- Overcomer Literature Trust
- Swindon
- Wiltshire
“THE SPIRIT OF HIM WHO RAISED JESUS”
By Mrs Jessie Penn-Lewis.
Romans 8 v11 reads, “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”. Note that the Lord Jesus did not raise Himself, He was raised from the dead by the Father (Rom. 6 v 4, Acts.2 v 24).
If the Spirit of the Father lives in you, then “He who raised Christ from the dead, WILL ALSO GIVE LIFE TO YOUR MORTAL BODIES THROUGH HIS SPIRIT, who lives in you”. That giving of life to the mortal body is the practical effect of verse 2 of the same chapter, “Through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me FREE FROM THE LAW OF SIN AND DEATH”. One law is therefore set against another - the law of sin and death, versus the law of life in Christ Jesus. Suppose we make the truth more personal and simple by reading verses 2 and 11 this way, ‘Through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit makes me free (v2), and if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in me (v11), He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to my mortal body through His Spirit, who lives in me’.
The basis for all this life in Christ is made clear in the eighth chapter of Romans, and follows the FACT OF THE CROSS FOR THE OLD CREATION explained in Romans 6. To know the life described in Romans 8, we must stand on the foundation of Romans 6 v6, “for we KNOW that our old self was crucified with Him”, then, and only then, can we know the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus making us free from the law of sin and death.
Following the marvellous first eleven verses of Romans 8, the Apostle then points out the obligation lying upon those who know all this. “Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation - but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according to it. For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live."
The life after the Spirit is spontaneous and simple as the life of a child. It may be described as a Divine-natural life. The Spirit of adoption is the spirit of a child, the spirit of a son and daughter. The believer then knows God as Father, and who is afraid of a God-Father? One evidence that you are walking in the Spirit is that you have liberty in your spirit towards God and you know Him as your Father.
But you say, how am I to know this child-attitude to God? This is the work of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is a Person. “The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children”. Notice here the distinction between the Holy Spirit and our spirit. We are given the witness of the Holy Spirit to our spirit that we are God’s own children, and if we are children, then “we are heirs - heirs of God”. ALL THAT GOD HAS BELONGS TO US. We become joint-heirs with Christ, “if indeed we share in His sufferings in order that we may be also share in His glory”.
When we are brought into this life of the Spirit, the more we live and walk in it, the more we will have the marks of the life as described by Paul, the quickening, the emancipating, the adopting, the leading, the witnessing and the interceding of the Holy Spirit. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus runs along these pathways in the spirit-life of the believer, and the marks of that law of the Spirit of life will be seen in us.
God is working with every member of the Body of Christ in all things for good.
“For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers” (v29). “What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?” Nothing can injure us if God is for us. “He who did not spare His own Son, but gave him up for us all - how will he not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died - more than that, who was raised to life - is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us” (v32-34).
Who will bring any charge against us? Will the Christ who died? Will He who died to redeem, condemn? He who died is the One who lives, will He condemn the child he prays for? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us” (v37).
From ‘The Work of the Holy Spirit’.