#DailyDevotion Living According To The Spirit Is To Live Before God Trusting In The Forgiveness Of Sins
Rom. 8:12-17 12And so, fellow Christians, we don’t owe it to the flesh to live according to the flesh. 13If you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the spirit you kill the activities of the body, you will live. 14All who are moved by God’s Spirit are God’s children. 15You didn’t receive the spirit of slaves to make you feel afraid again, but you received the Spirit who makes us God’s adopted children and moves us to call “Abba, Father!” 16This Spirit assures our spirit that we are God’s children, 17and if children, then heirs, God’s heirs, and joint heirs with Christ since we share in His suffering in order that we may also share in His glory.
When thinking about how we live as Christians we need an appropriate understanding of the Law and the Gospel. If we can remember from chapter seven of Romans, “While we were living in the flesh, the Law stirred into action the sinful lusts in parts of our bodies to produce fruit for death.” In Romans 5 Paul writes, “ 20The Law came to multiply sin…” But we are in Christ, through baptism and faith in Christ have died to sin and died to the Law. We don’t owe it to the flesh to follow its desires and the law gives no power to follow it but it rather stirs up our sinful desires in the flesh. To live according to the flesh is to focus our acceptance before God in how well we keep the commandments. That is not the way of faith and we will break the commandments of the Law.
But we don’t owe it to the flesh to live according to the flesh. If you live that way you will die. Instead we are to live according to the Spirit. The Spirit brings us the good news of Jesus Christ. He works through the Word and the Sacraments. The Spirit lets us know and gives us faith that God is our Father. He forgives our trespasses and sins for Jesus’ sake. Through faith in Jesus and his works He counts us righteous. The Spirit takes away our fear of God’s wrath and punishment. Having received the Spirit, He moves us to live in God’s love and live out God’s will in our lives. He accomplishes in us to fulfill the Law in our lives.
We kill the flesh by receiving the Gospel and believing it. We live out God’s will in our lives and are sanctified by God through the means of grace in which the Spirit promises to work. When we live by the Spirit we obey the commandments without fear of being punished for not obeying them perfectly. Our hearts and minds are focused on God being pleased with us for Jesus’ sake, his sacrifice, and his righteousness.
The Spirit, i.e. the Gospel of Jesus, through the means of grace (baptism, absolution, the Lord’s Supper, the Word proclaimed and taught, the word of forgiveness from the Church) takes away our fear and and moves us to God Father, “Abba.” It is a name of trust, mercy, kindness, and steadfast love. The Spirit assures our spirit through the means of grace we are God’s children, adopted through baptism, and are heirs of God. We are his heirs not based on what we have done or how well we have done it but by His choice of us in baptism. We are co-heirs in and with Christ of the kingdom. As co-heirs with Christ and children of God we will suffer with Christ in this age only to rejoice and participate his glory in the next.
Abba, Father, continually give us the means of grace, so we may have your Spirit and be moved by Him to fulfill your will and works in our lives. May your Spirit remove from our hearts the fear of our failures and give us the sure and certain confidence of your love through Jesus Christ who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit. Amen.