“New Life in a New Family”

Scripture: Romans 8:12-25

So what is Romans 8 really all about? It’s about the inadequacy of the law to bring life into our mortal existence. It’s about living life in the Spirit of God, and setting the worldly nature behind us. It’s about discovering the glory – the true and blessed gift of God – in all that we do and think and say. It’s about denying the ridicule and embarrassment and shame that the world would force upon us, and claiming the total joy and peace that the promise of Jesus Christ brings. It’s about being welcomed back into the family of God, and no longer being reconciled to the fact that the world is the best that we ever hope for. But is God’s family any better than the one we have in the world?

Picture this:
On an Iowa roadside, an old man chats with a pregnant runaway. For the girl, family is a prison, a place to be broken out of.
The old man tells her that he used to give each of his kids a stick and say, “You break that.” Of course they could. Then he'd tell them to tie some sticks in a bundle and try to break that. And they couldn't.
Then he said, “That bundle - that's family.”
The next morning, the old man wakes up to find the girl gone, with the hint that she'll be returning home. On the ground is a bundle of sticks with a bow tied around it.
-Scene from David Lynch's movie The Straight Story, cited by Richard Corliss in A Grand Quest, Time, October 25, 1999, 120.

The “bundle” of sticks - the family of God - is tied together by the power of the Holy Spirit, and it will never break. Today, we consider the power of this family.

Read Romans 8:12-17

“Heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ”. Here is one of the major differences in how the words “heir” and “inheritance” and understood. For the world, you become an “heir” to an estate through a legal process called probate. The court decision is based on the judge’s interpretation of the deceased person’s will, and may or may not be in line with the person’s actual intent. Inheritance occurs when the estate holder dies, with the estate then passing to the person’s designated and living survivors.
“Inheritance” for the family of God is a bit different, in that it is granted 1) when the heir “dies” to the world and is born again in Christ, 2) while the estate holder – God – is living in eternity, and 3) in a way that never detracts from nor diminishes the inheritance of any of the other heirs!

In the world, the basis for inheritance is a legal document called a will, but in the family of God, is a promise – a relationship - that we have come to know as a “covenant”. Wills can be changed, but covenants never change. Wills can have errors and omissions and loop-holes, but covenants say exactly what they mean, are never wrong, and leave no room for contesting the gift.

And this is what I believe Paul is trying to tell us in his discussion of “living in the sinful nature” versus “living in the Spirit”. When we live under the law, sin is free to find all kinds of loop holes and exceptions, but when we live in the Spirit, there are no loop holes, and even if there were, we would never have any desire to look for them! When we live in the sinful nature, the family may quibble over every little aspect of the inheritance, but when we truly live in the Spirit, the family must experience a sense of unity and harmony and common purpose.

And why the difference? Because the human family of God is called to live as the heavenly family lives. As we read through the gospels, Jesus’ teaching is consistent and constant – all teachings and all commandments are for all people, and the eternal reward will also be the same for all who are in Christ. Remember the parable of the Workers of the Harvest? Workers were called to work for the Master at various times during the day, but when the day ended, every worker received the same compensation, regardless of who they were or how long they had been working. (Matthew 20:1-16) The world constantly talks about equality – but maybe they should stop talking for a while and listen to Jesus for a change. His is true equality!

Paul’s point is that we have chosen the sinful nature, but our true obligation is to the way of God in Christ Jesus.

Read Romans 8:18-21

The trials of this life can’t even begin to compare to the glory that is awaiting us in the next. This is a similar thought to those in Romans 5:3-5, in which Paul says that we “rejoice in our sufferings”. And why should we rejoice? Because as Christians, we are in Christ, and in Christ, the new life is already in us and working through us. Unfortunately, as Paul says, this new life has yet to be revealed. But God’s glory is already ours in his promise, in his covenant, in his Spirit, and no matter what may come our way, we still have an overwhelming reason to rejoice.
And that reason is? It is the great expectation of the day when the family of God will be revealed for all of creation to see! That is ALL of creation, not just the human component. And why would the planets and the stars and the trees and the birds and the animals care? The truth is that they are buried in rot and decay, just as we are, and Paul says that even the non-human aspects of creation will be freed from its bondage to death, just as the family of God will be.
Oh, the rest of creation may not realize that it is decaying, and it may not understand what freedom from that sentence means for them, but one day it all will! Isaiah 65:17 tells us that the Lord will make both the heavens and the earth new, and Isaiah 66:22 tells us that this new creation will last as long as the Creator will (that’s eternally, you know!). But all of creation won’t understand God in the same way as those who are saved in Christ will – it will simply be “brought into the glorious freedom” that is ours. Because of the salvation that we have received, the new creation will also be blessed in the Lord’s sight.

Read Romans 8:22-25

Remember that Christmas so long ago, or maybe it was a special birthday, when you were eagerly expecting that new bicycle or some other gift that you “just had to have”! I mentioned a bicycle, only because that was the one great gift that I had waited for as a young boy. I can’t say that I was exactly “groaning” while I waited for Christmas day to arrive, but it was close. And the day came, adorned with that bike sitting next to the Christmas tree in our living room. As I remember, it was a fairly mild Christmas, and as soon as I was allowed to, I had that bike out on the driveway giving it a test ride. And the bike would serve me well, even after I got my drivers’ license.
And the anticipation in the waiting, and the joy I had in receiving of that bicycle, can’t even begin to compare to what that long awaited day of Christ’s return brings to us. The groaning is universal – Paul compares it to the anticipation of the birth of a child. While mothers can understand that feeling perfectly, it’s an analogy that men can’t fully grasp. But I remember the anticipation over Nathan’s birth. Those last couple of months were memorable, to say the least. We hadn’t experienced them with Chris, as he had arrived 8 weeks early, but Nathan was full term and full drama. Every trip to the Doctor brought new questions – how is the baby doing, how big is he going to be, when will he arrive – well, you know the thoughts. Then there was the evening when Diane decided to take a bath, and made the water a little too warm. When she stood up and exited the tube, she promptly fainted dead away on the bathroom floor! Scared me half to death! And then there was that morning at 3:30 AM when she decided that the time had come, and off we went to the hospital. The delivery went very smoothly, and a few hours later, I traveled to a different hospital to begin radiation treatments for cancer. It was a long couple of months.

And the coming day of Jesus will be far more wonderful and has a far greater anticipation associated with it than the birth of our children. And the reason is that it will be our welcome, our redemption, our salvation, our newness in Christ that will be realized, not just in the arrival of another human being, and certainly not as the gift of a new bike. We can wonder what our Christmas gift will be, we can imagine what our new son or daughter will be like, but we can never actually know the fullness of joy in Jesus until the “great” day arrives.
The day of Christ is nothing less. We can imagine what it will be like standing face to face with the Lord, and we can expect what it will be like to praise Almighty God with the heavenly chorus and the entire Church, but our thoughts still can’t even come close to the experience itself.
And Paul tells us that we must wait patiently until that day. And we say “Yeah – right!” But maybe his point is that there is still a lot to do right here – to bring praises to the Lord, to bring other people to the Lord, to continue to study his ways and his call - and he wants us to live in today, and not to get to focused on tomorrow. At least, not yet!

So put your hope and trust and tomorrow in the Lord, and may your new life in his new family be lived to the fullest. He has an incredible life for us right here.