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Scripture Reading: Rom. 8:2, 6, 10-11, 29
Romans 8 may be considered the focus of the entire Bible. The Bible begins in Genesis by revealing that God, according to His eternal plan, created the heavens and the earth so that man could exist to fulfill God’s eternal purpose and desire, which is to impart Himself into His chosen people as their life supply so that they could become His expression (1:1, 26; 2:9, 16). According to this marvelous purpose, God and man will be brought together in one expression with God as the content and God’s chosen people as the corporate manifestation. The Bible concludes in Revelation with this corporate expression. Revelation 21 and 22 describe the New Jerusalem as a composition of God’s redeemed people from both the Old Testament and the New Testament (21:12, 14). This composition is built with the Triune God as the content and God’s chosen people as the expression. The New Jerusalem thus fulfills God’s eternal purpose. Between these two ends of the Bible are Paul’s Epistles, which complete the divine revelation. Paul’s writings are the heart of the Bible, and Romans 8 is the focus of the entire revelation of God.
The New Testament uses three Greek words to denote three different lives. Bios, which is the root of biology, denotes the physical life. Our physical life is mysterious and difficult to define. The New Testament uses the word psuche, which is the root of psychology, to denote the soul-life. We have bios, the physical life, in our body, and we have psuche, the psychological life, in our soul. A third word, zoe, is used to denote the highest life, the divine, eternal, uncreated life of God.
The word zoe is translated as “life” in Romans 8:2, 6, 10, and 11. Verse 2 mentions the law of the Spirit of life. Within us is a mysterious and marvelous law of the Spirit of the divine life, which frees us from the law of sin and of death. According to Greek grammar, in the expression the Spirit of life, the Spirit and life are in apposition, which means that they are identical and refer to one entity. The Spirit is life, and life is the Spirit. Similarly, the titles the Spirit of God (v. 9a), the Spirit of Christ (v. 9b), and the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead (v. 11) indicate that the Spirit is God, Christ, and the resurrecting One. Life, the law of the Spirit of life, God, Christ, and the resurrecting One are all one in the Spirit. To have the Spirit is to have all these.
Verse 10 says, “If Christ is in you...the spirit is life.” Regeneration is to be born anew, to be born of the divine Spirit in our human spirit with the divine life (John 3:3, 5). The divine Spirit reached us and entered into our spirit to impart the life of God into our spirit. Thus, our spirit was made alive with the divine life. We have a regenerated spirit, a human spirit born of the divine life. By being born of God, we became a child of God (1:12-13). To be born of God is to receive His divine life. Although we are human beings, we are also children of God because we have the divine life in our spirit. Romans 8:16 says, “The Spirit Himself witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God.” We are much blessed to have the assurance that we have been born of God, yet this is only the beginning.
Verse 6 says, “The mind set on the spirit is life.” The spirit here is our regenerated spirit indwelt by and mingled with the divine Spirit (1 Cor. 6:17). When we set our mind on our regenerated spirit, which possesses the divine life, our mind becomes zoe, divine life. This is transformation (Rom. 12:2). First, we are regenerated in our spirit with the divine life, and then we are transformed in our mind also with the divine life.
Finally, Romans 8:11 says, “He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you.” The resurrecting One within us gives divine life to our bodies. Although our spirit is life, and our mind set on the spirit is life, our body is mortal, dying. However, He who raised Christ from the dead is within us resurrecting us. He is waiting for an opportunity to infuse zoe into our mortal bodies.
Romans 8 is the center, the focus, of the Bible and of the entire universe. Thus, if we are experiencing Romans 8, we are in the center of the universe. Romans 8 reveals that the Spirit of life, the law of the Spirit of life, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and the Spirit of the resurrecting One are all one in the Spirit, who is life to our spirit, mind, and body. Nothing is more precious than these aspects of the all-inclusive Spirit, which meet our every need and completely satisfy us.
The purpose of the all-inclusive Spirit being life to our spirit, mind, and body is revealed in verse 29, which says, “Those whom He [God] foreknew, He also predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers.” Before the foundation of the world, God knew each one of us and loved us in spite of our flaws, defects, and sinfulness. God loves us without reason. Real love has no reason. If love has a reason, it is political. God foreknew us, and because He loved us, He predestinated us to be conformed to the image of His firstborn Son. To predestinate is to mark out beforehand. Our destiny is to be conformed to the image of God’s firstborn Son. This conformation is the goal of the working of the divine life within us. God made our spirit life at regeneration and is now making our mind life and even working life into our body for His purpose — to conform us fallen sinners to the image of Christ, the firstborn Son of God.
Romans 8 is central because it concerns God’s goal and our destiny — our conformation to Christ’s image. God is accomplishing this goal, and we will reach this destiny. One day we will no longer be flawed and sinful. Today we are in the process, which means that we still have many defects and shortcomings, but we can be assured that we will eventually be fully conformed to the image, the expression, of God’s firstborn Son. We will be the same as Christ is. When we are fully conformed, we will express Christ perfectly. Our sinful nature and all our defects will be swallowed up as we are transformed into the same image from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:18).
The all-inclusive Spirit being life to our spirit, mind, and body is for us to experience all the time. When we leave the church meetings, we should not go back to living, speaking, and acting according to our nature, culture, habits, ethics, or religious concepts. Our nature is our natural disposition. Perhaps we even claim that it is our right to live according to our nature, saying, “I am this way by birth. Do not try to change me.” We are also habitual, often doing things spontaneously and unconsciously. We even insist on doing things according to our habit and sometimes offend others by our habit. According to our religious concepts, we may like to carry ourselves with a certain demeanor or prefer a certain kind of church meeting. This is to be religious. If we live according to nature, culture, habits, ethics, or religion, we are neglecting the Spirit of life, the law of the Spirit of life, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and the Spirit of the resurrecting One, and we are missing the Spirit being life to our spirit, mind, and body. To exercise our spirit only in the meetings is not life but performance. Many Christians behave very differently on the Lord’s Day. However, Christian meetings should be an exhibition of the daily Christian life. We should meet and worship God in the same way that we live. Our meeting in the spirit should be a result of our living according to the spirit.
We need to walk according to the spirit (Rom. 8:4) and forget about our nature, culture, habits, ethics, and religion. This does not mean that we will be unethical, for the mingled spirit is higher than ethics. The Spirit is the Spirit of life, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and the Spirit of the resurrecting One, and He is life in our spirit, mind, and body. We simply need to walk according to this Spirit, who is life. When we do, there will be an expression of the divine life in our daily living.
We have seen that Romans 8 is central in the Bible and in the universe. We also need to see that God in Romans 8 is different than He was in Genesis 1 and even different than in the four Gospels. In Genesis 1 He was God the Creator, but He was merely God. He had not yet entered into humanity. In the Gospels God came in the person of the Son to be incarnated. He became a man and lived on the earth for thirty-three and a half years. However, not until the end of the Gospels did He pass through death and enter into resurrection. God in Romans 8 has passed through creation, incarnation, human living, an all-inclusive death, and resurrection. Now in ascension He is on the throne, having received the lordship and the headship over all things. Today God has planned and accomplished everything. After all these procedures, or processes, He has presented Himself to us as the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit.
If we simply believe, God in Christ becomes our Redeemer and Savior. We are saved, forgiven of our sins, justified, reconciled to God, and regenerated. The all-inclusive life-giving Spirit enters our spirit and will never leave. God as the Spirit makes His home in us. Today our God has passed through all and accomplished all. He is now the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit indwelling our spirit. Furthermore, He is mingled with our spirit and is one spirit with us (1 Cor. 6:17). He is infusing us with the divine life in our spirit, mind, and body. This life is active and energetic, working within us toward the goal of conforming us to the image of the firstborn Son of God. The goal of the Spirit’s working within us is to renew, transform, and conform us in every avenue and corner of our being.
Romans 8 concerns the wonderful, all-inclusive life-giving Spirit as the ultimate consummation of the processed Triune God. This Spirit is now infusing life into our entire being from our spirit into our mind, the leading part of our soul, and eventually into our entire body — resurrecting, renewing, transforming, and conforming us to the glorious image of the firstborn Son of God, Jesus Christ, who is both the Son of God and the Son of Man. The Spirit will make us exactly the same as Christ is in life, nature, and expression. This is Romans 8.
Life is difficult to define. One principle concerning life is that it is invisible. For instance, we may say that our physical life is in our body, but we could not point to its specific location, even if we could see inside our body. However, life has manifestations, which are visible. Although we cannot see or define life, we can see the manifestations of life. We recognize that people have life because their bodies manifest the life within them. However, after a person dies, the same body that previously manifested life now manifests death. Similarly, we can see whether someone has zoe, the divine life, in his or her spirit, mind, and body by the manifestations of the divine life. When a brother spontaneously prays in a meeting, this indicates that he has life in his spirit. The way we listen to a healthy, proper message in a meeting may be a manifestation of life or death in our mind. If we receive the message with joy, this is the manifestation of a mind full of life. However, if we inwardly question and argue with the message, this is a manifestation of death in our mind. The life or death in the minds of the listeners can supply or kill the spirit of the speaking one. Life itself cannot be seen, but life is manifested by what we are, do, speak, and express. When we are full of life, although we may not do anything, our being will express life and minister life to those around us. The manifestation of the divine life in our bodies is not by jumping and shouting in the meetings. When certain brothers and sisters stand up to speak in the meetings, even before they say anything, the way they stand up indicates that they are full of life. When they begin to speak, their words and even their gestures and demeanor indicate that they have been given life even in their mortal bodies.
Life is realized not only by its manifestation but also by the proper feeling, or sense. Romans 8:6 says, “The mind set on the spirit is life and peace.” Peace indicates a kind of sense. Whenever we receive the life supply, we will have a sense deep within that we are full of peace. Peace implies joy, rest, satisfaction, and refreshment. When we sense that we are lacking joy, rest, satisfaction, and refreshment, this indicates that we need life. If we try to improve ourselves by our own effort, even if we are successful, we will not have peace. Perhaps an unbelieving husband is never kind to his wife. When he becomes a Christian, he may decide that he should be kind to his wife. However, even if he is successful in improving his behavior by his self-effort, he will not have peace, joy, satisfaction, or refreshment deep within. Instead, he may begin to inwardly complain that his wife does not deserve his kindness. On the other hand, when we regularly contact the Lord, call on His name, and pray-read the Word, we will receive the life supply and be full of life. Then we will spontaneously have a proper relationship with everyone around us, and we will have peace, joy, rest, satisfaction, and refreshment within. This inward condition and the sense of peace are indications that we are being supplied with life.
As we receive the life supply from the indwelling Spirit, every day we are approaching the goal of this life by being more conformed to the image of Christ, the firstborn Son of God. The genuine Christian life is not a matter of performance or human effort but of receiving of the life supply of the all-inclusive, indwelling, life-giving Spirit, which issues in peace, joy, rest, satisfaction, and refreshment and carries us on toward the goal. Although we do not have any realization that we are being transformed and conformed, every day we are closer to the goal of being fully conformed to Christ’s image. This is the genuine Christian life for the church life, and this is what God is after, as revealed in Romans 8. If we see this, it will help us to drop all other concepts. To endeavor to improve ourselves is according to religious teaching. Romans 8 tells us that the Triune God through all His processes has accomplished everything that is necessary. Therefore, we do not need to do anything but receive Him as the life-giving Spirit and allow Him to work in us to supply our spirit, mind, and body with life. If we are simply a willing receiver of the life supply, life will work out everything and will conform us to the image of Christ.
