Living in the Spirit
July 15, 2017
Scripture Reading: Romans 8:1-11
But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you. –Romans 8:9-11
Congressman John Lewis in his Note to Self* for CBS News, said to his younger self following a violent police response to a peaceful sit-in: “You got arrested the first time, and you felt so free. You felt liberated. You felt like you had crossed over,” he added. While he was still physically alive, he made the move from the flesh to the Spirit. Most of us dwell on the cusp of the Spirit, having never faced such a decisive threat to freedom, even life itself. Jesus Christ calls each of us to cross-over to the Spirit-driven life as we work for the actualization of the Kingdom of God.
While it may seem a paradox, it is harder at times for those of us who live in relative privilege and safety to answer Christ’s call to give up the flesh and become Spirit-led. What was it Jesus said in Matthew 19:24? Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.’ We are cutting ourselves short. We too can know the liberating facet of God’s love when we see past our privilege and open our hearts to love all our neighbors. When we have a world where everyone has enough and is enabled to become fully the persons God created them to be, the Kingdom of God is at hand.
Prayer:
Spirit of the living God,
Fall afresh on me.
Melt me, mold me, fill me, use me.
Spirit of the living God,
Fall afresh on me**. Amen.
*http://www.cbsnews.com/news/note-to-self-congressman-john-lewis-civil-rights-leader/
**Spirit of the Living God by Michael Hawn see at https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/resources/history-of-hymns-spirit-of-the-living-god