting in the One who died and rose again to bring peace between us and our Creator. If we can trust Him and rest in Him for our reconciliation with God both now and forever, then we can trust Him in the daily battle with troubles in this life. In Christ, there is life and peace.
Prayer Focus
God, help me to rest in your work of salvation. You are so good. Your mercies are new every day. I thank You for giving me life and peace through Your Son, Jesus Christ. Thank you for giving me an abiding peace that comes from a relationship with you. Thank you for the work of Your Spirit. I want to live with the knowledge of Your life and Your peace today. I confess my inadequacies to Your gift. My sin constantly assaults my walk with You. Far too often, I allow the busyness of my day to take this peace from me. Help me to set my mind on spiritual realities. Change my priorities and put them in line with Your priorities. Lord, I ask You to help my family. Help me to love my family more than myself. Help me to sacrificially put aside my selfish desires. Instead, help me to pursue Your goodness in my family, friends, and my church.
From DL Moody’s Secret Power
Secret of efficiency
In the teaching of Christ, we find the last words recorded in the Gospel of Matthew, the 28th chapter and 19th verse,
“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
Here we find that the Holy Spirit and the Son are equal with the Father - are one with Him, “teaching them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Christ was now handing His commission over to His Apostles. He was going to leave them. His work on earth was finished, and He was now just about ready to take His seat at the right hand of God, and He spoke unto them and said: “All power is given unto Me in heaven and on earth.” All power, so then He had authority. If Christ was mere man, as some people try to make out, it would have been blasphemy for Him to have said to the disciples, go and baptize all nations in the name of the Father, and in His own name, and in that of the Holy Spirit, making Himself equal with the Father.
There are three things: All Power is given unto Me; go teach all nations. Teach them what? To observe all things. There are a great many people now that are willing to observe what they like about Christ, but the things that they don’t like they just dismiss and turn away from. But His commission to His disciples was, “Go teach all nations to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.” And what right has a messenger who has been sent of God to change the message? If I had sent a servant to deliver a message, and the servant thought the message didn’t sound exactly right - a little harsh- and that servant went and changed the message, I should change servants very quickly; he could not serve me any longer. And when a minister or a messenger of Christ begins to change the message because he thinks it is not exactly what it ought to be and thinks that he is wiser than God, God just dismisses that man.
They haven’t taught “all things.” They have left out some of the things that Christ has commanded us to teach, because they didn’t correspond with man’s reason. Now we have to take the Word of God just as it is; and if we are going to take it, we have no authority to take out just what we like, what we think is appropriate, and let dark reason be our guide.
It is the work of the Spirit to impress the heart and seal the preached word. His office is to take of the things of Christ and reveal them unto us.
Some people have this idea that this is the only dispensation of the Holy Spirit; that He didn’t work until Christ was glorified. But Simeon felt the Holy Spirit when he went into the temple.
in 2 Peter 1:21 we read,
“prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.”
We find the same Spirit in Genesis as is seen in Revelation. The same Spirit that guided the hand that wrote Exodus inspired also the epistles, and we find the same Spirit speaking from one end of the Bible to the other. So holy men in all ages have spoken as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.