A Very Short Introduction

This is the introduction to The Law of the Spirit of Life: A Concise, Practical Commentary on Romans 5-8. I am writing the book here on the blog. If you use the link in the header "Law of the Spirit of Life," you can see just the blog posts that are part of the book-in-process. It will be available in the future as a paperback or eBook. It will be free here on the Reimagining Paul blog.

In the person of Jesus, God comes to humanity, coming still further through the Holy Spirit, gathering people into his family.

—Douglas Campbell and Jon DePue, Beyond Justification: Liberating Paul's Gospel.

The Gospel is God's truth, a mystery, a secret hidden for ages until that mystery came to us in person: Jesus Christ. It is the message of hope from God to us. There are many mistaken ideas floating around about the Gospel. In this little volume, I will be presenting the Gospel as Paul develops it in Romans 5-8. I will suggest here and throughout this commentary that these biblical chapters are a powerful statement of God's mystery.

Because of the mistaken ideas out there—promulgated in churches everywhere—I will begin by saying a few things the Gospel is not. It is not a contract. It is not a religious truth that you must discover with your reason or your faith. It is not based on fear of punishment. It is not simply a pardon for sins.

The sentence above by Douglas Campbell and Jon DePue is a wonderful statement of the Gospel, a short message with profound implications:

"The person of Jesus." The Gospel is personal for God. He came here, in person. And Jesus himself is the message.

"God comes to humanity." God reveals who he is and only God can reveal who he is. Finite beings (us) cannot comprehend the Infinite (God) except according to what he makes known. God is free and in his freedom God chose to become weak to save the weak. Jesus is God's strength shown in weakness.

"Coming still further." Not only did God come to us in the person of Jesus, but also in the hidden presence of the Holy Spirit. God is a differentiated being and we know of three persons who share the identity of God: Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit.

"Through the Holy Spirit." Though hidden and mysterious, anyone who follows Jesus does so only because the Holy Spirit revealed the Gospel to them and gave them the faith to put it into practice. Faith is not a condition we must achieve to fulfill a contract with God. There is no contract. When God is ready, he will grant you faith through the Spirit.

"Gathering people." God is three in one. People are communal beings also. Our identity is not separate from the other people in our lives. Our identity overlaps with God and other people, especially parents, children, family, friends. We may think of ourselves as separate individuals, but this is blindness to the reality of our social nature. God is already a communion and he gathers more people to join his communion. Our common life is with the Father, with Jesus, and with the Spirit.

"Into his family." He calls us sons and daughters. He adopts us after removing the barriers that kept us from a close relationship: sin and death.

The Gospel is the "power of God for salvation." Salvation means healing in the ultimate sense: not treatment of the minor symptoms, but entire rectification of the underlying problems that ail us. Human beings are not as self-reliant as we think. We are not strictly rational. We're pretty irrational, in fact. We are our own enemy.

God has done something about this. He became what we are. He did so to bring us up to where and what he is. If you see Jesus, you see God. If you wish to know what God is like, look at Jesus. Ignore the thousands of false depictions of God as a retributive judge, a harsh executioner and torturer. Look instead to Jesus who prayed for the people torturing him to death, "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing" (Luke 23:34 NASB).

Do you want to know the Gospel? This book, strictly speaking, cannot teach it to you. Only God's Spirit can. But God uses human words to cause divine effects. There is no need for anxiety. God has you. God has reached down with his mighty arm and grasped your wrist. When you grab his wrist back, he already has you but you at last also have him.

In the very chapters this commentary covers, Paul explains the Gospel this way: "God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8 NASB). In another place, Paul states it at greater length:

For I handed down to you

as of first importance

what I also received,

that Christ died for our sins

according to the Scriptures,

and that He was buried,

and that He was raised on the third day

according to the Scriptures.

—1 Corinthians 15:3-4 NASB

What do you or I need to do?

Nothing. God will do it. If he hasn't done it yet in your heart, he will. If he has made himself known to you, then my hope is this commentary will make the message so much more accessible by eliminating false depictions of God. If you are still a skeptic or agnostic, God has you and someday you will have him.

"The gift of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the partnership of the Holy Spirit be with you all" (2 Corinthians 13:13 NASB).