Tag: Paul

Labor pains

Re:Verse reading–Romans 8:18-39 (day one)

“The whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth”–v 22.

As a male, I will need to be careful and humble as I speak of this reality.  I do not, and will never, understand the cost that a woman pays to give birth.  I watched Holly do it.  I was proud of her.  I prayed for her.  But, I can never fully understand the experience.

In the same way, Paul compares the sorrow and stress of the present world to the pains of childbirth.  Excruciating at times.  More painful than we expected, and lasting far longer.  We want to give up or go back, but we can’t.

As a woman suffers pain for the sake of the baby who will be born in the process, Jesus taught believers to look forward to the world that will come.  Something wonderful is being born!  Worth even the suffering of the present moment.

Much obliged

Re:Verse reading–Romans 8:1-17 (day seven) 

“Therefore, brothers, we are under obligation. . .for all who are led by the Spirit are the sons of God.”  v 12, 14.

It is not what we expect.  The Scripture, in other places, communicates Spiritual life as an INVITATION.  An offer.  A king gives a party for his son and sends servants out to invite people to come. (Matthew 22)

Paul looks at it from a different perspective.  As an OBLIGATION.  Same word that he used of himself in Romans 1:14.  “I am under obligation.”  As a recipient of grace, how could he refuse to give it to others?

He says the same of us.  Christ died and rose and sent the promised Holy Spirit!  Those who are joined to Him by faith are, thereby, OBLIGATED to live and walk in that gift.

“How dare you benefit from Christ and owe him nothing in return!”, says Paul.  Not an offer.  Not an option.  It is our OBLIGATION.

Once a Slave

Re:Verse reading–Romans 8:1-17 (day six)

Experts say that there are more slaves in the world today than there were in the 18th and 19th centuries. Human trafficking, modern day slavery, is the fastest growing nefarious business in the world, second only to drugs. It would be hard to imagine the feelings a once-slave might experience after being rescued. Probably feelings of great relief and new found joy, mixed with fear and post-traumatic stress, would be very real and present.

if you are a follower of Jesus, you were once a slave; rescued from the bondage of sin and death. And yet we still can experience the shadow of our former slavery bearing down on our present life; we can even succumb to it, immobilized by fear and insecurity. Paul reminds us in Romans 8 that we don’t have to live in fear of our former way of life because now we are declared sons and daughters of God. As members of God’s family we have free access to come to Him when we experience our own spiritual PTSD. We can cry out “Abba Father!”

This is Not Fire and Brimstone

Re:Verse reading–Romans 6 (day six)

I think it is very important to note this is not a “fire and brimstone” text. Paul is not trying to intimidate sinners into being righteous out of fear that they may not “be saved.” (You can go to Hebrews 10:26 for that.) Paul is in fact answering critics who argued that this “faith” business would only lead to more sin, not less. So, Paul is not trying to scare anyone, but is actually writing matter-of-factly about the nature of God’s grace at work in the Christian’s life.

He began his argument in chapter five when he wrote, “how much more shall we be saved by his[Christ’s] life.” He makes the case that in the same way sin and corruption struck like a virus in humanity through Adam, so shall the life of Jesus spread into the life of those who believe in the Gospel by faith. If this is true, Paul believed that the resulting life is one given to more and more righteousness, or fruits of the Spirit. By God’s grace, the Christian is freed for the first time to fight the fight of faith, or to increasingly give themselves to the righteousness of Christ. It is a given reality, not just a possibility.