Life in the Spirit
The answer to chapter seven's exhausted cry. No condemnation, and the Spirit turns slaves into children who call our Father Abba. Paul never pretends the suffering is over — creation groans, we groan, prayer fails us — yet insists nothing in it can separate us from love.
8 1There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2In Christ Jesus, the Spirit's law of life freed you from sin and death's law. 3What the law couldn't do, weakened by the flesh, our Father did: sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, as a sin offering, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4so the law's righteous requirement would be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5Those who live by the flesh focus on what the flesh wants; but those who live by the Spirit, on what the Spirit wants. 6For a mind fixed on the flesh is death; a mind fixed on the Spirit is life and peace. 7For the flesh-ruled mind is hostile to our Father; it doesn't submit to our Father's law—indeed it cannot. 8Those ruled by the sinful nature cannot please our Father.
9But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of our Father lives in you. Whoever lacks the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10But if Christ is in you, the body is dead from sin, but the Spirit is life from righteousness. 11So if the Spirit of our Father who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also make your mortal bodies alive through his Spirit living in you.
12So then, brothers and sisters, we are debtors—but not to the flesh, to live by it. 13For if you live by the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the body's deeds, you will live. 14For all who are led by the Spirit of our Father are children of our Father. 15You did not receive a spirit of slavery, to fall back into fear, but received the Spirit of sonship, by whom we cry, "Abba! Father!" a a v15 Abba — Jesus' own intimate cry to the Father in Gethsemane. By the Spirit of restoration, the same cry becomes ours: we call to our Father with the same closeness Jesus does. 16The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of our Father. 17If children, then heirs—heirs of our Father, co-heirs with Christ, if we suffer with him, so we may also be glorified with him.
Creation Waits for the Father's Children
18I count this era's suffering as nothing next to the glory to be revealed to us. 19For the creation waits with eager longing for the children of our Father to be revealed. 20For creation was subjected to frustration—not by choice, but by him who subjected it—in hope, 21that creation itself will be freed from its slavery to decay, into the freedom of the glory of our Father's children. 22For we know the whole creation has groaned together in labor pains until now. 23And not only the creation, but we too—who hold the Spirit's firstfruits—groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our full rights as sons to be restored, the redemption of our bodies. 24In this hope we were saved. Hope seen isn't hope—who hopes for what he already sees? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
26So too the Spirit helps our weakness: we don't know what to pray for as we should, but the Spirit himself pleads for us with wordless groans. 27He who searches hearts knows the Spirit's mind, since the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to our Father's will.
28We know all things work together for good for those who love our Father, who are called according to his purpose. 29Those he foreknew, he also predestined to be shaped to his Son's image, so he would be firstborn among many brothers and sisters. b b v29 Our Father's eternal purpose is a family — Jesus the firstborn Son, and many brothers and sisters conformed to his likeness. This restoration is not metaphor; it is the family our Father always meant to have. 30Those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.
31So what do we say to these things? If our Father is for us, who can be against us? 32He didn't spare his own Son but gave him up for us all—won't he also freely give us everything with him? 33Who should bring any charge against our Father's chosen ones? Our Father is the one who justifies. 34Who condemns? Christ Jesus—who died, more than that, was raised, who is at our Father's right hand, who indeed intercedes for us.
35Who can separate us from Christ's love? Suffering, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, sword? 36As it is written: "For your sake we are killed all day long; we are counted as sheep to be slaughtered."
37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am convinced neither death nor life, neither angels nor rulers, neither present nor future, nor powers, 39neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, can separate us from the love of our Father in Christ Jesus our Lord.
