Romans 8:10-18
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 because of his Spirit who lives in you.
12 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. 13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.
14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. 17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.
This Life Is Not Meaningless
A couple months ago I found an old, film camera tucked away in a box somewhere. I hadn’t seen it for ages. I looked at the back and found that it still had film in it; the pictures hadn’t been developed yet! I couldn’t imagine what gems I was going to find on a camera that came from the previous millennium.
So, I took it to the drugstore, dropped it off and came back the next day to find out what was on it. Among many other nostalgia-inducing photos was one that made me more than a little envious of the past. It was a picture of me from college.
That was the year that I worked on a dairy farm, also known as the fittest year of my life. I guess carrying around 10-gallon pails of milk all day all summer long will do that to a guy. There was muscle definition I haven’t seen in years. You could even see individual abs. I mean, I looked good!
I look in the mirror now, and… I’m twice the man I was, literally. It’s a sobering reality – a punch to my considerably larger gut. I’m not running triathlons or half marathons anymore. I’m not doing 20-30 pullups at a time. I have clothes in my closet that I can’t fit into and it’s kind of depressing. This body isn’t what I want it to be.
And then coronavirus comes around and all of a sudden, every time I cough or sneeze I stop and think, “Is this it? Did the sniffling guy standing too closely behind me at the grocery store give me a potentially deadly disease? How many times did I touch my face today? Did I wash my hands after I brought the mail in? Can I trust my own body anymore?” Even if I were as fit as I once was, who’s to say that I couldn’t get seriously sick? This body, on its best day, still has a shelf life, an expiration date.
There’s something about a global pandemic that makes you painfully aware of your mortality. And there’s something about an awareness of your own mortality that awakens you to the realization of your guilt. Paul says, “Your body is dead because of sin.”[1]
“Dust you are, and to dust you will return.”[2] Those are the words we heard to start this Lenten season because they’re the words God spoke to Adam after the first sin in the Garden of Eden. They’re the reality for every human being ever since. So that when I think about how long or how little I have left on this earth, it’s a crushing reminder of the sin that lives in this dying body. Every aching joint, sore muscle, cough, cold, fever or flu is a preview of the ultimate failure of our bodies and the end of our earthly existence.
Forgive me. It’s a bleak view of the future, but a true one, and one that makes us yearn for something more – one that rejoices when we hear Paul finish his sentence: If Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.[3]
When we look back on old photos of ourselves and long for the good old days when we were fit and healthy, when we think back to the days before coronavirus when we didn’t have a care in the world that could keep us from walking out our front doors, it can be really depressing to project into the future. What hope is left? What is life going to be like even after this is all said and done? Can we ever go back and enjoy life the way we used to?
But when we hear Paul contrast the death in our bodies to the life in our souls, there’s hope in those words! Not all is lost. We have a future beyond whatever happens to our bodies. Your spirit is alive.
Disease can ravage this body. Sickness can strip me down. A sedentary lifestyle can eat away all the muscles I used to have, but God promises “your spirit is alive because of righteousness.”
Even after my body goes to the grave, my spirit will live on, in Paul’s words, “because of righteousness.” Not a righteousness of my own; not because I have lived an earthly life that deserves to be rewarded with eternal life, but because Christ is in me.
The truth is, all this thought of mortality – all the daily death toll updates from the news – remind me how short life is and how much I’ve messed up the little time I’ve had. It makes me think about the opportunities I’ve missed to serve people as God calls me to. It makes me think about the times I’ve been short with the people I love. It makes me think about the untapped potential for my life that I’ve let slip by because of my laziness and the time I’ve wasted serving myself instead of my God. So that if, God forbid, I were diagnosed with COVID today and had to face my Maker tomorrow, I wouldn’t have a good answer for the all the decisions I’ve made. If my eternal life depended on my righteousness, there would be no hope.
But Paul is careful to preface all this with, “If Christ is in you.” It’s Jesus’ righteousness that gives life to your soul. It’s his perfection that the Judge will see when you meet him. You don’t need to stand on your righteousness or have a perfect record yourself, because Jesus stood in your place and was judged on your behalf. He had lived a perfect life and was the only person ever to deserve eternal life but he willingly went to the cross to die the death that you deserve. He suffered unspeakable pain and agony as his body failed. He was killed and laid in the grave to cover your guilt, but he was raised to new life to give you the hope of eternal life.
Your body may be dead because of sin – destined for the grave – but your spirit is alive because of Jesus’ righteousness. And because of Jesus, you have heaven to look forward to.
Paul says, “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.”[4] It may feel as if this world is going to hell in a handbasket, but heaven is so much better than the best things in this world, that the memory of the worst things we could experience here won’t even cause us a moment of discomfort there. Heaven is the promise God makes to you now to lift your eyes above the present suffering to see the glory that is to come. Heaven is the hope we have in Christ. No matter what happens in our bodies here on earth, our souls will live on with him in heaven.
So, there’s comfort in the dichotomy. My future is not tied to the fate of my body. My soul will live forever by God’s grace in Jesus. And yet, even though it’s comforting in time of suffering to separate our bodies and souls, God promises to reunite them in the resurrection from the dead.
Paul says, “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.”[5]
In other words, God doesn’t just promise eternal life for your souls; he also promises to raise your mortal body from the dead. Your own body. God won’t just transfer your consciousness into some heavenly body that’s been set aside for you.
No, God will raise the same body that your mother gave birth to. The same body that grew with your soul and experienced all those formative moments in your life. The same body that was washed with the waters of baptism and made a child of God. The same body that ate and drank Jesus’ body and blood in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. The same body that kissed your spouse and raised your children. That’s the body God will raise from the dead.
And he promises to do it in such a way that it will be better than what you have now. It’ll be the same but better. It won’t be able to die anymore – it won’t be vulnerable to viruses or deteriorate with age. It’ll be better than the best picture you can find in the oldest album on your shelf. It’ll be better than the greatest hope you have for your earthly future.
Now, I don’t know about you, but for me that’s a wonderful comfort, because it means that all of this matters. God is not blind to the suffering we experience here and now. This is not a meaningless existence or unnecessary suffering. Our bodily lives are damaged, corrupted by sin like everything else but redeemable. Our bodies will die but they will live again in a glory that is not worth comparing to our present suffering. God guarantees it.
Twice in one sentence he says, “the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead,” and then just four words later,[6] “he who raised Christ from the dead.” The resurrection of Jesus in the same body that bore the marks of his crucifixion for you is God’s guarantee to you that whatever sickness, pain, weakness or disability you have now will be removed in the resurrection of the dead, when your body and soul are reunited in the heaven that Jesus won for you.
So, forget the old photo you found on the bottom of a cardboard box in your basement; that body can’t compare to how God will remake it in heaven. Stop playing the game of reminiscing about life pre-COVID and don’t even start with what life will look like whenever this is all over. Instead, in these last two weeks leading up to Easter, as we dig into the details of Jesus’ suffering and death, remember Paul’s words here: I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.[7]
It may feel like we are living in a perpetual Good Friday now, but Easter is coming. The resurrection is God’s guarantee. Heaven is our hope. Paul promises that although we share in Jesus’ suffering now, we will share in his glory forever. God give you patience to endure this suffering and joy to rejoice in his salvation. Amen.
[1] Romans 8:10
[2] Genesis 3:19
[3] Romans 8:10
[4] Romans 8:18
[5] Romans 8:11
[6] Notice that I wrote more words between these two phrases than Paul did…
[7] Romans 8:18