It's Not About Belonging

Romans 8:6-11

I amaze myself again today with how different I think about my relationship with God through the bible than even as short as 10 years ago. I have always been taught that this passage talks about how we have to have Christ as our Lord and Savior or we are considered dead sinners. Yet, today as I read this passage I see it in a much different, and maybe clearer, way.

It's right there in the second sentence of the second paragraph. "Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him." And, if you will allow me to add a piece of Paul's theology as I understand it, that's okay. because it's not about who you belong to, it's who brings alive the Spirit of God within you.

Paul is called the first Christian by most. His messages about living as one people unified under the love of God as taught to him by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus are the first known writings of such beliefs that we have. Perhaps more importantly is that these are the first writings from a Christian which have a call to action that we have.

Paul isn't saying to everyone that they have to be Christians in order to have new life in righteousness, as he puts it. Rather, Paul is reminding people that they need to have the same Spirit which dwells in Christ, that of an all-loving God, in order to be resurrected in a life filled with peace and joy. Paul's example of a Christ who is resurrected because the Spirit of God, the Spirit of love, lived in him, is what Paul is saying will bring people together as one.

In Romans, Paul is writing to a people who have put material things and personal achievement before the betterment of community. In this passage Paul is trying to remind the churches in Rome that it's because of the binding love of God, as shown through the examples of Jesus, that the true intent of God's law will be achieved - the law of loving God with everything one has and loving each other just as we love ourselves.