What the Law Could Not Do

Chapter 7 ended with a question and a name. Who will rescue me? Jesus Christ our Lord. Chapter 8 explains how the rescue works, and the explanation has a shape. What the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did. He sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering, and so condemned sin in the flesh. The righteous requirement of the law is now fully met in us, not because we finally managed it, but because we live according to the Spirit.

The Spirit is the missing piece. In chapter 7 the Holy Spirit is barely mentioned. In chapter 8 he appears in nearly every verse of the first section. This is not accidental. The struggle of chapter 7 was a struggle of a person alone with the law. The freedom of chapter 8 is the life of a person indwelt by God. The law told you what to do. The Spirit is God himself living in you, making you want what the law wanted and able to do it.

The one idea to hold is Paul's contrast between two mindsets. The mind governed by the flesh is death; the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. He does not primarily describe two sets of behavior but two settings of the mind, two things it is set on. Where your mind goes when it is free is the truest indicator of which government you are living under. The behavior follows the setting.

The turn toward life comes in verses 14 to 17, and it is warmer than anything in chapter 7. Those led by the Spirit are children of God. They did not receive a spirit that makes them slaves again to fear, but the Spirit who brought about their adoption, and by that Spirit they cry Abba, Father. The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. And children are heirs. The person who was a prisoner of war in chapter 7 is a son or daughter at the family table in chapter 8. So today, when the old fear rises, the fear that you are on trial and losing, remember which chapter you live in. Set your mind on the Spirit, and say the word he teaches. Father.