Familiar Religion

I am looking again even closer at the first part of Romans 8 and I am seeing something more familiar than I expected emerging. I went through the verses and pulled out the key words and phrases connected with references to the flesh and was surprised at the picture they produced when assembled together. Every one of them are familiar exhortations heard in nearly every church in the land and made up the main body of instructions that I remember hearing most of my growing up years. These are the main methods and techniques developed by religious people and passed on generation to generation that have become our legacy of tradition. Paul identifies this line of reasoning and motivation for getting right with God as a religion of the flesh.

There are a number of elements brought into these verses from points of emphasis by religious flesh. But it is shown that these goals cannot be accomplished by a religion of the flesh.

• Fulfilling the requirements of the Law – righteousness – obedience to God's rules.

• Accomplish this by firmly setting your mind to it – determination.

• Attaining to eternal life – getting life for ourselves.

• Becoming like God – godliness.

• Subjecting ones self to the Law of God – just surrender to obedience.

• Pleasing God (by implication but unarticulated – appeasing God).

• Belonging to God, His chosen people (or maybe God being on our side).

• Living under a sense of obligation to keeping the requirements of the Law through hard work (deeds). This could include a sense of obligation for “speaking in tongues”, getting the “spirit”, or any number of other denominational preferences and demands.

• This is the spirit of slavery motivated by fear.

I now see a direct connection between this passage and Romans 2:17-29 where he describes explicitly the kind of religious thinking that he labels as “according to the flesh”. It might be easy to think this doesn't apply to us since he started out with the name “Jew”, but that is not going to cut it. Even his reference to circumcision can sometimes become a distraction, but again that is only the particular issue that is a symptom of a deeper human problem in our view of trying to get right with God. These passages apply just as strongly today to our familiar routines and forms of religion just as much as it applied to Christian Jews in Paul's day. All we need to do is replace a few words that are unique to their time and tradition with our own favorite issues and doctrines and we will find that this book fits our situation all too well. The underlying principles in the heart and mind have not changed at all.

It is becoming apparent that the more I look at these passage the more questions I come up with. I guess its a good thing I am not on a hard time schedule with any deadlines to meet. That allows me to continue to explore for answers to these questions even though that process produces even more questions. I find that asking questions is a wonderful form of freedom that maybe I have not long indulged in because of the atmosphere of suppression usually surrounding religion. Typically religious people prefer to simply tell others what to think and believe instead of encouraging questions. But I believe that real spirituality thrives on questions, at least if the spirit of the questioner is honestly seeking for truth and not just using questions as a smokescreen for animosity.

Questions in the spirit realm are like hunger in the physical body. The more intense and focused our hunger is the more tasty food becomes when the hunger finds its desire. The same is true in emotional things and I suspect in every area of life. If we do not feel our need (question) we do not appreciate the fulfillment supplied for that need.

One of the biggest problems with typical evangelism is that we are most often trying to present “answers” to questions that most people are not asking. We are trying to supply something for which there is no hunger so we find a great deal of resistance to our force-feeding techniques. Any surprise there? I find the same principle in methods used to study the Bible. Nearly every form of “Bible study” that I have ever seen is generally a regurgitation of someone else's beliefs imposed over a string of proof texts and pre-arranged answers to which the studier is expected to conform. This is simply becoming a clone of another person's thinking and disengaging our own faculties for stimulating use of our own brains. It was never God's design for us and I am continually baffled as to why religious people continue to use this kind of methods. The very term “Bible study” or “prayer meeting” carried an immediate sense of heaviness and dread for me for most of my life whenever I heard it suggested. It was not until I began getting involved in a dynamic group using inductive-style thinking for study did I get really excited about the Bible and have enjoyed it increasingly ever since.

Here are a few more questions that I am wondering about as I look at this passage. I don't have time right now to explore them, but I like to at least get them out into the light so I can ponder them and listen for any suggestions that the Spirit may bring to my mind throughout the day.

8 why would a person want to please God? Not appease God. For a growing, bonded relationship.

9 He does not belong to Him. It is not clear who each of the pronouns belongs to. It may work equally well either way.

10 the spirit is alive because of righteousness. Not our righteousness – that is the deeds of the flesh in verse 13. Our spirit comes alive because of His righteousness. How/why is that?

Adam and Eve were tempted to live according to the flesh instead of the spirit.

Several references to dwelling. Goes back to John 15 – abide.

11 He who raised Jesus... will give life to your mortal bodies. Notice it is not Jesus who is doing this. And also notice that Paul says mortal bodies as opposed to flesh. What is the difference?

13 ...by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds... Notice that this activity is done by the spirit – in the spirit realm, not something the flesh can do. Also note that what is put to death here is deeds. This brings up the idea of any dependence on deeds of the Law by which to change God's mind about us.

14, 15 Spirit of God is opposite the spirit of slavery. Could it be that in 6:16 the second kind of slavery mentioned is legalism resulting in legalistic righteousness? Not according to 19 & 22. In 8:15 he moves the analogy up a step to go from a slave mentality in chapter 6 to adoption and a spirit of loving a kind and generous parent.

16 The Spirit testifies with our spirit... The more synchronized we get with God the more His Spirit reinforces the truths we are discovering and internalizing.

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