The Scripture for today is Romans 8:5-9
Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. 7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.
9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.
God breathed the breath of life into Adam and the first human being lived. Ezekiel prophesied to the breath “Come, breath, from the four winds and breathe into those slain” and a vast army came to life. More than 367,000 human beings drew breath for the very first time today.
Breath….. Life….. Birth…..Death. Our bodies, fresh from our mother’s womb, are fragile and mortal. As we live upon this earth, we suffer illness, injury, aging, and ultimately, physical death. For some, our bodies are a place of torment as we struggle with pain and disability. We focus on achieving healing and relief from suffering, sometimes going to extraordinary lengths to achieve health at any cost. For others, maintaining our youth becomes an obsession. We focus on the latest workouts, eat the “perfect diet”, and frequent the best plastic surgeons to alter our aging appearance - an endless quest that inevitably ends with our physical death. Although we search frantically for the fountain of youth, none of us can stop the inevitable aging of our body. Our bodies, although fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God, are merely flesh – weak, mortal, fragile flesh. St. Paul exhorts us in Romans 8 to live as more than flesh – not focusing on our physical body with its needs, wants and desires. He warns us that if we are living in the flesh, we do not belong to Christ. We do not have the TRUE BREATH of life within us.
Breath….. Life….. Birth….. powerful miracles from our Creator and yet, they pale in comparison to the hope we have in Jesus. In this earthly life, although we inhabit a weak, mortal, fragile body, we can have life and peace. The breath of the Spirit living within us will sustain us. If the Spirit of God lives within us, even though we will experience physical death, we will have eternal life with our Father. We are assured by Christ that in our Father’s house there are many rooms and he has gone there to prepare a place of us. Our Father’s house will be a place where we will dwell with him FOREVER.
Life in the flesh = death. Life in the Spirit = eternal life. We thank and praise you, JESUS for saving us from death and breathing new life into us through your death on the cross for us! Thank you, JESUS for the new life and hope that we have in you! We love you, JESUS! We worship you, JESUS! Amen
Kelly