Posts from 2025
More, Not Fewer
“My heart is filled with bitter sorrow and unending grief.” (Romans 9:2) How can such a gloomy statement so immediately follow the joyful outbursts of Romans 8? In short, the good news of Romans 5-8 has inadvertently created a problem for Paul. If God’s definitive act of rescue through the death and resurrection of Jesus is so completely true and sufficient and life-giving, then what is Paul to make of all his Jewish brothers and sisters who have not come…
It’s Going to Stay True
Romans 5-8 is a nonstop thrill ride, accelerating us from one piece of explosive good news to the next. “Hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” (5:5) “Just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all.” (5:18) “We were buried with him by baptism into death, so…
Becoming Jesus
“I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.” (Romans 8:18) Here is yet another piece of the astonishing gospel of Romans 8. Suffering is a given in the New Testament. Suffering is not a glitch; it’s the norm. Jesus suffered, so why wouldn’t we suffer along with him? But God is up to something, getting ready to take all our pain and tears and failures and…
Too Deep for Words
Romans 8 still haunts us the with question, what will it look like to walk in the Spirit (today, this week, this year)? But would we be surprised to discover that we are already doing just that, that the Spirit is already having its way with our hearts, and in ways we often don’t recognize? How many of us feel that we’re not praying enough, that our prayer life is not what it ought to be? Is there some spiritual…
Putting Eternity into Practice
What a happy and blessed life belongs to those who do not follow the paths of wickedness and cynicism, but their delight is in God’s law, and they meditate on it day and night. Here is how the book of Psalms begins. Beatitude, an excited pronouncement of blessing, happiness, and good fortune for those who allow themselves to be rooted in a daily diet of scripture, contrasted with the emptiness of being rooted in nothing. These blessed, happy, fortunate ones…
What God Is Actively Making Us
Romans 8 hits us with some astonishingly good news, but also continues to haunt us with the question – what will it look like to walk in the Spirit? Not for the sake of “getting” the Spirit (that already happened (8:9); the Spirit is in us just as we are in the Spirit!), but for the sake of awakening us to what the Spirit is doing in and around us. Fortunately, in Romans 12, we find a robust answer to…
The Spirit in You, You in the Spirit
In Romans 8, Paul has established that the death and resurrection of Christ has freed the baptized, Christ-centered community to “walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit (8:4).” What does this look like? When the Spirit is truly in the driver’s seat, what does daily life look like? First and foremost, Paul defines life in the Spirit by what it is not. It is not life lived in the way of “flesh.” Flesh is the New…
In the Same Current
Romans 8 begins with the mind-blowing good news that “there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” But Paul follows that up with one heavy dose of good news after another. The Spirit has set us free from sin and death (Romans 8:2), because God did what no one else ever figured out how to do – destroying sin on the cross (8:3). And now, living in tune with God’s will is truly possible because sin is…
Plainly True
“There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” -Romans 8:1 I find Jesus and the gospel to be good and true, but also exciting, interesting, captivating, haunting, life-giving, and endlessly enjoyable. That’s why we gather, why we open our Bibles and fold our hands in prayer – not because we’re obligated to do so, but because Jesus stirs up something in us, something powerful, beautiful, and eternal. The Gospel is not good advice, a good plan, a…
Who Will Rescue?
Halfway through Romans 7, Paul has been exploring the bizarre relationship between sin and religious law. As good as the law (Torah, as the Jewish Romans would have called it) is, pointing us toward patterns of living that are good, just, and holy, law is also a catalyst for sin. We can love law too much, making observable righteousness an ultimate good that it was never supposed to be. Plus, giving a prohibition can inflame the desire to violate that…
What We Really Want
We’re a peculiar bunch, church. We are the ones who strive to experience that which is eternal, infinite, that which lies beyond all human possibility. In one sense, it’s a fool’s errand. But we can’t imagine any other way to be human, can we? We read in 1 Timothy that Christ “dwells in unapproachable light.” Unapproachable, but we hunger and thirst to approach anyway. Yet, the means we have to do so are entirely finite. Meeting times. Paper hymnals and…
A Very Ancient Programming
We who are in a position of power are indebted to bear up the weakness of those in a position of powerlessness. Welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you. This is Paul’s relentless challenge to the Roman church (Romans 15:1-13). There’s an uneven power dynamic in the church and Paul just isn’t having it. This discrepancy is especially present in the difficult, fractured practice of table fellowship (explored throughout Romans 14). The Jewish Christians and gentile Christians of the…