(Rom 8:15 ESV) For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”

Paul had used slavery as a metaphor back in chapter 6. He reminds his readers that we shouldn’t go back to the slavery we escaped — the law of sin and death — or the fear of damnation that he described in chapter 7. Rather, we should stick with the Spirit.

He refers to the “Spirit of adoption” and emphasizes our relationship with God as “Father” and “Abba.” It’s by the Spirit within us that we can cry, “Abba! Father.” What does that mean?

This passage parallels,

(Gal 4:6 ESV) And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”

But in this passage, it’s the Spirit who cries, whereas in Romans, we cry.

The word translated “cry” referred originally to the cry or caw of a raven. It came to refer to anything like that. Hence, it’s “cry” as in “town crier.” It’s to call out. The word doesn’t mean “cry” as in sobbing — although one could certainly cry out while crying. In fact, “cry out” might be a better translation.

Abba is, of course, Aramaic for “father,” and so Paul uses both the Jewish and Greek forms, showing that God is father of all nations — and just as close to one as the other. Some dictionaries add that “Abba” is a more intimate term than “Father” is in English. In fact, a son of an earthly father would rarely call him “father” in modern America. He’s say “Dad” or “Daddy” or “Papa.” And “Abba” is the word a child would use of his father in Aramaic, making “Father” a bit too stiff of a translation.

It is, of course, the constant delight of young people to pray to God in congregational settings as “Daddy,” and there is nothing wrong with that so long it’s from the heart. Paul refers to our having a “Spirit of adoption,” and an adopted child would call his new father “Daddy.”

Some take offense at this, thinking this is too familiar for a personage as august and mighty as God — but this is sheer confusion. Someone as august and mighty as God gets to decide how he’ll be addressed!

But Paul tells us that we address God as Abba “by the Spirit.” What does this mean? Well, I think, at least two things. First, it means it’s the Spirit who changes our hearts so that we want to be God’s children. This is not entirely our doing. After all, a rebellious child isn’t looking for an Abba-sort-of relationship.

Second, it means that it’s only by the Spirit that we can feel about God as our father. It’s the Spirit that drives away the fear and allows us to crawl up into God’s lap and take comfort there. It’s not that God isn’t fearsome. He’s the same God whose wrath we escaped when we were saved. But our relationship with him has changed and so our feelings toward him must also change.

Rom 8:16-17

(Rom 8:16-17 ESV) 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,  17 and if children, then heirs–heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

V. 16 is very controversial. What on earth does it mean that the Spirit bears witness? The verb “bear witness” means to confirm by testimony, as opposed to being the primary evidence. We might better translate “corroborates.”

Well, if the Spirit is the corroborating witness, who is the primary witness? Evidently, “our spirit.” Now, “spirit” can carry many different shades of meaning in the Greek, and different authors use it differently. But in Romans, Paul only uses the word a few times to refer to a part of the Christian other than the indwelling Spirit.

(Rom 1:9-10 ESV) 9 For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you  10 always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God’s will I may now at last succeed in coming to you.

(Rom 11:7-8 ESV)  7 What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened,  8 as it is written, “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that would not see and ears that would not hear, down to this very day.”

(Rom 12:11 ESV) 11 Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord.

Rom 11:8 is a quotation from the Septuagint, and so not necessarily representative of Paul’s use of “spirit.” In 1:9 and 12:11, “spirit” means something like “will” or “passion.” It’s the part of us that drives us to behave a certain way.

Therefore, in 8:16, “with our spirit” does not mean that the Spirit testifies to our spirit (taking “spirit” to mean something like “mind,” I suppose), but that our spirit testifies to our adoption, and this is corroborated or supported by the Spirit’s own evidence. More precisely, the idea is that our spirits and the Spirit jointly testify to our adoption.

But how? Well, by what Paul has just said. We have the Spirit of sonship. We are led by the Spirit. Our hearts have been circumcised. And when our hearts are circumcised by God, when are paths are led by the Spirit, and when we have an Abba-relationship with God the Father, well, people can tell. Or they should be able to.

This is not a warming or fuzzy feeling that surely I’m saved. Not mainly. Paul isn’t worried about you know that you are saved. He’s wanting other people to see it! And they should be able to see the work of God’s Spirit on your spirit.

The thought Paul tosses in is heirship. By becoming God’s children, we gain an inheritance, which Paul had earlier described in –

(Rom 4:13-14 ESV) 13 For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith.  14 For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void.

Our inheritance is the world. We are the meek! We inherit the earth!

Now, this is a surprising thing, because we normally think of Christians leaving the world for a better place. And besides, the earth is pretty messed up. Surely, God has something better in mind for us! But “world” means world.

We start by looking back to God’s promise to Abraham –

(Gen 15:18-21 ESV) 18 On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates,  19 the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites,  20 the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim,  21 the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites.”

(Gen 17:4-8 ESV)  4 “Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations.  5 No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.  6 I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you.  7 And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you.  8 And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God.”

God’s original covenant with Abraham was not for the entire world, but for Palestine and surrounding territories only. Bobby Valentine considers this question in detail in a recent post, and I’ll not repeat his excellent analysis here. I would add that although Abraham is promised only certain land, he is also promised that all nations will be blessed through him.

(Gen 12:3 ESV)  3 “I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

Paul evidently took this as requiring that the inheritance ultimately include where all the families on earth live — which makes sense. What also makes sense is a separate line of prophecies -

(Isa 66:18-23 ESV) 18 “For I know their works and their thoughts, and the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and shall see my glory,  19 and I will set a sign among them. And from them I will send survivors to the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, who draw the bow, to Tubal and Javan, to the coastlands far away, that have not heard my fame or seen my glory. And they shall declare my glory among the nations.  20 And they shall bring all your brothers from all the nations as an offering to the LORD, on horses and in chariots and in litters and on mules and on dromedaries, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, says the LORD, just as the Israelites bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the LORD.  21 And some of them also I will take for priests and for Levites, says the LORD.  22

“For as the new heavens and the new earth that I make shall remain before me, says the LORD, so shall your offspring and your name remain.  23 From new moon to new moon, and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship before me, declares the LORD.”

In a prophecy frequently referred to in the New Testament, the end of time is pictures as the creation of new heavens and a new earth (a re-making of the Genesis 1 creation!).

(Rev 21:1-3 ESV) Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.  2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.  3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

The Revelation in fact concludes with the making of the new heaven and new earth (“new” meaning renewed or refreshed) and God leaving heaven to dwell with man. And so it’s easy to see how Jesus, Paul, and John all conclude from the Old Testament that the “inheritance” is not just Palestine, but the entire world.

Finally, Paul says we must “suffer with” Jesus to be glorified with him. To be “glorified” is to be taken into the immediate presence of God. And suffering is to be like Jesus, the suffering servant of Isaiah –

(Isa 53:11-12 ESV) 11 Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.  12 Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

We are called to be like Jesus — to also be suffering servants, willing to die to help God redeem the world.

Now, to borrow a lesson from Ray Vander Laan, we Americans feel blessed not to suffer as the early Christians did, and often thank God for that. What we don’t do is feel the pain of those who do suffer for the gospel today. If we mourned with those who mourn, we’d suffer. But we are far too comfortable to pay much attention to the Christians who are being persecuted all over the world today for their faith.

I get emails –

Just curious–

How would you understand Eph 5:4 in such a way that it doesn’t condemn Paul in Phil 3:8?  I’ve found a handful of scholarly sources over the years that claim that “rubbish” in Phil 3 is equivalent to what we would consider a ‘cuss-word.’  I was reminded of this just the other day because a guy at my church said that he took a class from Curt Nicum at OC who claimed “rubbish” was best translated “s**t.”  Do we raise too big of a fuss over a list of words?

There are many verses teaching us not to be vulgar in our speech –

(Eph 5:4 ESV) 4 Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.

(Eph 4:29 ESV)  29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.

(Col 3:8 ESV) But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.

(Psa 10:7 ESV) His mouth is filled with cursing and deceit and oppression; under his tongue are mischief and iniquity.

(Psa 59:12 ESV) For the sin of their mouths, the words of their lips, let them be trapped in their pride. For the cursing and lies that they utter,

It seems pretty clear that God is opposed to vulgar speech. So how can Paul get away with such talk?

According to R. P. Martin’s commentary in the Tyndale series,

Skubala can mean simply “refuse” (so RV mg., RSV). The derivation is a choice between human waste product and the unwanted food which is consigned to the garbage heap. … [T]he derivation of skubalon from es kunas balein, “to throw to the dogs,” is accepted by Moulton-Milligan.

Jac J. Muller in the New International Commentary writes,

It seems as if σκύβαλα is used with two meanings, although the true derivation is uncertain, viz. (a) excrement from the body; (b) refuse of fragments remaining after a feast which are removed from the table and thrown away (to the dogs?)

The Friberg Lexicon gives as a definition –

anything that is to be treated as worthless and thrown out, translated according to the context dung, rubbish, garbage, offscourings

Louw-Nida Lexicon says,

worthless or unwanted material that is rejected and normally thrown out – ‘rubbish, litter, trash.’

Thayer defines it as –

any refuse, as the excrement of animals, offscouring, rubbish, dregs, etc.: (A. V. dung) i. e. worthless and detestable

However, the NET Bible has a footnote:

The word here translated “dung” was often used in Greek as a vulgar term for fecal matter. As such it would most likely have had a certain shock value for the readers. This may well be Paul’s meaning here, especially since the context is about what the flesh produces.

Robert McLaughlin comments,

Dr. Fredrick Lang, an excellent German scholar, says that; “Skubala means excrement or dung” and then he quotes the Septuagint where “skubala” occurs only once and he said “It is used for lumps of manure remaining in the sieve to illustrate the refuse, impurity, and wickedness in the mind of man”.

The choice of this word used by the apostle stresses the force and totality of this change in his life, and tells us what Paul thought of his celebrityship, his education, his genius, his power, plans and his ability. Our plans and the human ability we possess is “skubala” when it comes to the plan of God. Skubala is what human power, celebrityship, ability and talent is, when we try to use it to worship or impress God.

Lang’s comment refers to –

(Sir 27:3-4 KJA) 3 Unless a man hold himself diligently in the fear of the Lord, his house shall soon be overthrown.  4 As when one sifteth with a sieve, the refuse remaineth; so the filth of man in his talk.

This is the only other use of the term in the Bible or Apocrypha. Sirach, by Ben Sira, also known as Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach, the Wisdom of Ben Sira, or Ecclesiasticus is a Second Century BC book included in the Apocrypha. Although not inspired, it was a very popular work and surely very well known to Paul and many of his readers. And in this context, despite Lang’s comment, I have trouble seeing skubala as meaning “dung” or anything quite like it. It seems to clearly mean “refuse.” Why would you filter dung out of water? I mean, the water would still be far too nasty to drink or wash or cook in. What would be the point? But any filtration process would leave refuse of some kind. In any event, there’s no indication that the word is vulgar in that passage.

Now, vulgarity is a funny thing. Some words are vulgar in some contexts and not in others — “mother” and “suck” would be classic examples. There are many more. Moreover, vulgarity changes quickly in time, because vulgarians enjoy the novelty of new cuss words. “Snafu” began as very profane during WWII and is now generally considered entirely innocent.

Therefore, it’s not surprising that the experts disagree on just how vulgar skubala is. Indeed, in English, we have degrees of vulgarity — some words shock more than others. And a translator unfamiliar with our spoken language would have trouble distinguishing very mild profanity — “darn” — from much worse. They look the same in writing unless you’ve lived here.

And so, I have to disagree with the OC professor — assuming he was accurately quoted.

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Jesus: The Discernment Artist

Getting Off the Bus

You know, sometimes it’s good to talk about something written by someone else. This should be a pretty good mix.

Click here to view the embedded video.

// Send “What Can I Do For You?” Ringtone to your Cell

I get emails –

Jay,

I have done some counseling with people in the church. One brother in his 60’s told me recently that he had been very unhappy and even miserable in his married life for over 35 years. They stayed married but now his grown children are fairly miserable and depressed themselves. This man told me he wonders if he will go to heaven because he was such a bad father (not abusive or a drunkard, just ineffectual and unhappy). Have we (Christian teachers) led people to believe they would be better off being miserable for 40 years than getting a divorce and going to hell?

I am so blessed to be with someone I could love for many years. But not everyone is so fortunate. Is it right for me to tell someone less fortunate you must remain in this  wretched, pathetic marriage for the rest of your life because you made a bad decision when you were a 19 year old?  In fact, I haven’t said that , but that is what most church of Christ people believe and if a preacher told them differently it would start a firestorm of trouble.

I usually say something like, “knowing that God wants you to be faithful and happy, what do you need to do for that to happen?” Any further feedback or advice from scripture you or your readers can give me?

Marriage is a covenant. The scriptures often speak of God’s relationship with the church as a covenant, which is an extension of God’s covenant with Abraham and later Israel. And we know from the Old Testament that God was faithful to his covenant with Israel despite its unfaithfulness. Just one particularly graphic example would be –

(Hos 1:2 ESV) When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, the LORD said to Hosea, “Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the LORD.”

Despite God accusing Israel of whoredom, God was faithful to his covenant — but no to every single Jew. Rather, some Jews were lost because of lack of faith or deliberate disobedience.

(Psa 95:7-11 ESV) Today, if you hear his voice,  8 do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,  9 when your fathers put me to the test and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work.  10 For forty years I loathed that generation and said, “They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.”  11 Therefore I swore in my wrath, “They shall not enter my rest.”

Compare Heb 3:8 ff.

Although some argue that we must be as faithful to our marriage covenants as God is to covenants, I think the better analogy is at the individual level. How faithful is God to his covenant with individual Christians? Well, those of the Calvinistic school of thought would argue that God is so faithful that no one can fall away so as to be lost, but as regular readers know, that’s not by view. But neither do I believe people fall away for every mistake or sin.

Rather, as I taught at GraceConversation, there are three ways to fall away –

A Christian falls away when he no longer has faith. “Faith” means faith in Jesus.

A Christian falls away when he is no longer penitent. Equivalently, a Christian falls away when he no longer submits to Jesus as Lord. Equivalently, a Christian falls away when he willfully continues to sin.

A Christian falls away when he seeks to be justified other than by faith in Jesus.

Now, Todd Deaver and I defend those propositions at GraceConversation, and I’ll not repeat the many pages of argument here. Rather, let’s see what would be analogous to those breaches of covenant in a marriage?

Faith/faithfulness

A spouse no longer has faith in his or her spouse. It’s hard to find an exact equivalent, as we normally think of “faith,” but the word in the Greek also means “faithfulness,” and it often carries this double meaning in the New Testament — although rarely picked up by the translators. Indeed, the “faith of Jesus” mentioned in Rom 3 and Gal 2 is his faithfulness to his covenant with Abraham.

(Rom 3:22 ESV) the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for [Greek: "faithfulness of Jesus Christ to"] all who believe. For there is no distinction:

(Gal 2:16 ESV) yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ [Greek: "faithfulness of Jesus Christ"], so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ [Greek: "the faithfulness of Christ"] and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.

Therefore, the marriage-equivalent of “faith” would being faithful to your spouse. Now, this is more than sexual faithfulness, but it certainly includes that. Rather, “faithfulness” means honoring your covenant with your spouse. This includes several things.

(Exo 21:10 ESV) If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights.

Moses states that a man taking a second wife must not deny the first food, clothing, or “marital rights,” that is, sexual relations. Paul likely had this passage in mind when he commanded that spouses not deny each other sexual fulfillment in 1 Cor 7. This was standard rabbinic teaching in Jesus’ day, and a close study of rabbinic debates shows that rabbis who insisted on this (all of them) also debated the grounds for divorce found in Deu 34 — fornication vs. any ground at all — without mentioning these, and yet the rabbis of both schools of though routinely allowed divorce (and remarriage) for a breach of these commands. David Instone-Brewer covers this in remarkable detail in Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible: The Social and Literary Context. I summarize his work in much more detail in my ebook posted online But If You Do Marry … and the earlier series on divorce called “MDR.”

The deeper teaching is found in Ephesians –

(Eph 5:21-33 NIV)  21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.  22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.  23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.  24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.  25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her  26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,  27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.  28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.  29 After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church–  30 for we are members of his body.  31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”  32 This is a profound mystery–but I am talking about Christ and the church.  33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

My views on this are detailed at –

Ephesians 5 Part 1 (“Head”)

Ephesians 5 Part 2 (“Submission”)

Additional Material on Ephesians 5:21

Suffice to say that Paul compares the relationship of husbands to wives to Christ’s sacrificial relationship to the church — supporting the overall thesis of this post. The key command is: “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” The reference to the crucifixion is explicit and routinely ignored. The covenant of the husband is submission just as Christ submitted –

(Phi 2:5-8 NIV) 5 Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:  6 Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,  7 but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  8 And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death– even death on a cross!

Surrender, self-emptying (making oneself nothing), and humility reflect the nature of Jesus as shown by the cross.

Wives, of course, are taught by Paul to submit as their husbands, but husbands, to be like Christ, must also submit –

(Heb 5:7 NIV) 7 During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.

And, I believe, the command of mutual submission ultimately subsumes the commands for food, clothing, and marital rights — they are still true, of course, but the principle is much, much deeper.

Repentance

To repent is to live what you confess –

(Rom 10:9-10 NIV)  9 That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.  10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.

Now, only Jesus is Lord, but both husbands and wives must be faithful to their covenants and must submit to one another. This submission is the essence of marriage in Christ.

Justification by works

Galatians teaches that our salvation is by faith in Jesus and not works. Indeed, seeking justification by works rather than faith causes one to fall away. It’s a scary book! Works salvation is also known as legalism — the idea that there are a bunch of rules we can obey and so deserve salvation or that there are rules other than faith in Jesus that define the boundaries of the kingdom.

The marital equivalent of legalism is seeking to earn your spouse’s love or, much more commonly, demanding that your spouse earn your love — that is, making your love conditional on meeting some standard of behavior.

Now, there is, of course, a standard we really want our spouses to meet, right? We really want them to be sexual faithful. We want them to carry their share of the load. There are many, many standards we want our spouses to meet. Just so, God has extremely high expectations of us his children. But God’s covenant is not legalistic.

Rather, God acts first. He pursues us and gives us grace. We respond in obedience, but a very imperfect obedience. Nonetheless, as God gives himself to us, even living in us to form a kind-of unity through his Spirit, we grow in our obedience and love, and the relationship deepens.

I’m no marriage counselor, but many a counselor gives this advice: pursue your wife or husband. Don’t demand her or his love. Rather, be the first to love, the first to serve, the first to submit — asking nothing in return other than the opportunity to love. And, the counselors teach, no spouse can resist such unconditional love. Love changes people.

You see, we must learn from God’s grace how to be gracious to others — especially to our spouses. Submit by being willing to sacrifice for the other first. It’s works for God. It’ll work for you.

Christian marriage

There are three kinds of marriages — marriages between non-Christians, marriages between Christians, and mixed marriages. Let’s take them one at a time.

For non-Christians, the Bible doesn’t really have a lot to say. Obviously, God deeply cares how the spouses treat each other and their children, because God love them all. But the church can’t do much for non-Christian couples, nor can we call them to live like Jesus.

For mixed marriage, the Bible is quite clear.

(1Pe 3:1-2 ESV) Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, 2 when they see your respectful and pure conduct.

(1Co 7:12-17 ESV) 12 To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her.  13 If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him.  14 For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.  15 But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace.  16 For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?  17 Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.

The believing spouse must remain married in hopes of converting the unbeliever. The failure of a spouse to convert does not, by itself, justify a divorce. But where other grounds exist, they’d certainly apply.

Now, for marriages between Christians, the rules are as discussed above, and absent disease, God and the church insist that the spouses treat each other as described in Ephesians 5. And when spouses do this, they’ll get along — especially if they are part of a Christian community where good marriages are modeled and the leadership supports them in their efforts to make a good marriage.

I’m convinced that virtually all miserable marriages are miserable because of one or both spouses’ selfishness. I mean, self-giving, Christ-like spouses can make a marriage work, even if they aren’t intrinsically compatible. They just have to grow up and do what the Bible says.

The sad truth, however, is that our churches are pretty good at producing spiritual midgets because we teach a selfish Christianity. Indeed, our marketing often emphasizes what the convert gets out of Christianity, rather than the joys of missional living. When the church is selling coffee in the lobby and child care and great worship rather than mission with Jesus, it’ll produce selfish Christians and failed marriages.

I have nothing against coffee, child care, and great worship. I just don’t think they should be the reason anyone joins my church. If they join because of what they get out of it rather than because of how well they’ll be equipped for ministry, well, we leaders aren’t doing our jobs.

Therefore, the most important cure for miserable marriages is Christianity — the Phillippians 2 kind, not the marketing kind. Get that right, and we’ll not fix them all, but we’ll fix a whole lot of them!

Discipline

If a Christian spouse insists on being a selfish jerk to his wife, he should be counseled, prayed with, and warned. Professional counseling should be made available. We may even need him to take a physical and make sure his problem isn’t due to some disease. But after everything else has been tried, he may need to be disfellowshipped. (Obviously, the same rule applies for wives who are selfish jerks.)

Very understandably, elderships are reluctant to get involved in such matters, because there will always be a lot of “he said, she said,” and most of us aren’t qualified counselors. But, ultimately, a church that won’t insist its members stop being selfish isn’t really much of a church. It’s not optional behavior.

(Phi 2:1-4 NIV) If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion,  2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.  3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.  4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Christianity changes hearts and lives. And we should certainly treat our spouses at least as well as Paul tells us to treat our fellow church members. This is the heart of Christianity.

(1Co 13:1-8 NIV)  If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.  4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  8 Love never fails.

Again, this passage is about how to treat your fellow church member, and we can properly insist that spouses do at least as well with each other.

I’m convinced that countless marriages could have been saved and many a husband or wife spared untold misery by a church that teaches a Christ-like Christianity, that insists that we honor these commands, and that is willing to discipline those who refuse. I doubt many will refuse if the teachings are taught properly.

(Rom 8:10 ESV) 10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

Some have argued that “Christ is in you” means we are indwelt by the Spirit in the same sense we are indwelt by Christ — through obedience to the “law of Christ” or “law of the Spirit.” That reading, of course, is entirely out of context. Christ is in us because his Spirit is in us. The same thought appears at –

(Joh 14:20 ESV)  20 In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.

– which is another passage dealing with the indwelling Spirit. But the most explicit statement is found in –

(Eph 3:14-19 ESV)  14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,  15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being,  17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith–that you, being rooted and grounded in love,  18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,  19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

The thought is plainly that Christ dwells in our hearts via the Spirit’s work in us.

Therefore, Paul says, if Jesus lives in your body (through the Spirit) — which is dead under the law of sin and death — then the Spirit gives life (again, alluding to Deu 30:6). And this is all because of “righteousness.”

Now, scholars debate whether this is our righteouss living resulting from the Spirit’s power in us, or Christ’s imputed righteousness (we are credited with the righteousness of Jesus), or God’s righteousness, meaning God’s keeping his covenant promise.

N. T. Wright, and many others, argue that in Romans, “righteousness of God” refers to God keeping his promises, especially his promises to Abraham. Consider –

(Rom 3:21-26 ESV) 21 But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it–  22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction:  23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,  24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,  25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.  26 It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

This is not the place for detailed exposition. The argument is laid out here –

The Cruciform God: Righteousness and Faith, Part 2

The Cruciform God: Righteousness and Faith, Part 3

The result isn’t critical to our understanding the Spirit — but I suspect Paul is referring to God keeping his promise to save us by faith, detailed in the preceding chapters of Romans. The answer absolutely is not that we have somehow become so righteous we need no grace.

Rom 8:11

(Rom 8:11 ESV)  11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

Paul now moves to the topic of hope — the fact that the Spirit is in us assures us that we will be resurrected. Those with the Spirit will be resurrected. Those without the Spirit will not be. There is no condemnation in Christ Jesus! All with the Spirit are saved.

Rom 8:12-13

(Rom 8:12-13 ESV)  12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

“You will live” again refers to Deu 30:6: “that you may live.” And here we see another aspect of the indwelling Spirit. It is “by the Spirit” we “put to death the deeds of the body.”

(Rom 6:6-8 ESV)  6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.  7 For one who has died has been set free from sin.  8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.

Clearly, “deeds of the body” means “sin.” Therefore, the Spirit helps us defeat sin in our lives. It helps us overcome our sinful natures in the struggle Paul described back in Rom 7.

Now, notice the parallels between chapters 6 and 8. In chapter 6, Paul speaks of the moment of our baptism, when we were buried and resurrected with Jesus, demonstrating that “we will also live with him.” This is also a promise we have in the form of the indwelling Spirit — received, of course, when we were first saved.

Our initial conversion is a new birth, and we are born of the Spirit, meaning we receive the Spirit through whom God washes our sins away by the power of Jesus’ blood — and which stays with us to defeat the “law of sin and death” and give us the victory at the end.

You see, God wants us to make it! All three persons of the Trinity are working to see that we make it to the end. Our future resurrection is pictured and anticipated in our baptism, and the Spirit works powerfully in us to help us get there. It’s a big, big deal. And part of what the Spirit does is work within us to help us defeat sin — the deeds of the body.

Rom 8:14

(Rom 8:14 ESV) For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

By being baptized into Jesus, we take on his son-ness. We, too, become sons of God because we are “led by the Spirit.” This is obviously parallel to –

(Gal 5:18 ESV)  18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

So what does it mean to be “led by the Spirit”? Well, we’ll get there. But we already see some substantial parts of it. The Spirit helps us bear fruit for God. The Spirit helps us defeat sin in our lives. The Spirit pours the love of God into our hearts. The Spirit circumcises our hearts, that is, changes our hearts so that we want to obey his will. Indeed, the Spirit makes Deuteronomy 10 a reality in our lives –

(Deu 10:12-20 ESV)  12 “And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul,  13 and to keep the commandments and statutes of the LORD, which I am commanding you today for your good?  14 Behold, to the LORD your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it.  15 Yet the LORD set his heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them, you above all peoples, as you are this day.  16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn. 17 For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe.  18 He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing.  19 Love the sojourner, therefore, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.  20 You shall fear the LORD your God. You shall serve him and hold fast to him, and by his name you shall swear.

It’s not that the Spirit makes us in-fact sinless. Rather, the idea is that the Spirit changes our hearts so that we obey from the heart. The goal is not perfect obedience or perfect understanding. It’s a circumcised heart — a heart that truly wants to obey.

You see, God began calling on his people to love him and to care for those he cares for — the orphan, the widow, the alien — not because we fear hell but because we’ve been re-made to have hearts like his heart, hearts that love God and love those who need help. This is the Spirit’s leading.

We got on the wrong path when the question became tongues vs. no tongues and special revelation vs. no special revelation. That’s not what Romans is about. Romans — which is the most detailed exposition of the Spirit’s work in the Bible — other than Deuteronomy! — tells us that it’s all about circumcised hearts. Understand that, and the rest falls into place well enough.

I say “well enough” because there will always be unanswered questions. The key is to get the biggest, most important questions answered. And the answer is: the Spirit’s work is mainly and most importantly about our hearts because the only obedience that matters is obedience from the heart — and that can’t be gained through a system of threats and punishments. It requires a new heart.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Jay,

I have done some counseling with people in the church. One brother in his 60’s told me recently that he had been very unhappy and even miserable in his married life for over 35 years. They stayed married but now his grown children are fairly miserable and depressed themselves. This man told me he wonders if he will go to heaven because he was such a bad father (not abusive or a drunkard, just ineffectual and unhappy). Have we (Christian teachers) led people to believe they would be better off being miserable for 40 years than getting a divorce and going to hell?

I am so blessed to be with someone I could love for many years. But not everyone is so fortunate. Is it right for me to tell someone less fortunate you must remain in this  wretched, pathetic marriage for the rest of your life because you made a bad decision when you were a 19 year old?  In fact, I haven’t said that , but that is what most church of Christ people believe and if a preacher told them differently it would start a firestorm of trouble.

I usually say something like, “knowing that God wants you to be faithful and happy, what do you need to do for that to happen?” Any further feedback or advice from scripture you or your readers can give me?

Asking the right questions

For those new to the blog, I need to mention my ebook posted online But If You Do Marry … and the earlier series on divorce called “MDR.” We’ve covered the theology of divorce and remarriage extensively here, and so I hesitated to post the question — not because it’s not a good question but because I know it’ll be hard to keep the discussion on task. You see, there are at least three ways this could go –

Question 1 — is divorce for some reason other than fornication ever permissible?

Question 2 — for an impermissible divorce, is remarriage permitted?

Question 3 — how does the church deal with someone who has impermissibly divorced? or impermissible remarried?

Those are kind of the usual questions. But in this case, only Question 1 is on the table. And I’m thinking that may not even be the right question. Maybe we should instead ask –

Question 4 — how important is my happiness in the grand scheme of things? And not much gets written on that one.

One wrong answer

And while I struggle to find a good answer, I’m pretty confident that some answers are wrong.

We dare not recommend to someone that he sin (by divorcing or otherwise) just because forgiveness or remarriage or church fellowship is possible. That’s rebellion. It’s a very dangerous path. It would be the height of irresponsibility to say: “Go ahead and commit this sin. God will forgive you.” That is exactly the sin that Hebrews warns us against –

(Heb 12:15-16 ESV) 15 See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;  16 that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal.

The root of bitterness is found in –

(Deu 29:18-20 ESV)  18 Beware lest there be among you a man or woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the LORD our God to go and serve the gods of those nations. Beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit, 19 one who, when he hears the words of this sworn covenant, blesses himself in his heart, saying, ‘I shall be safe, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart.’ This will lead to the sweeping away of moist and dry alike.  20 The LORD will not be willing to forgive him, but rather the anger of the LORD and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and the curses written in this book will settle upon him, and the LORD will blot out his name from under heaven.

(Compare Heb 10:26-27.) So that line of reasoning is just not available to us. That doesn’t mean it’s our place to invoke God’s judgment on those who’ve traveled down this path. It’s not. But we can certainly not recommend such a course of action.

What about a legal separation?

But does God allow divorce on other grounds? Well, as I considered at some length in the book and earlier series, the “putting away” that ends a marriage is not the filing of the divorce petition in court — a practice foreign to First Century thought. The “divorce” is the ending of the marriage, which could happen by abandonment or other serious breach of the marriage covenant.

Therefore, a legal separation would be, in the eyes of the New Testament writers, a divorce. It’s not the legal status of the spouses that matters so much as how they treat each other and their relationship. A legal separation is simply a divorce by another name except that the state won’t allow remarriage. Being legally married while living apart as though single is not a marriage. Not having sex with someone not your spouse is hardly sufficient for a marriage. I mean, the goal here isn’t celibacy but for the husband and wife to be “one flesh” and united.

Therefore, the marriage may well have already been ended by one spouse or the other long before the divorce papers are filed in the courthouse. And, therefore, if it’s a sin to divorce your spouse in a given situation, it would be sin to be legally separated in that situation, too.

Incompatibility

Let’s assume for purposes of this discussion, however, that the spouses simply can’t stand each other. They honor their marital obligations to one another. The husband supports his wife. They don’t deny sexual relations. They do the usual husband-and-wife things. They just detest one another. Does God intend that we be miserable? And doesn’t that misery have an impact on the children and future generations, perhaps leading to another several generations of dysfunctional marriages?

Of course, in the First Century, marriages were arranged. The idea of building a marriage on romantic love and having a soul-mate would have been quite foreign to most of Jesus’ audience. It’s not that no one ever made their own match, but normally the spouses were selected by the parents, and family loyalty and honor were much more important than individual autonomy or even happiness. Surely, therefore, there were countless miserable marriages!

I mean, the modern, working theory of marriage is all about compatibility — and it’s unlikely that the parents did that well selecting mates for their children. I know that the girls my parents wanted me to date were not the ones I wanted to date. And I’m sure my kids feel that same way about my taste in potential girlfriends! I doubt that First Century parents were any better at it that we’d be today.

Then again, many lousy marriages would be avoided if the kids would listen to their parents! I think parents are pretty good at seeing losers and mistakes. We’re not so good at finding ideal matches.

So we have to read the New Testament in light of First Century culture and practices. And I’m very fortunate to have married well. I know plenty of people who didn’t do so well — and it would be hard to exaggerate just how terrible life can be with a bad choice of spouse.

Therefore, if you were approached by a beloved friend who is miserable in his or her marriage, and yet the spouses aren’t guilty of any heinous sins against the other, what would you recommend? What’s the best counsel we can give?

Examples

I’m sure the readers will remember –

(1Pe 3:1-2 ESV) Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, 2 when they see your respectful and pure conduct.

Peter taught Christian women to remain married to their unbelieving husbands in hopes of saving them. And a marriage between a believer and an unbeliever can be a very difficult one. Imagine what it would have been like in pagan society! Do the children worship the God of the Jews or Apollo? Do they suffer persecution or become good citizens who honor the gods of the city? It would likely have been much tougher then than it is today in the US. It would be not unlike the wife of a Muslim converting to Christianity today. And yet Peter says the chance to convert the husband requires the wife to remain married.

Paul says much the same thing in 1 Cor 7 –

(1Co 7:12-17 ESV) 12 To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her.  13 If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him.  14 For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.  15 But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace.  16 For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?  17 Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.

By the way, “separates” should not be considered the equivalent of a modern legal separation. No such legal process existed in the First Century. Rather, the way a Greek man divorced his wife was by kicking her out of the house or by leaving, announcing the divorce in the presence of witnesses.

The strking thing about these passages is the flow of thought. It’s all about the kingdom — how to save your spouse — not how to be happy. But what if the spouse is already saved but a terrible husband?

Modern examples

Consider a spouse who becomes paranoid schizophrenic after the marriage and refuses to take medication (paranoid people don’t trust their doctors!) The condition is permanent.

Consider a spouse who is in a persistent vegetative state — entirely unresponsive to external stimuli and kept alive on machines because her parents won’t allow her to die. She might stay on the machines for decades before “dying.”

Consider the spouse who becomes increasingly self-absorbed and shows no love for his wife and children. He doesn’t cheat on his wife; he pays for the mortgage and household expenses. But he has no interest in his family. Medical tests show no problems. He’s just a jerk.

Assume both spouses are otherwise good, Bible-toting Christians. What advice do you give?

(Oh, and you can’t cite the Book of Common Prayer as authority here, even though that’s where we get our wedding vows from.)

(Rom 8:5 ESV) 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

“Set their minds on” is a single verb in the Greek, and it’s present, active, indicative. As Zodhiates explains the Greek, present, active, indicative expresses action that is occurring while the speaker is making the statement. Hence, “have their minds on,” as in the NIV, is more precise. In other words, this isn’t a command; it isn’t a condition; it’s an observation on the difference between our natures without and with the Spirit. If we have the Spirit, our minds are set on the things of the Spirit. This is about a change in our natures, not a change from one law to another.

Rom 8:6

(Rom 8:6 ESV) For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.

There is no verbs in v. 6 in the Greek. The way Greek works, that means they are borrowed from v. 5. Present, indicative, active is hard to express in English, but the thought is that our minds are presently set on the Spirit. Hence, “the mind that is set on the Spirit is life and peace.” Again, it’s not a command or condition, but a statement of fact.

Notice, that “is life” refers back to Deu 30:6: “so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” How is it that we “may live”? By God, through the Spirit, setting our minds on the Spirit rather than the flesh. (There is also this parallel: circumcision of the heart by the Spirit rather than circumcision of the flesh, which accomplishes nothing.)

Rom 8:7-8

(Rom 8:7-8 ESV) For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot.  8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Paul continues to borrow his verbs in v. 7, so “is set on the flesh” remains present, indicative, active, that is, presently true: minds set on anything other than the Spirit are hostile to God — even if your mind is set on the Law of Moses or some other legal system that supposedly came from God, because to set your mind on a legal system cannot be submissive to God. No legal system can please God, because that’s the nature of the flesh. The way you escape the flesh is through something that is not flesh — the Spirit.

Rom 8:9

(Rom 8:9 ESV)  You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

Let’s start with the second sentence. If you don’t have the Spirit, you are damned. Why? Because you are trapped in the Rom 7 situation. You can’t obey sufficiently, even if you love the law of God.

But if the Spirit “dwells in you,” you are “in the Spirit.”

Now, there are some deep meanings in these phrases. “Dwell” goes back to the Exodus and God’s instructions to build a tabernacle –

(Exo 29:44-46 ESV) 44 I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar. Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate to serve me as priests.  45 I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God.  46 And they shall know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them. I am the LORD their God.

God dwelled in the tabernacle in the form of a glorious, special presence.

(Exo 40:34-35 ESV)  34 Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.  35 And Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.

In 1 Cor 6:19, Paul refers to our bodies as temples of the Holy Spirit. It’s the same thought: God will dwell in each of us, through his Spirit, just as he dwelled with Israel in the tabernacle and, later, the temple through his glory.

God’s indwelling in the tabernacle was a special place of communication –

(Exo 25:22 ESV)  22 There I will meet with you, and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim that are on the ark of the testimony, I will speak with you about all that I will give you in commandment for the people of Israel.

It’s also an assurance that God will keep his promises — an earnest –

(Exo 29:45-46 ESV)  45 I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God.  46 And they shall know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them. I am the LORD their God.

The key, of course, is that the people could perceive God’s presence there. They knew God dwelt among them because they could see the glory of God among them. And this is the root of Paul’s description of the Spirit dwelling in each of us. This is no mere abstraction. Indeed, it’s a special, personal, visible, powerful presence.

The next intriguing phrase is Paul’s distinction between being “in the flesh” and “in the Spirit.” “In the Spirit,” of course, sounds opposite to the Spirit being in us. But we’ve heard similar language elsewhere –

(Joh 17:20-21 ESV)  20 “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word,  21 that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

For us to be “in the flesh” is to be only flesh and blood — without the power of the Spirit in us –

(Rom 7:5 ESV)  5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.

We are no longer “in the flesh” because we’ve been transformed into beings that are partly Spirit. We are “in the Spirit” because our essential natures have been changed, so that we are no longer mere flesh and blood beings.

(2Co 3:18 NIV) 18 And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

I addressed the question from a theological standpoint in the series on Imperfect Baptisms, but there’s another way of looking at the question that is rarely addressed. You see, it wasn’t that long ago that I also believed that those not baptized by immersion were lost even if they had a submissive faith in Jesus. And it was during that phase of my study that I learned something very interesting: we are not alone.

The Roman Catholics baptize adult converts by immersion for the remission of sins, and they have always done this — although not always uniformly. European cathedrals typically have a separate baptistry that is designed for immersion. Recently, many (not all) American cathedrals have built baptistries for immersion.

The Eastern Orthodox have always baptized adult converts by immersion or dipping — except they do it three times — and theirs is also for the remission of sins.

All Baptists baptize by immersion and some do so for remission of sins. Yes, really. I know some personally. Not every pastor follows denominational teaching and not every Baptist denomination adheres to Zwinglian teaching.

The Wikipedia says,

Baptism by submersion is also practiced by the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), although the faith does not suggest rebaptism of those who have undergone a different Christian baptism tradition. …

Seventh-day Adventists believe that “Baptism symbolizes dying to self and coming alive in Jesus.” They practice full immersion baptism.

Anabaptists perform baptisms indoors in a baptismal font, a swimming pool, or a bathtub, or outdoors in a creek or river. Baptism memorializes the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus.^[Rom 6] Baptism does not accomplish anything in itself, but is an outward personal sign or testimony that the person’s sins have already been washed away by the cross of Christ.

Also listed as practicing baptism by immersion are Christadelphians, Trinitarian Pentecostals and various “Holiness” groups, Christian Missionary Alliance, Assemblies of God, and Oneness Pentecostals. For denominations outside the Reformed/Calvinist tradition, baptism is almost always for the remissions of sins.

The Plymouth Brethren baptize believers by immersion, but take a position similar to the Southern Baptists as to its effect. The International Church of the Foursquare Gospel is also immersionist.

Now, if all these groups practice baptism of believers by immersion and most do so for the remission of sins, why don’t we treat any of them as part of “us”? — unless, of course, we are rank sectarians who believe that only those in the Churches of Christ are saved?

You see, I think it’s a respectable position to hold that baptism by immersion is essential for salvation. I held to that position for many years. But how can we say that our reason for treating “the denominations” as damned (or too uncertain to fellowship) is solely our view on baptism and then treat denominations as damned even when they agree with us on baptism?

And because we really don’t consider anyone else worthy of our fellowship, it’s entirely fair to ask: why not really?

Now, it’s not sufficient to point out some severe error by one group or another. The question is: why not fellowship any of them? If baptism is really the reason we don’t cross denominational lines, why not cross the line to at least one other immersionist group?

Deuteronomy

First, up to this point, Paul’s discussion of the Spirit in Romans has been built heavily on the Old Testament prophecies related to the Spirit, especially Deuteronomy 30:6 –

(Deu 30:6 ESV)  And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.

This passage refers back to the beginning of the second giving of the Law in chapter 10 of Deuteronomy — just before the Israelites were to cross the Jordan River and begin the campaign to conquer the Promised Land –

(Deu 10:12-20 ESV)  12 “And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul,  13 and to keep the commandments and statutes of the LORD, which I am commanding you today for your good?  14 Behold, to the LORD your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it.  15 Yet the LORD set his heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them, you above all peoples, as you are this day.  16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn. 17 For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe.  18 He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing.  19 Love the sojourner, therefore, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.  20 You shall fear the LORD your God. You shall serve him and hold fast to him, and by his name you shall swear.

At the beginning of the Law, God tells the Israelites to “circumcise therefore the foreskin[s] of your heart[s]” and to love God “with all your heart and with all your soul.” There then follow many particular commands, followed by a series of curses that will befall Israel should they fail to do this. Finally, in chapter 30, God through Moses states that even if Israel were to rebel, God would save a remnant for himself, for this remnant, he’ll circumcise their hearts himself — rather than expecting them to do it for themselves — and as a result, “you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” Thus, the commands of chapter 10 would be honored by God’s remnant because of God’s operation on their hearts.

Paul tells us that God has now fulfilled this promise through his Spirit –

(Rom 2:25-29 ESV) 25 For circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law, but if you break the law, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision.  26 So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision?  27 Then he who is physically uncircumcised but keeps the law will condemn you who have the written code and circumcision but break the law.  28 For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical.  29 But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God.

V. 29 is a plain allusion to Deu 30:6. Notice the flow of Paul’s thought. To be a true Jew, one must keep the “precepts of the law.” And the only circumcision that matters is Deu 30:6 circumcision: circumcision of the heart by the Spirit. Thus, Paul considers keeping the law and having the Spirit as parallels, indeed, two sides of the same coin. But they are not, of course, the same thing. They are two different things that correspond.

Rom 5

In chapter 5, we see that, through the Spirit, the love of God — the central command of Deuteronomy found in 10:12 — has been poured into our hearts by the Spirit.

(Rom 5:3-5 ESV) 3 More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,  4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,  5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

Again, you can’t help but hear echoes of Deuteronomy here.

Rom 7

We next turn to chapter 7.

(Rom 7:4 ESV)  4 Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God.

Paul declares that we died to the law through the crucifixion of Jesus, so that we may “bear fruit for God.” It’s not just bearing fruit — it’s also for whom we bear fruit. We bear fruit for God because we now love God.

But there’s a problem. We are still sinners –

(Rom 7:22-24 ESV)  22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being,  23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.  24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?

If God were to judge us strictly by how we live, no one could make it! Our weakness as broken, flawed humans makes it impossible to obey even what we understand of God’s will. Thus, our bodies become “bodies of death” because we just can’t escape our fallen natures.

Rom 8:1-2

(Rom 8:1-2 ESV) There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.  2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

Now, if words mean anything at all, v. 1 says that there are no damned Christians. I’ve heard many a person say something like, “He is my brother in Christ but I’m not sure whether he’s saved.” Can’t be. All Christians are saved, all the time. Rom 8:1 says so. (Other verses, too.)

But I reject the doctrine “once saved, always saved” and the Perserverance of the Saints. Rather, Christians can fall away. I’ve seen it happen. But once they so fall as to become damned, they are no longer Christians or brothers. Rather, they’ve become enemies of God and his kingdom because they are in rebellion against the gospel.

V. 2 speaks of freedom from “the law of sin and death.” These words appear repeatedly in chapter 7 and refer to the damnation that we deserve because of our inability to actually merit God’s salvation. But this means that the “law of sin and death” is, in fact, the “law of God” combined with our fallen nature. It’s not the Old Testament, now repealed. The law of sin and death is the law of God in which we delight — but which we fail to obey.

Harken back to 7:22-24. Paul first mentions the “law of God” — which is God’s revealed will for how we should live. Then he refers to “another law” or a “law of sin” that dwells in our bodies. This is our fallen nature — our inability to obey sufficiently. Thus, in 8:2, the “law of sin and death” is our fallen nature, but it only damns us because God’s law damns us if we don’t obey. It’s God’s law plus our fallen nature, working together to damn.

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Rom 8:3-4

(Rom 8:3-4 ESV)  3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,  4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

V. 3 confirms this conclusion. The law of God — in which we delight — cannot save us, because it is “weakened by the flesh.” The only cure is not a better law. After all, Paul had said –

(Rom 7:12-14 ESV) 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.  13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.  14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.

– the law is holy, righteous, and good. The law isn’t the problem. The problem is “sin, producing death in me through what is good” because “I am of the flesh.”

So we cannot obey so as to deserve salvation. It cannot be done. What’s the cure? Well, it’s Jesus, because he condemned sin in the flesh. He condemned the “law of sin and death” by defeating it through the cross and his perfect obedience.

The result is that “the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us” because we are in Christ and so in his perfection. And for those who are in Christ — and therefore have no condemnation — we “walk not according the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

Now, Paul will have more to say on what this means as he goes, but it’s clearly not the same as exact obedience to God’s laws — because that’s not possible. Paul is not promising us perfect obedience or perfect knowledge of God’s will. Rather, he says those in Christ Jesus “walk … according to the Spirit,” which id plainly not the same thought as “walk according to all God’s laws.”

Paul invites us into a different way of thinking — and if we miss the turn, we turn into legalists and find ourselves back in chapter 7, which is quite plainly not where God wants us to be.

To this point, Paul has told us that the Spirit circumcises our hearts, having the same sense as in Deuteronomy. That means, per Deu 10:16, we will no longer be “stubborn,” but will instead “walk in all [God's] ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.” Notice the parallel use of “walk” in Rom 8:4 and Deu 10:12. And notice that the emphasis in this passage, alluded to by Paul back in Rom 5:5, is the state of our hearts. Indeed, the entire discussion centers on having circumcised hearts, which is a metaphor for hearts dedicated to God. It all about our hearts.

Now, there’s a popular bulletin article that talks about how terrible it is that some denominations focus on the state of our hearts. Well, unlearn that lesson! Jesus teaches that the greatest command is –

(Mar 12:29-30 ESV)  29 Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.  30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’”

And this is all about our hearts. That’s the most important thing, Jesus says, and it makes sense. And, therefore, to “walk … according to the Spirit” is first and foremost to have our hearts changed by God — through the Spirit — to love God this much.

Paul, of course, mentions the “law of the Spirit,” which defeats the law of sin and death. Plainly, this third law is neither “the law of God” in which we delight nor the “law of sin and death” but is rather a new way of being — that is, a way of living in relationship with God where God lives in us through his Spirit, changing our hearts to be more pleasing to him.

It’s standard cant among the 20th Century Churches of Christ to teach that the “law of the Spirit” is simply new laws found in the New Testament that replace the Law of Moses found in the Old Testament. That conclusion can only be reached by ignoring a very large portion of the the Bible, especially all of Romans that has preceded this verse. I mean, that argument is to replace one “law of sin and death” with another — because we can’t obey either one.

Ask any preacher for the conservative Churches to list the laws we must obey, and he’ll refuse. He’ll likely refer you to the entire New Testament! At least the rabbis could list the 613 commands of the Law of Moses. There was a stopping point! But the new “law of the Spirit” (falsely called) is an even more unbearable burden than the Law of Moses.

This is profoundly bad exegesis. Indeed, it’s not exegesis at all because it ignores all the rest of the book, and leads to conclusions such as –

Now, friends, should we be legalists? If you mean should we keep the law of Moses or follow human creeds or traditions, or can we earn our salvation, the answer is a resounding “No!” If you mean are we under divine law, the law of Christ, that we must keep it, in fact all of it, to be saved, the answer is emphatically “Yes!”

Don’t worry about people calling you derisive names. Just obey Jesus in all things.

Limestone Church of Christ. This is not an unusual interpretation at all. And it puts us right back into the desperate state described in Romans 7 — the condition Jesus died to rescue us from!

Leaders from the churches decide to meet periodically not just for prayer and encouragement, but to coordinate and plan their efforts. With over 100,000 volunteers available, they realize that the church in Tuscaloosa is capable of far more than it’s even imagined in the past.

The leadership encourages some of its members to move to impoverished communities to become beacons of light and serve in God’s redemptive mission there. Over time, many are rescued from poverty and addiction, from broken marriages and failed families, and many turn to Jesus. Racial divisions weaken and the town changes.

The volunteers who work most closely with the poor do evangelism, too, of course — and they look for congregations for their new converts. They find themselves more concerned with whether the people they’ve rescued from poverty and brokenness will be accepted, encouraged, and supported than whether they are correctly taught on infralapsarianism. Christianity has a doctrinal element that’s of critical importance, but they learn that love is the greatest gift.

(1Jo 3:14-18 NIV) 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death.  15 Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.  16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.  17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?  18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

When John explains to us how to know whether we are saved, he asks whether we love — not whether we understand hypostatic union. He also asks whether we have faith, but “faith” is simply faith in Jesus as the incarnate Son of God — not faith in how baptism works or God’s preferred form of church organization.

(1Jo 5:1 NIV) Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well.

When a single mother is killed in a housing project, the church must find suitable foster parents for her children. The volunteers, of course, insist that the foster parents be devout Christians, but they are far more concerned with their ability as parents and Christian role models than their position on how often to take communion.

Over time, although the churches in town continue to meet in separate buildings, with differing worship styles, the Christians begin to think of themselves as part of but one church — not a single congregation under a single eldership, but a single body of the Messiah, united by the Spirit. A big part of the transition is the quarterly communion services in Bryant-Denny stadium (it now holds over 100,000 people). The services focus on celebrating victories that Jesus is winning through the Tuscaloosa churches. Stories are told, testimonies are shared, and people find themselves cheering for churches of different denominations.

Churches begin to merge, as old priorities shift in favor of higher, better priorities, but not all churches merge. Some churches merge but conduct multiple services. Some just merge. It just seems so silly to maintain 200 75-member congregations with barely enough resources to pay the power bill when a merger will allow them to support desperately needed services, to support missionaries, etc. But there remain hundreds of congregations, worshipping and teaching as they understanding the scriptures.

And as the churches grow larger and as the churches see mission to those in need as more important than preserving stale animosities from the post-Reformation European religious wars, they see the need to train up their own members for fulltime ministry and missions. Just as many megachurches already do, they form their own training programs, because the seminaries are teaching a religion that’s 20 years behind the times. The West Alabama churches want ministers trained in what they consider important. And so they start a school for ministry – not just preaching, but counseling, serving in the housing projects, planting churches, feeding the hungry, cooperating with secular and governmental social services agencies, interfacing with local government — a whole host of skills not taught in the typical Christian college.

Meanwhile, the local Christian private schools begin to change their curriculums. No longer do they offer a secular education with devos and Bible classes and pledges of allegiance tacked on. They see the necessity of involving their students in actual works of ministry and teaching them how to understand what they’re doing and how to be leaders in such efforts. They teach them how to plant churches by bringing church planters in as spiritual heroes to be emulated. They teach a religion that expects Christian children to grow up not only orthodox but practicing a lives of selfless love. It’s not enough just to have the right positions on the issues — and the “issues” change as immigration, welfare, racial reconciliation, and environmental concerns become far more immediate than apostolic succession versus congregational autonomy.

The united church organically, naturally, and by the power of the Spirit transforms private schooling, seminary education, benevolence, and missions. The children growing up in the Churches of Christ learn that the assembly is a time to celebrate God’s powerful working in the community, to encourage and uplift one another as they learn a new way of being, and to praise God for inviting them into his family where they can experience such things.

There are, of course, tough decisions to be made. The movement begins with mainstream, evangelical churches with very orthodox views on the Trinity, inspiration, and such. But other churches that aren’t so orthodox want to join their communion — and some lines have to be drawn. Some lines are easy. You must have faith in Jesus, and so non-Messianic Jews, Muslims, and Hindus can’t join. Other lines are more difficult– Mormons, Catholics, and other groups present serious challenges to knowing just how broad God’s grace is.

But the leaders have the wisdom to adopt no creed, and so they let the Bible answer these questions in terms of faith and repentance, not creedalism. In fact, many people from less orthodox denominations join the good works and worship of the united church — and most gladly lay their positions at the foot of the cross as they see the power of a lived gospel.  And the united church grows.

Now, I’m the first to admit that I’m naive, optimistic, and unrealistic.

(Mat 19:26 ESV) 26 But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

But if God wants us to be united, well, it must be possible. And if this isn’t the way forward, I’d love to hear a better idea. I’m not interested in the naysaying. It’s easy and cheap to be a cynic (I speak from experience). It’s dangerous to have a dream, because dreams can disappoint. Cynics never have that problem. But what fun is that?

I’ve seen God do some amazing things. And this one has to be easy for him — because he commanded it. We’re just too scared to try. And that’s not his fault.