Romans 8:5-11
I have a pocket watch that belonged to my grandfather. I never met him because he died when I was in my mother’s womb but I think I would have liked him. He was born in Switzerland, and he liked watches, which I guess makes sense since Switzerland is know for making fine watches. I was given two of his watches. One is a Patek Phillippe wristwatch that sits in a safe in the US. The other is a pocket watch made by the Elgin National Watch Company that I brought with me this morning. When I was in college, I bought a silver chain and wore it in the little coin pocket of my jeans.
It is a nice substantial watch with one hand that counts off the hours and a second that counts of the minutes. And then there is a small circle at the bottom of the watch with a little hand that counts off the seconds.
It is a nice watch but when you take off the back and look at the inner workings, you see that it is truly a work of art. The bulletin cover shows the inner workings of an Elgin National Watch Company pocket watch. My grandfather’s pocket watch was made in 1891 and is even more beautiful.
We take for granted that we have watches and clocks that keep accurate track of time, but lose the wonder for how clocks and watches are made. We look at the watch and see that it is 1:05 but don’t stop to consider the tiny, delicate gears and springs that make it work.
The reason I am starting the sermon talking about the inner workings of a watch, is that reading the beginning of Romans 8 is like taking off the back of a watch to see how it works.
Paul has been discussing in his letter to the church in Rome the two stages of salvation: justification and sanctification. Justification is the process by which we are accepted, unconditionally accepted, by God. The blood of Jesus covers over and pays the price for our sin and we are made acceptable in God’s sight. Sanctification is the process by which we are slowly transformed into being more holy and righteous.
Paul’s discussion of sanctification began in chapter 6 and he has talked about the struggle involved in becoming more holy, more righteous.
7:15
I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.
7:21-23
So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.
In his frustration at his inability to live purely for God he cries out
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?
And his glorious answer to who will rescue him – and us – is
Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
God, through Jesus Christ our Lord, will rescue us from this body of death. Now in chapter 8 he shows us how this will be done. He takes off the back of the watch and tells us how it works.
Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; 7 the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.
9 You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. 10 But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. 11 And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.
When you take off the back of a watch (Forgive me if I do not talk about modern digital watches. For the purpose of this sermon, the classical watch works best.) you find gears and springs and many other parts. When you take off the back of sanctification, you find the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is what makes the process by which we are transformed into more holy beings work. Without the Holy Spirit there is no sanctification.
If you have a watch that does not have the gears and springs inside, the watch will not work. It will tell you the correct time twice each day, but that does not really help, does it. A watch with no mechanical mechanism does nothing.
And if you do not have the Holy Spirit inside you, you will not grow in holiness or sanctification.
So the first question to ask yourself is this: Is the Holy Spirit in me?
Paul is very clear about this.
8:9
You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
If you are a Christian, the Spirit of God lives in you. If the Spirit of Christ does not live in you, you do not belong to Christ. You cannot be a Christian without having the Holy Spirit living in you.
Paul wrote in Ephesians 1:13b-14
Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.
When we believe in Christ, when we accept his gift of salvation, the Holy Spirit is given to us as a guarantee of our future salvation. All Christians have the Holy Spirit.
There is some confusion about this because of the Pentecostal doctrine of the second baptism of the Holy Spirit. It is painful to realize that the Holy Spirit who was given to unite us has become the cause of so much division in the church. It is not my intention to talk about this today but let me say this. Pentecostals and Evangelicals, all Christians, need to be filled and refilled with the Holy Spirit. We may have differences in how we view this process, but we all need this filling and refilling. As someone once said, the problem with Christians being vessels of the Holy Spirit is that we leak.
So put aside the confusion and settle on the clear teaching of Scripture that when we become Christians, in what Paul calls the first stage of salvation, our justification, we are given the Holy Spirit and that is what Paul is talking about here.
If you take off the back of your Christian watch, you will find the Holy Spirit.
My grandfather’s pocket watch has gears and a balance spring and lots of other beautiful, neat parts in it, but it is not ticking. The hands are not moving. Why not? It has all the parts it needs. Why will it not tick?
If I want the watch to work, I have to wind it up. Like this. And now the little second hand is moving and if I wait just a bit, I will see the minute hand move and then the hour hand as well.
In the same way, if I want the process of sanctification to work in my life, I have to do something. I can’t sit back and relax and wait to become more righteous. I have to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in this process of my being made holy.
If I am a Christian, I have the Holy Spirit in me, but that does not automatically mean I will begin to be made more holy. I have to do my part.
I have to make good choices when I face temptation. I need to confess sin when I fail to live as I ought to live. I need to exercise self-control when confronted with the desires of my flesh. There are a lot of things I need to do to work with the Holy Spirit.
Let me stick with a couple observations taken from this part of Paul’s letter.
8:5
Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.
This pocket watch tells me the time is 1:05 but it is actually 9:40. The watch is ticking but I have to set it to the right time. How do I know the correct time? I look to the clock on the wall here in the sanctuary or perhaps I can go online and look up the time or maybe I ask someone what time it is. In someway I do a bit of research and then I set the watch to the proper time.
In the same way, in my spiritual life, I have to set my mind. I go to the Scriptures and read about how it is God wants me to live. I read, reflect on what I read, perhaps I journal about what I read, maybe I read a book someone wrote about how to live a life pleasing to God. I go to a Bible Study and Sunday School and listen to the sermon on Sunday morning and then with the information I have gained, I set my mind on what the Spirit desires.
But we, like this watch, wind down over time. If I want to use this pocket watch, I have to wind it up each day. If I fail to wind it up, it can go for a second day, or at least part of a second day, but then it will stop. It will no longer keep the right time.
Spending time with God reading the Bible, journaling and praying needs to be a frequent, daily activity. We may miss a day and we will not fall apart by missing a day, but if we miss too many days, we will stop growing in our relationship with God. We will wake up one day and wonder why it is that God seems so distant and why our Christian life seems so lifeless.
We have to begin again to rewind our spiritual watch.
Modern watches are run by batteries that last five or more years and are very accurate. But watches like this pocket watch wind down and need to be rewound and they also lose time and have to be reset.
The world, our flesh and the devil attack us and because of this we get off track and need to reset our attention and focus on God.
The world sends a continual message about how to gain what the world has to offer and we are pulled by this message away from what it is God desires for us.
The temptations to satisfy our fleshly desires come to us and we lose control. It may be food or sex or power but in a variety of ways, we are tempted and get pushed away from living the life God wants us to live.
The devil whispers in our ear and encourages our discouragement and poor self-image and tries to convince us that God does not love us and is tired of dealing with us.
This is why it is so important to take time each morning to learn and be reminded about who God is, how God thinks and feels about us and what it is God wants for us. We are loved by God, loved without conditions and we need this reminder over and over again to counter the message we receive from the world, our flesh and the devil.
We are like this watch in that we tend to drift from the life God wants us to live. In John 10:10 when Jesus was teaching, using the analogy of his being the good shepherd and we being the sheep, he said,
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
We are meant to life a full life, an abundant life, full of peace and joy. So Paul tells us to set our mind on what the Spirit desires. This is where we find peace and life.
The reason we talk over and over again about taking time in the beginning of the day to read the Bible, journal and pray is that we need to prepare ourselves each day to live in a world that will attack us and attempt to lure us away from what God wants us to do, think and observe. Each morning we need to set our attention on what we know really matters.
We need to think through what we know about the day that lies ahead of us. Who will we meet? What challenges will we face? And we need to pray for the people we will meet and pray for wisdom to face the challenges that will come. We need to ask God to help us to remember throughout the day what it is that the Spirit desires for us.
I was talking with someone this week who is facing a crisis in her life. She is in a bit of a panic, is afraid of losing her job, doesn’t know what to do. I asked her if she was going to church and she told me she had not been going for the past few months. I asked her if she was taking time in the morning to read her Bible, journal and pray and she said no. So I asked her if facing life’s struggles on her own was working. It was a kindly, sarcastic question.
When we fail to wind and reset our Christian watch is it any surprise that we end up without the energy needed to face the crises that come to us in this life? I had my own experience with this a year and a half ago. I came to the point of emotional and spiritual exhaustion and it is only because I began taking the time to wind and reset my spiritual watch each morning that I have regained an emotional reservoir that keeps me going.
Paul points out to us the consequences of where we set our minds.
The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace
Do you want life and peace? Then set your mind each morning on what the Spirit desires. Are you experiencing death? Turn and set your mind on what the Spirit desires.
There are a lot of ways we restrict the working of the Holy Spirit in us and we talk about some of these quite often. But is has been on my heart as I prepared this message to talk about how our theology and church background can restrict the work of the Holy Spirit in us.
One of the books that has influenced me over the seven years I have been in Morocco is a book written by Paul Cain and R.T. Kendall titled, The Word and the Spirit. Paul Cain is a prophet and evangelist and was the mentor for John Wimber who started the Vineyard churches. R.T. Kendall is pastor of Westminster Chapel in London where Martin-Lloyd Jones once pastored.
This is a small book, just six lectures they presented at a conference in London in 1992. Their contention is that the Evangelical church has emphasized the Word of God and minimized the experience of the Holy Spirit and that Pentecostal churches have emphasized the experience of the Holy Spirit and neglected teaching the Word of God.
They created some controversy when they said they believe the modern Pentecostal movement is Ishmael, the first son of Abraham, and that Isaac, the promised son of Abraham, is yet to come. They believe that when the Word and the Spirit merge, a more powerful movement of God will come to us.
I have seen this beginning to happen. The Alpha Course, which we have gone through three times here at RIC, has gained wide acceptance in Evangelical churches and the emphasis on being open to the work of the Holy Spirit has transformed members and churches. New life has been breathed into churches with strong Biblical teaching.
I have seen friends in Evangelical churches experience new life and vitality in their Christian life as they opened themselves to the work of the Holy Spirit. I have grown in my own Christian life over the past seven years, in large part due to the influence of Pentecostals in our congregation who have encouraged me to expect the Holy Spirit to be active in my life.
And Pentecostal churches are beginning to preach from the breadth of Scripture and not just passages that relate to our experience of God. If you grew up in a Pentecostal church, you undoubtedly heard many sermons and series of sermons about how to experience the Holy Spirit, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, healing, prophecy, speaking in tongues. But I would bet that you heard few sermons about the theology of suffering, not many sermons about sharing in the sufferings of Christ. This too is changing.
You may come from a background that taught that certain spiritual gifts ceased with the early apostles. Parts of the church teach that the gifts of healing, prophecy and tongues are no longer valid gifts for today. This teaching is a relatively modern teaching, not the teaching of the church through the centuries of its existence. This theology was developed in reaction to the beginning of the modern Pentecostal movement in the early 1900s. It is not part of the church’s historical understanding of how God works in our lives. It is not part of Reformed theology that began with Martin Luther and the birth of the Protestant Church.
One of the reasons I view this theology as destructive is that it limits the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. It tells the Holy Spirit you cannot do this and you cannot do that. And when we restrict the Holy Spirit we limit our sanctification.
I do not come from a Pentecostal background and I do not speak in tongues and over the years I have had many, many people pray for me to receive the gift of tongues. So I have thought a lot about this. Am I willing to receive the gift of speaking in tongues?
Why is it that you would say to God, “I want to give you my life but I don’t want this gift or that gift?”
Is it a lack of trust? Jesus said in Matthew 7:7-11
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
9 “Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!
If you ask God to give you anything he wants to give you and you open yourself to receive whatever it is he wants to give, will you receive something that will be bad for you? God will give you bread and fish, not stones and snakes. God will give you what is good for you.
The goal is not to become a Pentecostal. The goal is not to speak in tongues or receive the gift of healing or begin standing up in church meetings and speak prophecies from God. The goal is to be open in every way you can to the work of the Holy Spirit in your life.
If we are to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in our sanctification, we have to trust him and open ourselves fully to his work in us. Put up a barrier, put on the brakes, lay down restrictions and you block your own sanctification. At any point that you block the work of God in your life, you are the big loser.
Here is where I want to end this morning. I printed a prayer in the bulletin in the section where you can take notes on the sermon. I would like you to pray this prayer with me.
All good things come from you, my father, and so I open myself to you. You sent the Holy Spirit to help me and I want and need his help. I know you love me and so I trust you, as much as I am able to trust. Help me to trust you more. I open myself as completely as I know how to a full experience with you and for the parts of me that block my openness to you, I ask that you tear those down so I can be more open to you. I ask for every gift that you know I need. I ask for greater intimacy. I ask for everything you want me to have and experience. Come Holy Spirit, save me, do your work in me.
This is a prayer for those from Assembly of God churches, for those from Presbyterian churches, for those from Anglican, Lutheran, Methodist, Baptist, Brethren churches. I am told that on an average Sunday there are about 40 denominations represented in our congregation. Every Christian needs to pray this prayer. We trust God to protect us, to give us what we need. Pray with me this prayer, trusting in God who gives his children bread and fish, not stones and snakes.
Let us pray.
