“Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.” (v. 12) It has brought us into a bad condition and a bad position. However, we are no longer in. the flesh, but delivered from it through redemption; we have been brought into a new position through the Redeemer’s death, of which we have the consciousness through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. The two eyes, the two principles, are directly opposed the one to the other; and it is important to remark (what has already been established as a principle in chapter 6) that these natures, whenever they act, bring forth consequences in accordance with their natures. I can overcome the flesh by the Spirit; I have the right and the duty to reckon it dead. But if the flesh lives, it brings forth death; and if I live according to the flesh, death is my lot. The nature, and the operations of this nature—its consequences—are ever the same. God can give me a new nature, and—His name be praised for it—He gives it to me in Christ; and in such a way that salvation is thereby my portion, and that in the power of the Spirit I am enabled to overcome the old nature and walk after the Spirit. But the nature of the flesh is not changed, anymore than its consequences for itself. If I live after the flesh I must die. Grace redeems; gives me a new life in which I walk after the Spirit and reckon the flesh dead; and finally, it gives me the glory. But this new life does not live after the flesh, nay, it cannot do so. If I live after the flesh, then I die at a distance from God; for death is the fruit and wages of the life of the flesh. But if through the Spirit I mortify the deeds of the body, then I live, and shall live forever with God, from whom this life flows down into my soul, and whose Spirit is its strength and guide.
This gives occasion for the apostle to speak of the position of those who are led by the Spirit of God, and in the first place of their relation to God. The Spirit which they have received is the Spirit of adoption; they possess it because they are children. But extensive blessings flow from this relationship; if they are children they are also heirs—heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ. Meanwhile the condition of the creation around us, and particularly that of our own bodies, is not yet restored. “The carnal mind is enmity against God.” In the same way the friendship of the world is enmity against Him. The principles of the flesh and of the world resist us; both are subjected to the bondage of corruption. Moreover, the world through which we pass, being at a distance from God, and under the dominion of Satan, is for us the source of countless sorrows and afflictions. The Lord Jesus was in this world “a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” A world of sin in contrast with His holiness, a world of sorrow and of grief in contrast with His love, could not but be for His heart a source of sorrow and grief. He was solitary and alone in such a world, and was not once understood by His disciples. Himself full of sympathy for all, He found sympathy nowhere for Himself. When such a thing did once break through the darkness of man’s heart, it was something so wonderful that the Lord says, “Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her.” (Mark 14:99Verily I say unto you, Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her. (Mark 14:9))
Can we, possessed of the Spirit of Christ, go through this world without feeling its condition? Should not our hearts be grieved when we see at every turn the dominion of sin, and have daily before our eyes the sufferings of sinful man, when we see that all is under the bondage of corruption? The time will come when we shall behold the universal blessing of the world, and when we shall rejoice therein with God Himself. But now, as those whose hearts are renewed and delivered, we can but suffer in the midst of an undelivered creation.
Let us remark, however, that this is suffering with Christ, not for Him. To suffer for Christ is a privilege, a special gift of God. (Philippians 1:2929For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake; (Philippians 1:29)) One cannot be a Christian without suffering with Christ; for how could the Spirit of Christ produce in us a different mind from that which was in Christ as He passed through this poor world? The glory of the children of God is a subject of hope. Now the sufferings of Christ in weakness are reproduced in a heart in which Christ dwells. We suffer here, where Christ suffered, as heirs of the kingdom of love where all will be joy and delight. Although we are now already children, or rather sons, and therefore heirs, yet we do not yet possess the inheritance; nay, we cannot ‘yet possess it, for it is still corrupt and defiled, and in this condition would not suit us. Christ is seated at the right hand of God until His enemies are made His footstool. Then we shall reign with Him and be like Him.
Therefore the apostle, who knew well what suffering was, could say, “I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” We are in the relationship of sons, and consciously so, and therefore are without fear. Where there is fear, the knowledge of this position is not in the heart. The Spirit in us cries, “Abba, Father!” and it cannot be otherwise, for He only came after all was accomplished which has placed us in this relationship. Christ has given us His own position before God. After accomplishing all that was requisite, as well for the glory of God g for our salvation, there indeed where it had to be accomplished for both—namely, in the place of sin— “made sin for us,” as Man He has gone up into heaven. In Him a Man has entered into the glory of God, the other side of sin, death, the power of Satan, the judgment of God against sin, so that He could send the message to His disciples by Mary Magdalene— “Say to my brethren that I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.” Thereupon He sent down the Holy Spirit as the blessed result of His ascension as Man into heaven, after having fully accomplished our redemption. This Spirit dwells in believers who are resting on the value of His blood, so that their body is a temple of the Holy Ghost. (1 Corinthians 6) They are sealed by the Spirit and have the earnest of the inheritance, the consciousness that they are the children of God. He presents Christ, who is in heaven, and causes us to enjoy unseen things. It would therefore be impossible that He should be a Spirit of fear. or of bondage.
But the operations of the Spirit in us are twofold.
He leads us to appreciate the glory which lies before us, and gives us the sense that the sufferings through which we are brought in striving to reach this glory, and in faithfulness to Christ, are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed, so that we can pursue the path of God with fresh courage and perseverance. Likewise, also He helps us in our weakness, so that we may take part in these sufferings according to God; and that through the Spirit our hearts may be vessels of sympathy answering to the heart of Christ, whilst our groans are an expression of the groans of a suffering creation to God. What a precious position thus to be able to realize His glory and love, who came down into the midst of a suffering creation, so that although as to our bodies we belong to a fallen creation, yet our hearts by the Spirit can be the mouthpiece of the whole creation, and can express according to God its groans to Him. Into this feeling the heart of Christ entered to the full in love and perfection. A true Man, yet as to His person absolutely free from the sin which had brought these sufferings upon creation, His sympathy with us in the consequences of sin was all the more perfect. “He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.” (Compare Matthew 8:1717That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses. (Matthew 8:17)) At the grave of Lazarus, seeing Mary and all the Jews weeping, He groaned in His Spirit and was troubled. Thus although as fallen creature’s weakness and imperfection are our lot, yet we are permitted to share, by the indwelling Spirit, in the sufferings of creation, not indeed with selfish impatience, because we suffer ourselves, but according to God. The picture drawn by the apostle of the condition of creation around us will make this experience clearer; although in the foregoing different points have been already considered, we can nevertheless begin once more at verse 19.
It has been already observed that we have to suffer in the world because it is all lying in sin and confusion, we having been brought back to God; and further, that our hearts also have to suffer because we dwell in the midst of an undelivered creation. But the eye of faith is fixed on the glory which lies before us, and this joyful prospect, together with the fellowship which we enjoy with God already down here, makes us realize that what is around us is unreconciled.
Creation awaits deliverance; but it cannot be delivered and restored until the children of God in the glory of the kingdom are ready to take possession of it as joint-heirs with Christ. Christ sits at the right hand of God until these joint-heirs are gathered. It is a blessed thought, that as we have brought the earthly creation under the bondage of corruption, so now it must wait to be restored and delivered from this bondage until we are glorified. (v. 19) The creation was not subject to bondage willingly; we have done it—but in hope; for this condition will not always last; the creation will be restored. God, however, in the counsels of grace, begins with the guilty, with those who are the farthest off, with those towards whom in the ages to come He will show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:77That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:7); compare Colossians 1:20,2120And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven. 21And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled (Colossians 1:20‑21))
The creation being merely a physical thing, cannot enter into the liberty of grace; it must wait for the liberty of the glory of the children of God. When they are delivered, and their bodies which belong to this creation are changed and glorified—when Satan is bound—then the creature also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption in which it lies enthralled. For we know—those of us who are instructed in the truth of Christianity—that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. We know it yet more because we have the first-fruits of the Spirit; and “we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.” We wait with patience to possess that which is saved by hope; not only eternal life as life—this we have already—but to be glorified when our bodies, which belong to the creation, will be changed, and we shall be made like Christ the Lord according to the power hereby He is able to subdue all things unto Himself. (Philippians 3:2121Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself. (Philippians 3:21))
J. N. D.