We now come to the last of our chapters, Romans 8. It is the last chapter of what is called the Gospel of God for believers, and it is one of the grandest chapters in the Bible…. As we compare it with the three chapters already considered, it gives us the positive side of experimental salvation. The preceding chapters speak of deliverance from; this one of deliverance by and unto.

An important distinction

The fully equipped believer will in no wise neglect Romans 8. Chapter 6 is most important, but we must not limit ourselves to it. Without chapter 8, chapter 6 is impossible. The positive must always he added to the negative. The potency of the indwelling of the Divine Spirit must be added to our dying with Christ, and our dying with Christ to our yielding to God. In chapter 5 we are delivered from death; in chapter 6 we are delivered from sin; in chapter 7 we are delivered from law; but in chapter 8 we have deliverance by the Spirit, and unto glory.

The Hope of Glory

Here we come into touch with the Divine dynamic of Christian life and experience, and this dynamic is in the Holy Spirit. The latter uses as His chief means “the hope of glory.” It is those who have that hope before them who are able to go right through all the dying with Christ, to sin, the law, and the flesh. Here we are brought to the thought with which the section begins — HOPE … The believer here forgets the things behind–sins, Sin, law, flesh, etc., and reaches forward to the things before. Chapter 8 represents a man free from hindering shackles, his face to the light of day. He is no longer a poor slave, a vicious enemy. He is a “child,” waiting for the day of adoption into full sonship [vv 19,23]. With the knowledge of his amazing destiny he thinks nothing of the straitness, the perils, the persecutions the way, but in spite of bleeding hands and feet, he pursues his way to the goal, sure of one thing–that love that “will not let him go.”…

The Indwelling Spirit

Look at verses 19-30 for the scope of the chapter–from past foreknowledge to future glory. There are two words around which the two main lines of the chapter gather, the word “Spirit,” and the word “sons.” Let us centre in the first one, by enquiring about the Holy Spirit’s work in our redemption. It is significant that, with the exception of Rom. 5:5, it is in this chapter that we first meet with the Holy Spirit in this Epistle. Rom. 5:5 anticipates the full teaching of chapter 8. It is also remarkable that never once in chapter 8 is He named as the “Holy Spirit”; His name here is five-fold, He is (1) The Spirit, (2) The Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, (3) the Spirit of God, (4) the Spirit of Christ, and (5) the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead. One or other of these names occur seventeen times in this chapter, and this number is a contrast to the silence of the previous chapters…

The full work of redemption must be accomplished from within, from the indwelling Spirit. He dwells in all believers, but alas! He is not effectual in all. Two conditions are necessary for His effectual working, (1) the recognition of His indwelling, and (2) a surrender of all into His hands and authority. In verse 2 He is the Spirit of life, Who takes of the things of Christ and imparts them to us. He ministers to us the life that is in Christ Jesus, He guards and nourishes it. He is also the Spirit of Liberty, Who hath “made me free from the law of sin and death.” In verse 4, He is the Spirit of Obedience, freeing us from the bondage of the flesh. We do not now walk after the flesh but after the Spirit. The freedom is on the ground of the Atonement–“God, sending His own Son … condemned sin in the flesh.”

For sin

In connection with sin, dealing with sin, and there was no way of dealing with sin but by Atonement and expiation. He made Himself an Offering for sin, and it is on the ground of our freedom from the flesh, that our walking in the Spirit is possible. In Him we make the choice of obedience unto righteousness. In spite of antagonisms, when the resistance of the flesh is faced and defied in the power of the Holy Spirit, that heroism for obedience is from Him, and so the righteousness which the law required is fulfilled in us…

Verse 6 speaks of the Spirit of Peace. “To be spiritually minded is peace,” that is, “the mind of the Spirit” (R.V.), is peace. Peace comes from fellowship with and dependence upon the Holy Spirit. Be concerned with what concerns Him, for the mind of the Spirit is Peace…

The Quickener of the mortal body

Verse 11 is the next mention of the Spirit, as the Quickener of the mortal body. It is called the “mortal” body — “If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead … shall quicken your mortal bodies.” Here again we have the duality we had in chapter 7. First of all there is a part of our being full of life [the new spirit], and another part which is full of death [the flesh]. “If Christ be in you, that body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life, because of righteousness.” The inner spirit full of life, the outer body full of death…

It is not physically dead, of course. The same body you notice in verse 11 is called the mortal body. Not dead, but mortal. Not dead physically, but it is on its way there, and in a sense it is dead now…

Our condition is this: We are living beings, living spirits in “dead” bodies. In other words, the life in the spirit is different from life in the body. The former is life indeed, but the life in the body is death. How can such a body respond to the movements and desires of the Spirit within? It does not, it cannot, it antagonizes, conflicts with the inner life. When the Spirit within does succeed in carrying the body with it, in its holy life, witness and service, how is it managed? Because of the quickening specially given by the Holy Spirit. It is He who enables us to yield the members of body as instruments of righteousness unto God. Apart from this our bodies would simply wear us down, and render spiritual movements impossible. Indeed, as it is, there are Christians who are absolutely imprisoned by their bodies. They are its slaves. They obey their bodies. They are such a burden to them, that spiritual life is almost impossible…

The quickening of the mortal body, naturally leads us to think of Him as the Spirit of resurrection; “the Spirit who raised up Jesus from the dead.” He is the Spirit of resurrection power, and He is well able to do that. This is the earnest [down payment] of the body’s full redemption. This quickening is the first fruits; the future full redemption of the body is the harvest.

The Spirit of Victory

In verse 13 we find Him as The Spirit of victory, and here is the other side. In verse 11 we see how the Spirit nullifies the deeds of the body by quickening it. Here it is seen how He counteracts the activities of sin–“Through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the body.”… He enables us to the mortifying of the deeds of the body. He puts an end to the evil habits of the body–He does it! Hallelujah!!…

In verse 14 He is the Spirit of Obedience. This life in, and victory through the Spirit, have a vital relation to our future. “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they (and they alone) are the sons of God.” They alone, and all of them, are sons of God. Here begins the passage of sonship. The word here is “sons,” not children. There is a distinction in the New Testament between sons and children, and the Holy Spirit is most careful in His use of the two words. Children suggest kinship in nature. We are children of God by nature, God is our Father, from Him we derive life and being. On the other hand, “sons” denotes rank, character, likeness, privilege… To be born of the Spirit makes us children, but to be led by the Spirit, makes us sons.[1]

In verse 15, He is the Spirit of Hope. “We have received the Spirit of Adoption,” that is the Spirit of hope, for we are waiting for the adoption, but the Holy Spirit has brought us a strong hope of it already. Terror has gone, and God’s Father-love floods our hearts and we cry “Abba, Father.” … The hearts of sons we have already, but the adoption of sons we wait for.

In the same verse we have Him as the Spirit of Assurance, for we cry “Abba Father”, because of the Spirit’s witnessing with our spirit that we are the children of God. There are two spirits–your own spirit and the Holy Spirit. He joins His witness with you, unites with your spirit in bearing witness and testifying. He adds His testimony to ours that we reign, we are no longer servants…

Then He is the Spirit of Sympathy, to help our infirmities. He bears His part in our helplessness. We are not alone in our feebleness, for He has taken up our cause, and joins Himself to our weakness. And He is the Spirit of Prayer, for He “maketh intercession for us according to the wiil of God.”

[“For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Rom. 8:38, 39, NKJV.]

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[1] “Son” in this context is rich in symbolism, but not gender specific. Sons and daughters have this privileged rank in God’s family.

An condensation of The Gospel for the Believer, CHAPTER 4: On ROMANS 8 – From Flesh to Spirit. The complete chapter is online at http://www.GraceNotebook.com / Classics. Bracketed content added by JBW. The Gospel for the Believer is an exposition of Romans 6-8 that has been out of print. These are transcripts from a conference. British spelling was retained.