26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
28 We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.
31 What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? 32 He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else? 33 Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. 35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written,
“For your sake we are being killed all day long;
we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.” [Psalm 44:22]
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:26-39 goes on to offer reassurance that in addition to entitling the believer to a new life in Christ, the Spirit will also make the pain of this life easier to bear by bringing comfort and support to those experiencing tribulation. It is difficult to endure suffering, even if one truly believes it is only a passing phase prior to the coming of better times. Knowing this, Paul assures his readers that God is also aware of how difficult earthly suffering is. God is not distant from us. God is not separated from us.
One needs to read Romans 8:26-28 in a way that closely identifies it with what Paul has just said in the first part of this chapter. Paul has focused upon the presence of the Spirit through human weakness as well as the groaning and suffering of creation. He ended by stressing the hope the Spirit gives us. 26 Likewise, indicating the close connection of these verses with what Paul says in the first part of the chapter, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, Paul once again reminding us of the congenital weakness of humanity, for, presenting the evidence that the Spirit helps us, we do not know how to pray (προσευξώμεθα) as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes (ὑπερεντυγχάνει) with sighs too deep for words. Even if we have become completely inarticulate, God is immediately aware of our needs through that spiritual connection with us. We can read this as the groaning of the Spirit itself on our behalf. The Spirit is emotionally involved and eternally invested in our yearnings toward the Divine. The Spirit groans for us, yes, and the Spirit gives us hope by helping us in our weakness. Thus, as he continues that theme, Paul expresses a profound “religious” or “spiritual” experience. He stresses that although we experience all the weakness of the flesh, the Spirit helps us. Even in our weakness, we pray. Regardless of the difficulty in which we find ourselves as human beings and as followers of Jesus, prayer remains a possibility and reality.
27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit. God understands this speech because he searches the heart and he thus knows what the Spirit saying. After all, this is God’s Spirit. This comes out of an account of religious experience. The Spirit works in accordance with the divine will to help translate the stutterings and stammerings of our souls into a vocabulary of praise and love. Since the Spirit is the Spirit of God, the Father knows what the Spirit is saying on our behalf. The Spirit interprets our stuttering, stammering, groaning, and yearning in a way that becomes praise and love. The Spirit makes the pain of this life easier to bear by placing it in the context of hope. God is not distant from us. God is immanent, with us, and for us, through the Spirit. Even if we are inarticulate, the Father is aware of our needs through the immanent experience we have of the power of the Spirit. Because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. When our words are incapable of articulating our greatest needs to God in prayer, the Spirit calls out to God for us.[1] Paul will write like this in other places. In I Corinthians 2:6-16, God has revealed to “us” through the Spirit, for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. Only the Spirit of God can comprehend the thoughts of God. Paul contrasts the spirit of the world and the spirit from God. The Spirit from God helps us understand the gifts God bestows on us. “We” impart this wisdom in words taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who possess the Spirit. The unspiritual person does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, for such a person would them as folly. The gifts of a God require spiritual discernment. I Corinthians 4:1-5 refers to receiving judgment from others, and even from himself, but such judgment does not matter, for the Lord judges. II Corinthians 3:4-6 discusses confidence that “we” have through Christ toward God. Competence is not from self but from God, who gives competence in the ministers of a new covenant written in the Spirit that gives life. Throughout, Paul distinguishes between the wisdom of this age and wisdom from God. The connection with what preceded could go two direction. First, just as creation and us ourselves groan, so the Spirit also groans for us. Second, just as the Spirit gives us hope, the Spirit also gives us help in our weakness. Paul tells us that the fact Christians live in and with the groaning of the spirit is proved by the fact that they are able to hope without wavering, even though they do not see. They can wait with patience. They can do this because the Spirit helps them and strengthens them. The Spirit does this by making prayer a possibility and reality, even when prayer is difficult. As God hears them and understands them, they endure the long night, looking for morning. All this, as the Spirit is the power in which the love of God is shed abroad in their hearts. The Spirit makes them Christians. It is perfectly acceptable to read Paul's declaration as the groaning of the Spirit itself on our behalf. The Spirit is emotionally involved and eternally invested in our yearnings toward the Divine.[2] The Spirit helps us in our prayers even when we are so weak, we do not know what to say. We can be grateful for this, for in our weakness who knows the twisted nature of our pray3ers. Our requests in prayer stand in need of repentance and forgiveness. If we do not know what we ought to pray, we might ask God for anything. Human egoism, human anxiety, cupidity, desire and passion, human short-sightedness, unreasonableness, and stupidity, might flow into prayer.[3] The Spirit coming to the aid of Christians does not involve only a new ethical standard to which the individual would have to adjust behavior. The Spirit has transplanted the Christian into a sphere of power in which behavior is no longer subject to one’s own decision, but which one experiences as freedom rather than compulsion. The Spirit has transplanted the Christian into the freedom of being a child of God. That the Spirit is the personal center of Christian action residing outside the individual makes it understandable that in Paul, the Spirit is both a person distinguished from the Christian and as a power that they possess internally. Thus, the Spirit claims our service. The Christian exists outside the self to the extent that the Christian lives in faith in the resurrected Jesus and thus “in the Spirit.” The immanence of the Spirit in believers exists through the fact that as believers they have found the ground of their life beyond themselves.[4] The leadership of Spirit is not a blind force of nature but is of a personal sort. After all, this is God’s Spirit. This comes out of an account of religious experience. This verse reveals that God hears and understands the Spirit even when words or utterances of any kind fail the human praying. God goes directly to the heart, which is one with the mind of the Spirit. When our own words are incapable of articulating our greatest needs to God in prayer, then the Spirit calls out to God for us.[5]
Paul becomes a theologian of the Spirit. His Christology and eschatology depend on his doctrine of the Spirit. Paul strongly emphasizes the ecstatic element in the experience of the Spiritual Presence. These experiences he claims for himself. He knows that every successful prayer has an ecstatic character. As he will say here, the divine Spirit prays through the person, even should it be “unspeakable sighs.” The formula, being in Christ, which Paul often uses, involves an ecstatic participation in the Christ who is the Spirit, whereby one lives in the sphere of this Spiritual power. Yet, Paul resists any tendency that would permit ecstasy to disrupt structure. To refer to Romans 12-15 at this point, note that Paul can write of the gifts of the Spirit, which is does extensively in I Corinthians 12-14 in dealing with ecstatic experiences. Yet, in both places, he writes of the structure of the moral imperative of love. His focus on love or morality and knowledge are the forms in which ecstasy and structure unite. The church has a problem in actualizing the ideas of Paul because of specific ecstatic movements. The church must prevent the confusion of ecstasy with chaos, and it must fight for structure. On the other hand, it must avoid the institutional profanation of the Spirit. It must avoid the secular profanation of the mainline Protestant church that occurs when it replaces ecstasy with doctrinal or moral structure. Paul would move against both forms of profaning the Spirit. He thinks of this as criterion as duty and risk for the churches.[6]
The closeness of the Spirit to our weakness puts us in the position of those who hope when we do not see. We can wait patiently during the night longing for morning to come. The Spirit who helps us is the Spirit by whom God has poured into us the love of God in Chapter 5.[7] The Spirit is the personal center of Christian action. As such, those in Christ re-center their lives away from self outside themselves to the power the Spirit gives them. The Spirit becomes a personal center of power as those in Christ walk in and live by the Spirit. Those in Christ have found the ground of their lives beyond themselves.[8] This leadership of the Spirit is of a personal sort. Those in Christ, those who participate in Christ and are in union with Christ, live in the sphere of this spiritual power. Paul is careful to provide moral and institutional guidance in a way that provides some structure, but we must always be aware that he also expected the power of the Spirit to provide leadership in new ways.[9]
As we continue to verse 28, God sees to it that the aspirations and sufferings of those in Christ contribute to their good. How can this happen? Suffering produces endurance, which produces character, which produces hope, all of which finds confirmation in the love of God shown us in the personal presence and power of the Spirit (Romans 5:1-5). Those who love God are also those whom God has called to live in accord with the purpose of God. 28 We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called (κλητοῖς) according to his purpose (πρόθεσιν, “that which is planned in advance, plan, purpose, resolve, will”). God is the supreme good for those who love God. God is a helper for good in all things. God turns all things for the good of those who love God. Paul equated those who love God with those called according to God’s purpose.[10] We must not read this phrase as a lame appendix. Rather, Paul us to the sustaining ground of the hope of the community. The existence of the community rests on the primal decision of God in which the will of God will bring to eschatological glory coincides with the will of God to affirm that the community in love. The purpose of God is not formal or abstract. The purpose of God finds its content in the faithfulness of God shown in Christ. Thus, Paul directs us to the basis of the event that discloses the purpose of God, that is, Christ, rather than the contingent quality of an historical community of the people of God.[11]Paul expresses how this can happen in Romans 5:1-5, in which “we” rejoice in “our” sufferings, as suffering produces endurance, which produces character, which produces hope, which has confirmation in the love of God poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. This notion of the purpose of God fits in well with the other “pro-” words, which Paul lists immediately afterward. The providence of God governs everything that happens to Christians in earthly life. Nothing in this life can harm Christians, whether it is suffering or the attack of hostile evil powers, for all these things can contribute to the destiny to which God has called Christians, whom Paul now refers to as “those who love God.”
Some people will use the phrase, “Everything happens for a reason,” based on this verse. I imagine people who do so find comfort in the idea that there is a grand plan, that some tragedy is a part of that plan, and that with time we will see and understand the good that was the result of this horrible evil. However, reflect upon any of the horrors human beings have done to themselves. Are they part of a larger plan, essential to a greater end? This implies that there is a script that has already been written by which the events of our world unfold, one leading to another, until the happy conclusion is finally reached. In this picture of reality, we are all characters in the novel that God is writing. We merely do or experience what the Author intends. Personally, I find this disturbing. If everything happens for a reason, according to the plan of God, then the horrors committed by humanity did not originate in the mind of the people who committed them, but in the mind of God. God intended this and put such horrors into the minds of the individual who did them, because it was a part of God’s plan. Think of it this way. What kind of “god” intends children to be killed? What greater good could justify the horrible pain their parents must endure? If “everything happens for a reason,” then every act of evil is God’s doing. Rape, abuse of children, terrorism, the cruelty human beings perpetrate on one another – are all these really the will of God? This line of reasoning does two things: It removes human responsibility for evil acts, and it makes God culpable for all evil, having intended it to happen. What kind of monster wills all the horrible events in this world, even if for some greater good? Can the ends really justify the means when the means are the murder of a child or the many other forms evil takes in our world? We are on far more secure ground if we think of evil as that which is in the world to thwart the plan of God. The evil that happens in this world is not God’s will and is, in fact, a thwarting of his plan. So how do we explain the evil that human beings inflict upon each other? The freedom to make choices is an essential part of what it means to be human. Yet God has not left us entirely to our own devices. God seeks to influence humanity. Our struggle with good and evil is manifest in a hundred small decisions each day. Every act of evil produces a thousand acts of goodness. While some misuse their freedom to perpetrate evil, millions respond by feeling compelled to use their freedom to do good.
One of the ways the providence and sovereignty of God works itself in our lives is that God takes the suffering and weakness of our lives and brings good out of it. In this sense, nothing can harm those who love God in an ultimate way. The sovereignty of God over our lives means that everything will contribute to our destiny as determined by Christ. Evil is that which attempts to thwart the plan or purpose of God. Our weakness, combined with our propensity toward serving self, is a large part of the harm we inflict upon self, others, and creation. Of course, even if human beings did not exist, plenty of suffering and pain would exist in creation. Yet, God has not left creation without assistance. The Spirit is with creation and with human beings in their suffering and weakness. Human beings make a hundred small decisions every day that contributes to the evil and suffering in the world. Yet, in response, we have seen human beings offer acts of kindness and goodness. Some will misuse their freedom to perpetrate evil. Millions will respond with using their freedom to re-dress wrong and contribute to what is good in this world.
One way to view the biblical notion of the Spirit (Holy Spirit, Spirit of God) is that God is the source of life-giving energy we need. Life has its ups and downs, twists and turns, that can leave us weary. That means, of course, that we need to develop our time with God. As individuals, we need energy as well to live our lives. Most of us do not miss the time for physical nourishment. As the saying goes, call me anything, but do not call me late for supper. Most of us make sure we have made time for friends and family. We are social creatures, after all. However, when it comes to seeing the feeding of mind and soul as important, we tend to be less diligent. We need to remember that when we are weak, “the Spirit helps us in our weakness.” (Romans 8:26). The Holy Spirit strengthens and improves our prayer lives, creating a direct channel between ourselves and God. Such intercession makes it possible for us to pray as we ought, for the Spirit gives us both the words we need and the assurance that God hears them. God is already penetrating our hearts, filling us with divine power. The Spirit is at work within us, to do God's will and bring about God's new creation. Paul assures us that we are not powerless victims, vulnerable to all the struggles and heartaches of life. No, our powerful and creative God is at work inside us.
Thus, the theme of Romans 8:29-39 is salvation and the love of God. Paul has taken the path of the Spirit as the immanence of God amid our weakness and suffering. He now returns to the destiny of those in Christ. To put in terms of later theology, he will move in Chapter 8 from his emphasis on pneumatology as life in and walking with the power of the Spirit to Christology as defining the destiny of humanity. The following verses will make more sense if we view them in the context of the light of the promised full deliverance of creation by God.
Romans 8:29-30 have the theme of the Christian called and destined for glory. Properly read, Paul characterizes the plan of God for history in one sentence. Paul is stretching human language here in order to express the providential care of God for us. Thus, the Father knows beforehand (see 11:2) and decides beforehand (I Corinthians 2:7, Ephesians 1:5, 11) those whom the Father will conform to the image of the Son. Thus, Paul gives further definition of what it means for God to work everything for the good of those in Christ. Everything that happens has the possibility of conforming us to the image of the Son. The movement toward “good” is a process of forming Christlikeness in the lives of those who love God. The risen Christ is the beginning of a large family of people who will be with God in eternity. Paul refers to those whom God decided beforehand. Such a decision occurs within the context of the ongoing work of God since the beginning of creation and ends in the redemption of creation. In that sense, this decision beforehand we understand best in the context of Romans 8 and the thought of 9-11. Thus, we can also understand this decision beforehand as having a close connection to the formation of those who love God into the image of the Son. Amid human suffering and weakness, God has decided beforehand what the outcome will be. Those who love God will gradually conform to the image of the Son. In II Thessalonians 2:13-15, God chose them from the beginning for sanctification through the Spirit. For these reasons, I must disagree with John Calvin, who thought of this decision beforehand to relate to individuals who would experience eternal life or eternal judgment.[12] Such a view, rooted in Augustine, is an abstract view of election because it separates the electing activity of God from the historicity of the divine acts of election to which the Bible gives witness. We can see the abstraction of this view as it focuses on individuals and separates them from the corporate nature of the people of God. Christ is the first among many whom the Father will bring into filial relationship with the Father through the Son.[13] God decided beforehand a plan that those who love God have the destiny, through their weakness and suffering, to reproduce themselves in the image of Christ by a progressive share in the risen life of Christ. Paul is bringing the resurrection of Jesus and the resurrection of believers into close parallel.[14] Therefore, God also called them. If God calls them, God also pardons them their offences. God will also glorify such persons in the fashion of the risen Lord. Those who love God and those whom God has called bear the form of the Son. God incorporates people in the rule of the Son by binding people to Jesus through the proclamation that awakens faith and sets them on the course of formation into the image of the Son. Although Paul will not directly connect this idea to the mission of the church, the responsibility of the church is to develop this likeness in its fellowship and teaching.[15] Paul has just said that creation awaits the revelation of the children of God. Yet, that revelation has already appeared in the Son.[16] The goal of election and the government of the world by God is that the elect should find themselves formed into the image of the Son. This decision beforehand by God has the design of offering assurance to those who love God that through the weakness and suffering of human life and creation the purpose of God will reach its desired end. The mission of the people of God is to include all humanity in this relation of the risen Christ to the Father. The aim of election is the fellowship of a renewed humanity in the rule of God.[17]
29For those whom he foreknew (προέγνω, “to know something beforehand” or even ”to choose someone beforehand.” The word appears elsewhere in Pauline literature only in Romans 11:2.) He also predestined (προώρισεν, “to foreordain,” “to decide upon beforehand” or “to predetermine.” It appears elsewhere in Pauline literature only in I Corinthians 2:7 and Ephesians 1:5, 11 (within a passage that has several resonances with Romans 8). The omniscient God has determined everything in advance. We find a similar thought in the prophets. Isaiah could say that God planned and designed what the people are now seeing long ago (II Kings 19:25). The people give no thought to the Lord who0 planned and designed long before what they are now seeing in their history (Isaiah 22:11). God is eternal and has ordained everything before time. For Paul, it is no surprise that Jesus Christ is the goal of that which God has planned in salvation history.[18] God predestined these people to be conformed (συμμόρφους, fashioning in accord with the Christ event, one of several morj/ morph” words Paul uses. They are often translated with the suffix “form,” as in “conform” and “transform.” See Romans 12:1-2; II Corinthians 3:18; and Philippians 3:10 [KJV], 21. The words all have a similar meaning in the context of Paul’s writings.) Paul has said that if we have died with Christ, we shall also live with him (Romans 6:8). He now states clearly what this means in the lives of believers. God foresees, predestines, and calls, and therefore God conforms them to the image (εἰκόνος) of his Son. "Good" declared in verse 28 is defined in verse 29 as being a transformation into "the image of his Son” a continuing process toward Christlikeness in the lives of all believers. The “image” refers to Genesis 1:26-7, as God created humanity in the image of God. We must also understand it considering his affirmation that believers have the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, and that they have the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (II Corinthians 4:4, 6). Christ is the image of God. Believers are caught up in the Christ event and become “copies” of the Son.[19] The point of conforming a people into the image of the Son is in order that he might be the firstborn (ensuring his uniqueness and superiority) within a large family. 30 And those whom he predestined (προώρισεν) he also called (ἐκάλεσεν, the aorist tense emphasizing anticipation the eschatological glorification which is not yet obvious to all but has at least begun in Christ). As Christians who have been "called" into participation with the divine purpose for all creation, we may trust that God has a plan for our lives. And those whom he called he also justified (ἐδικαίωσεν); and those whom he justified he also glorified (ἐδόξασεν). The glorification refers to the image of his Son. The progression of God’s work within the life of God’s people is to pre-plan, to pre-know, to predetermine, to call, to justify, and to glorify. God remains the subject of the calling and justification enacted in time.[20]
We cannot resolve the centuries-old theological debates about the nature of God’s predestining and calling, but whatever Paul means is within two contexts. First, God’s predetermination is within the wider context of God’s ongoing work since the beginning of creation, leading to God’s delivering and glorifying all creation. (See Romans 8 as a whole and as a prelude to chapters 9-11; also see the biblical “bookends” of the early chapters of Genesis vis-à-vis the last chapters of Revelation.) Second, God’s predetermination of those “in Christ” is within the narrower context of the last part of verse 29; namely, God predestines them in order that they will be “conformed to the image of his Son.” Thus, the kind of "predestination" Paul is discussing here in verse 29 is not concerned with salvation. Rather, it is God's foreordaining of believers to be gradually conformed to the image of the Son. The unqualified nature of this good news offers Paul and all Christians a foundation of unshakable faith and hope no matter what challenges or hardships must be faced. Just as the Spirit's presence opens a continuing line of true communication between God and humans, so the "workings" of God are an ongoing process of growth and development in our relationship. As the divine dynamic of communion continues, so does this Divine/human relationship evolving, changing and adapting throughout our lives. The goal of this relationship is also part of God's plan a plan that is foreknown and predestined from the beginning of creation. Paul expresses this thought in II Thessalonians 2:13-15, in which he stresses that God chose them from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit, for God called them through the gospel.
John Calvin famously wrote extensively on predestination, including this passage.
5. The predestination by which God adopts some to the hope of life, and adjudges others to eternal death, no man who would be thought pious ventures simply to deny; but it is greatly caviled at, especially by those who make prescience its cause. We, indeed, ascribe both prescience and predestination to God; but we say, that it is absurd to make the latter subordinate to the former (see chap. 22 sec. 1). When we attribute prescience to God, we mean that all things always were, and ever continue, under his eye; that to his knowledge there is no past or future, but all things are present, and indeed so present, that it is not merely the idea of them that is before him (as those objects are which we retain in our memory), but that he truly sees and contemplates them as actually under his immediate inspection. This prescience extends to the whole circuit of the world, and to all creatures. By predestination we mean the eternal decree of God, by which he determined with himself whatever he wished to happen with regard to every man. All are not created on equal terms, but some are preordained to eternal life, others to eternal damnation; and, accordingly, as each has been created for one or other of these ends, we say that he has been predestinated to life or to death.[21]
With predestination, Paul has a corporate view in mind. He does not have in mind the predestination of individuals. Such an interpretation of these chapters began with Augustine in his controversy with Pelagians, and it has distracted interpreters of Romans from the main thrust of Paul’s discussion in these chapters. Predestination refers to the divine plan that Christians are destined to reproduce in themselves an image of Christ by a progressive share in his risen life. Before we lose ourselves in a discussion of predestination, let us remember that Paul is bringing the resurrection of Jesus and the resurrection of Christians into essential parallel.[22] In addition, the significance of the resurrection of Jesus is present here in that if Jesus has been raised, then the end of the world has begun.[23] The Christian bears the shape or form of God’s own Son. God incorporates people in the Kingdom of the Son by binding people to Jesus through the proclamation that awakens faith by being shaped to the likeness of the Son of God. In fact, Christian theology must read the Old Testament saying about our divine likeness in the light of such a statement, speaking of transforming of believers into this image. It is related to the concept of humanity by what is said about the new human being who is manifested in Jesus Christ. To that extent, the idea of Jesus Christ as the image of God in which believers have a share through the Spirit has a general anthropological significance that the New Testament develops. Although the responsibility of the church is to develop this likeness in its fellowship, this is not a direction that Paul will develop.[24] We see that for Paul, the creation waits for the revelation of the children of God that has already appeared in Jesus as the Son of God in Christians.[25] Paul has characterized the plan of God for history in one sentence.
Pannenberg has a discussion of the election of individuals and the goal of election, both of which I have found helpful. I will focus my discussion here on the way these few verses influence the direction he takes these discussions. He begins by saying that verses 28-30 has governed the development of the doctrine of election and predestination in Christian theology, more so that Chapters 9-11.[26] Origen[27] described election as an act of divine foreknowledge. God sees in advance our future conduct and sets us accordingly on the way to salvation or the way to perdition. Hence, the predestination of the elect, as the loving care of God directing them to and on this path, rests on the divine knowledge of their future free decisions. He followed here the sequence in 8:29, first foreknowledge, and the predestination. He took the former in terms of the Old Testament as including an element of electing. Yet in accordance with the purpose of 8:28, he related calling to the good purposes of the called that God foresaw. If we were to take foreknowledge more generally as relating to the bad no less than the good, it would certainly be true that human conduct rather than the divine foreknowledge is the basis of salvation or perdition. Augustine took election to an act of the will of God prior to any prevision of the future conduct of the creatures God has made. He appealed to 9:16 for this. He set aside the view in 8:29 that the foreseeing of human faith and obedience is the basis of predestination to salvation. For him, the purpose of predestination is itself the basis of the electing of some out of the mass of the lost. He followed up on this in the development of his thinking even before the beginning of the Pelagius controversy. Despite their differences, they have some common presuppositions. First, both treat election as an act of God that takes place in eternity before time in accordance with the distinction that Paul had made in 8:29. Second, eternal election in both relates directly to individuals with restriction to the theme of their participation in eschatological salvation. The argument of both the gnostic thinkers guided them in this individual focus. Pannenberg refers to what the two thinkers have in common as an intellectualistic interpretation of foreknowledge, which remained dominant in the Scholastic period. He refers to both as an abstract view of election. Pannenberg thinks of it as abstract because it makes the concrete historicity of the divine acts of election as the Bible bears witness to them, it detaches individuals from all relations to society, and it restricts the purpose of election to participation in future salvation and separates it from any historical function of the elect. Such an abstract view of election is different from what the Bible has to say about the election of Israel or of the election of individuals. As we can see in 8:33, the members of the Christian community are the elect of God. Only by detaching 8:29-30 and 9:13, 16, from the context of salvation history in which Paul set them makes it possible to link them to the abstract notions of election that both Origin and Augustine espoused, and through them, guided most of the discussion since. At the same time, Pannenberg admits that in this passage Paul refers to a divine counsel, by which believers are beforehand elected by God in Jesus Christ and ordained to be conformed to the image of the Son points to an eternal act of God as the origin of the event of salvation in time and of its acceptance in faith. He also differentiates fore-ordination and calling. In these verses, Jesus Christ is to be the firstborn among many who will be taken up into his filial relation to the Father conformed to the Son. The “we” of believers as the recipients of the election by God cannot have an exclusive sense. Its setting is within the divine place of salvation and its actualization in the process of salvation history; individual are the objects of election and calling, but not in isolation.[28]
As an example of the abstract view of predestination, Barth discusses I. Boettner in his defense of the older Reformed notion of predestination in its representation of the absolute and unconditional purpose of the divine will, which is independent of all creation and grounded solely in the eternal counsel of God. Everything outside of God is enclosed by this decree. All creatures owe their creation and preservation to the divine will and power. Everything that exists does so only as a medium through which God in some way manifests divine glory. The doctrine of predestination is no more than the application of this perception to the doctrine of the salvation of humanity. When God made the world, God had a plan, just like any rational human being has a plan. God executes this plan in the teaching of predestination. Human history is nothing more than the execution of this plan. We confess that our lives are overruled, for we were not asked whether to be born or to die, we confess that God rules and determines these things. Everything will happen as God ordains them for the attainment of the end that God has set for all things.[29]
Pannenberg continues discussion of the goal of election and the government of the world by God in the process of history by stressing that the aim of the election and for-ordination of God is that the elect should be fashioned in the likeness of the Son and thus participate in his filial relation to the Father. The participation of the elect in salvation does not mean exclusiveness relative to other show are passed over but stands under the condition of dynamic inclusiveness, that is, of a movement toward the inclusion of all. The differentiating of the elect form the nonelect often neglects this point. The result is that they doctrine of predestination, which is properly meant to be the assurance of the believer of grace on the basis of its origin in the eternity of God, in his eternal counsel of election, has horrified the compassionate, who are weighed down by the question what will become of all the rest. The answer to this question is that the election of individuals, and also of the people of God to which individuals belong as members is open to the participation of all people in the relation of Jesus to God. Elect individuals and the elect of people of God receive with their calling the commission and mission to work for the inclusion of all humanity in the relation of Jesus Christ to God. The aim of the election of God is the fellowship of a renewed humanity in the kingdom.[30]
Romans 8:31-39 focuses on the decision of God to be “for us.” Yes, God loves us and is ready to help us in our weakness. However, the focus here shifts to Jesus. We know God is for us because the Father did not spare the Son but gave him for us so that we might find life.[31] This passage points to a reality we all face. This world has an alien character, for it is chaotic, destructive, and dangerous.[32] Yet, above the weakness and suffering of this life is a divine Yes. This Yes does not arise within us. It comes from beyond us and confronts us. This Yes summons us to seek and find ourselves. We hear this Yes in Jesus Christ.[33] We hear the pardon for our sins coming from God through the cross. No one can accuse those who love God and respond to the call of God. No one has the right or power to condemn such persons. The reason is Jesus Christ who died for us and who the Father raised to new and resurrected life within the Trinity. The Son prays for us and with us. In this way, the Son unites with the ministry of the Spirit within us. His point is that nothing in the world can feel so alien to us because of its dangerous character that it will separate us from the love Christ.
Paul will list some ways in which this world is dangerous. Scholars refer to these portions of the letters of Paul as his “hardship” lists. He notes that Psalm 44:22 sums up his experience in this world, and the experience of many early followers of Jesus. For the sake of the Lord, people are killing them all day long like sheep led to the slaughter. His point is that regardless of the ways in which we experience our weakness and suffering in this world, it will not separate us from the love God has shown us in Jesus Christ. He even identifies the forces that may try to separate us from that love, such as death or life, angels or rulers, things present or things to come, powers, height or depth, and anything else in creation. Paul is getting poetic as he builds to this conclusion. Nothing will separate those who love God and have responded to the call of God from the love of God shown in Christ. In the process, he stresses the love of Christ for us cooperates with the love of the Father for us.[34] He said in 5:5-11, in union with what he says here, that the essential content of the history of Jesus in the fact of the love God has for the world.[35]
31 What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? God being “for us” sums up the message of the New Testament. “God for us” is not the general proclamation of the love of God and divine readiness to help. It means that Jesus is for us. God did not spare his own Son. Its meaning is for the advantage or in the favor of or in the interest of someone. It can also signify for the sake of a definite cause or goal. It can also signify in the place of or as a representative of someone.[36] This world, which should be a home for humanity as the creature of God, is alien land. Here and now, it has an alien character, for it is chaotic, destructive, and dangerous.[37] Yet, we can hear this superior Yes. However, we hear this only when we look away from and beyond ourselves because we see something confronting us, and this something as a Someone, and in this Someone ourselves, so that in Him, in this Other, we are summoned to seek and find ourselves. This Someone, this Other, is Jesus Christ. We come here to the frontier of human life.[38]
In 8:32-34, Paul continues with his questions.32 He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else? 33 Who will bring any charge against God’s elect (ἐκλεκτῶν)? It is God who justifies (δικαιῶν). The Father gave up his own Son, abandoned him, cast him out and delivered him up an accursed death. Combined with II Corinthians 5:21 and Galatians 3:13, where the Father made the Son for us and the that the Son became a curse for us, we find that in in this total and inextricable abandonment of the Son by his Father, Paul sees the delivering up of the Son by the Father for godless and godforsaken humanity. The Father did not spare the Son, and therefore godless humanity are spared. They are godless but not godforsaken because the Father delivered up the Son. The delivering up of the Son to a godforsaken reality is the basis for the justification of the godless and the acceptance of enmity by the Father. The Father who abandons the Son and delivers him up suffers the death of the Son in the infinite grief of love. The Son suffers death, while the Father suffers the death of the Son. The grief of the Father is just as important as the death of the Son. The Son is Fatherless, but the Father is without the Son.[39] 34 Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes (ἐντυγχάνει,entreat or even confer) for us. The only God who counts is the one revealed in the strangling Jesus stretched against a darkening sky. We do not have here simply the precondition for salvation. On the cross we have the enduring word of God, “See how much I love you; see how much you are to love each other.”[40]
Romans 8:35-39 speaks mostly for itself. It speaks of God’s love for us, a love that cannot be broken by any other external power. 35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written in Psalm 44:22, “For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.” 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, a crucial theme in Romans, with the thesis in 1:16‑17 stressing that the gospel "is the power of God for salvation." The Good News about Christ's life, death, resurrection and enthronement is the most powerful force on Earth, according to Paul. Nations and flags may rise or fall; guns and bombs may destroy; swift legs may set new world records; but only the gospel has the power to redeem the lost. Only the message about the love of God manifest in Christ can set the guilty free. And apart from proclaiming the transcendent power of God, there is no hope for keeping human arrogance and folly within bounds to save the foolish world or wanton individuals from self‑destruction. Therefore Paul stresses the visibility of divine "power" in Romans 1:20, arguing that when persons fail to recognize it, they fall into a self‑imposed darkness. Therefore Paul includes other "powers" in the list of factors unable to "separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" in Romans 8:38‑39. This is why he returns to the theme of divine power in the benediction of Romans 15:13. "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." If we did not believe that the gospel of Christ embodies the greatest power on Earth, none of us would be involved in ministry.[41] 39 Nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. In raising the question of who can separate us from the love of Christ, Paul is going further than other New Testament writers in stressing that the love of Christ for us cooperates with the love of God for us.[42] Thus, in 8:35-39 Paul offers a hymn to the love God has shown in Christ, a love that no circumstances can cancel. Paul finds here, as well as 5:5-11, that the essential content of the history of Jesus in the fact of the love of God for the world found expression here.[43]
In form, 8:35-39 are part of the hardship lists of Paul. In I Corinthians 4:8-13, Paul admits “we” have become a spectacle to the world and to angels. “We” are fools for the sake of Christ. He describes his team as weak, hungry, thirsty, ill-clad, buffeted, homeless, reviled, persecuted, and slandered. They seek reconciliation. He admits that they have become like refuse in the world. In II Corinthians 4:7-12, “we” have this treasure in earthen vessels, afflicted, perplexed, persecuted, struck down, and carrying in their bodies the death of Jesus. Death is at work in them. In II Corinthians 6:1-10, “we” develop great endurance, in affliction, hardship, calamity, beatings, imprisonments, tumults, labors, and hunger. He refers to how people treat them as impostors, unknown, dying, punished, sorrowful, and as having nothing. In II Corinthians 11:21b-29, he refers to five times receiving from the Jews 39 lashes, three times beaten with rods, stoned once, shipwrecked three times, in danger from rivers, robbers, and the Jews, danger from Gentiles and the city, danger in the wilderness. In II Corinthians 1:9, he says he felt he had received the sentence of death. In II Corinthians 12:1-10, he refers to his thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, that harasses him. Considering all of this, Philippians 4:10-13 says that he has learned contentment in all things and that he can do all things through Christ who strengthens him.
To most people, bridges are beautiful. If we visit San Francisco, we will probably want to see the Golden Gate Bridge. The newest and biggest suspension bridge, opening to traffic in 1998, is in Japan, the Akashi-Kaikyo bridge. It boasts a main span of 6,532 feet, almost four times the length of the Brooklyn Bridge, for example. It stretches 12,828 feet across the Akashi Strait to link the city of Kobe with Awaji-shima Island. Each cable is composed of 290 strands, each strand containing 127 wires. The length of the wire used totals 300,000 kilometers, enough to circle the earth 7.5 times. Its two towers, at 928 feet, soar higher than any other bridge towers in the world.
But not all attempts to push the limits are successful. In 1940, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in Washington State was hit by strong winds and collapsed, sending a 600-foot section of the bridge into Puget Sound. The roadway had been open to traffic for only a few months, and it took 10 years to redesign and reopen the bridge.
Because people love to reach across water and establish a link, there will always be a human hunger to build immense bridges around the world. One current dream is to construct an intercontinental connection across the Strait of Gibraltar. Europe to Africa, by bridge. Planners are calling for a structure that would stand 3,000 feet tall and dwarf any existing bridge in height and length. Driving from Spain to Morocco, you would cross a full seven miles of water.
We like to establish links, to fill in the gaps, and reach out. Yes, economics plays a part. Another part is communication. However, I think we like to explore. The bridge helps us explore a little more easily than we could without them.
Building a bridge has become a metaphor for connecting that which has separated. We build bridges between groups that have experienced estrangement. We build bridges in relationships that have become strained. Famously, Simon and Garfunkle had a hit song, “Bridge over troubled waters.” The suspension bridge is a metaphor for the oldest question in human history: How are we related, or linked, to God and what can we do to bridge the chasm between the human and the divine?
The history of religion shows that humanity feels a need for connection with what it senses is above and beyond it. We sense we have missed the mark; we have fallen short of what we could be, and this feeling leads to some sense of estrangement from God. We may work hard at it. We may construct idols. We offer sacrifices, burn incense, and offer prayers. Yet, the chasm remains. All bridges that human beings have built toward God have collapsed and failed. Toppled by wind, crumpled by earthquake, incomplete because of the sheer magnitude of the task. They have come short.
First, we need a bridge. Here is the first recognition we need spiritually. We need to recognize our separation from God and its importance in our lives. “There is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus” (I Timothy 2:5). Think of what kind of God it would be to recognize the separation and do nothing to make a bridge across the divide. Across the raging waters of our failures, our weaknesses and our acts of disobedience came Someone who links the human and the divine. We did not design this bridge. We did not finance it. We did not build it. We do not deserve it.
Paul’s first-century Roman audience already buys into this. We do, too. This congregation in ancient Rome, however, had some other concerns. Living at ground zero of the world, at the vortex of political storms, situated as they were as a lightning rod for everything that was going wrong in the empire at the time, these Christians had every reason to wonder if there was a bridge between fear and hope, whether there was a bridge between suffering and glory, whether there was a bridge between the evil done to them and the good that would ultimately triumph. They understood Jesus Christ as our connection, our link, as “the way, the truth and the life.” Faith in God. Faith in Jesus Christ. Faith in the Master-Bridge-Builder.
Second, faith is a bridge that works. We love God; we have embraced God’s creative purpose for our lives. We can be confident, despite evidence to the contrary, that all things — not some things — will work together for good. That is, in the big picture, the pieces will fall into place. So, Paul begins: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). It should not have worked. But it did and still does.
Third, faith is a bridge that stands strong in the storm. Paul asks: “What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us?” (8:31). The answer, of course, is a ton of stuff. Paul even lists some of them: “hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword” (8:35). All these things were very real possibilities for the Christians in Rome of the first century. Self-identifying as a Christian often meant a loss of rights, the inability to conduct business in the marketplace, a loss of economic well-being, the possibility of being reduced to abject poverty, and even the possibility of losing one’s life, or watching loved ones lose theirs.
Think again of the Golden Gate Bridge. When this bridge was built in the 1930s, they said it was a bridge that could not be built. The bridge was to rise in San Francisco Bay, an area known for its persistently foggy weather. It would be subject to 60-mile-per-hour winds and strong ocean currents. Nevertheless, constructed it was, at a cost of $35 million and 11 human lives. The Golden Gate Bridge is still standing strong today, although it can sway 27 feet as it withstands windblasts of up to 100 miles per hour.
What is at stake for us when we identify ourselves as Christians? We may gain the respect and admiration of others, but chances are we will be considered a bit odd, or off. We may be linked to fringe religious groups that we really do not have any connection to. It is not easy in our culture to proclaim our faith boldly.
Paul was not afraid to share with his readers the hardships he faced. What would your hardship list look like today? How would it change at the various stages of your life? for most of us, our hardships would pale when compared to Paul. That does not mean God does not take them seriously. My early childhood and teen years would have included growing up as firstborn boy, an alcoholic father, working-class blue-collar poor, and rejection of my interest in certain girls. In my young adult life, it would have included a broken engagement, rejection from other girls, getting into a painful and unfulfilling marriage, raising children and youth, ending the marriage, further rejection from girls, financial stress, possibly entering a United Methodist Church ministry for which I was not well suited, seeing the dark side of the good people of the church, and facing my own darkness. It would include missed opportunities of fulfilling my dreams and the desires of my heart. In my adult years, seeing my “career” plateau, continuing to see the dark side of good people, including myself, finding the United Methodist Church increasingly less a spiritual home, alienation from the Indiana Annual Conference, and feeling isolated from the groups fighting within the UMC. Throughout the stages of life I revisit my commitment to the values I established early to Christ and to the church. In retirement, such hardship seems distant. Such a list is not “woe is me.” I have led a reasonably good and happy life. In fact, if one could add up all the pain in the world, I am confident I have had less than my share. The prospect of losing my health and life still feels distant, but I know that is a mirage. I am far closer to the end of my life than the beginning. Regardless of how far away it may be, the supreme hardship we all face is ahead of me.
We would rather live in some idyllic place, free of so much hardship.
Don't let it be forgot
That once there was a spot
For one brief shining moment
Known as Camelot.
(Alan J. Lerner)
Such were the sentiments expressed in the musical "Camelot." Camelot was a marvelous place. One author said it had become known as not just the capital city of King Arthur's kingdom, and the center of the Knights of the Round Table, but also the gathering place of noble and courageous lords and of beautiful and chaste ladies. It was a place of banquets and tournaments, in short, the finest court that has ever been. It was renowned for its splendor, justice, and chivalry.[44]
Sounds wonderful, does it not? It sounds like happiness, does it not? And indeed, the legends say that it was wonderful for a long time. But yes, trials and tribulations eventually came, even to Camelot.
There are no Camelot's here. If we think that in order to be happy and to lead a life of meaning and purpose, if we think we must be in "Camelot," then we are searching for something which does not exist in this life. In other words, there is no time in this life when we live "happily ever after" in this life. This life will always have its trials and struggles. If we are going to find happiness, it must be in the real world which you and I live in every day.
The hardships we face are simply part of a human life. if I could go back and change one thing, it would, of course, be the failed marriage. Such a change would change the types of hardships I faced, but I would still face them. A well lived life is one that does not allow hardship to defeat the basic reason we are here. Due to our experiences, we will develop a unique set of passions and gifts that we will have the opportunity to offer the friends and communities we touch. We have our best self to offer. For me, of course, we have the will and purpose of God to discover. Hardship defeats us if we turn to addiction, crime, or suicide. Defeat can also take less aggressive forms that allow our fears and anxieties to make us shy away from life.
The question of what shall separate us reveals a deep anxiety concerning our fear of loneliness and alienation. In our time, the notion that we simply “fade to black,” that we experience “something” and then “nothing,” is quite popular. I have no question that many people in a modern and secular age will find ways of living meaningfully with that notion. It can even be peaceful. It can even take away the “sting” of our prospect of dying. For many others, however, the prospect that love ends is a sad thing. The love we have in our hearts will stop. We can truly pose the question, “Is that all there is?” For Paul, the only assurance we have in this life that love endures is what God has done in Christ.
Nevertheless, even though “God be for us,” there are plenty of storms that come our way that serve to challenge, to weaken the bridge we are crossing. We are buffeted by economic pressures, we are fearful of relationship problems, we are concerned about health issues, and we are caught in battles of sobriety, sanity, depression and despair. We worry about terrorism, virus from China, global warming, house prices, interest rates, crime rates and road rage. This is a bridge that is critical to our well-being — even our salvation. This bridge must be a bridge that can stand strong in the storm. And it is. Because God is for us. Many things may be against us, but the bottom line is: Nothing can prevail against us!
Fourth, this is a bridge that is long enough. Walk this bridge and we will make it to the other side: “Nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God” (8:39). Some freeway construction features bridges and ramps that lead to nowhere. You look up, and there is this half bridge — a bridge uncompleted. Construction cones warn of the danger. This is a bridge you do not want to be on, and if you are and persist in traveling you will go flying off into the blue. Might work in movies, but not in life. We must be careful about the bridges we choose. Paul urges us to traverse the bridge of faith. It is a bridge that is long enough to connect us to the love of God, thus making it the biggest suspension bridge in the history of humankind.
Fifth, this is a bridge that is high enough. You do not want a bridge that when the rains come will be flooded and washed out. You do not want a bridge where floating debris can knock out one of the spans. That is why Paul writes: “In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (8:37-39).
In the face of death ...
there is the Resurrection.
In the face of illness ...
there is eternal healing.
In the face of danger ...
there is the right arm of God.
In the face of adversity ...
there is "blessed assurance."
In the face of confrontation ...
there is confidence.
In the face of the Serpent ...
there is the gift of the Cross.
In the face of greed ...
there is the abundant life.
In the face of pollution ...
there is God's redemption of
all creation.
In the face of hunger ...
there is a legacy of loaves and
fishes.
In the face of homelessness ...
there is compassion.
In the face of hardship ...
there is the promise of goodness.
Does your faith falter when it contemplates the challenges that surround every human life? Are you
doubting in the face of death ...
weak‑kneed in the face of illness ...
wimpy in the face of danger ...
worthless in the face of adversity ...
frozen in the face of confrontation ...
apathetic in the face of challenges ...
despairing in the face of the Serpent ...
acquiescent in the face of greed ...
oblivious in the face of pollution ...
heartless in the face of hunger ...
self‑absorbed in the face of
homelessness ...
whining in the face of hardship...?
“Do not fear,” says Jesus, “only believe” (Mark 5:36). Jesus is inviting us into a relationship with God that is not going to be shattered by terrorism, warfare, virus, job loss or bankruptcy. He is inviting us to walk a bridge that will not collapse when it is battered by national turmoil or personal pain. He is asking us to let go of our grip on the things of this world, and get a grip on grace, as Max Lucado would put it.
Suspension bridges are things of beauty. They hold us in thrall. And none are as beautiful as the bridge of faith when traversed by the believer whose feet are shod with courage, whose hands grasp the Word, and whose face beams with the light of heaven. We all need a bridge, a bridge that works, a bridge that stands strong in the storm, a bridge that is long enough, a bridge that is high enough. Let us not be afraid to step out.
[1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
[9]
[10] Bertram, TDNT, Volume VII, 875.
[11] Maurer, TDNT, Volume VIII, 166-7.
[12] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 3, Chapter 21.5
[13] Pannenberg, Human Nature, Election and History, 47-61
[14]
[15]
[16]
[17]
[18][18] K. L. Schmidt, TDNT, Volume V, 456
[19][19] Grundmann, TDNT, Volume VII, 787-8.
[20] Maurer, TDNT, Volume VIII, 166-7.
[21] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 3, Chapter 21.5
[22]
[23]
[24]
[25]
[26]
[27] Origen, Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, 7.7-8. PG, 14, 1122-27.
[28] Pannenberg Human Nature, Election and History, 47-61
[29]
[30]
[31]
[32]
[33]
[34]
[35]
[36]
[37]
[38]
[39]
[40] Brendan Manning (The Signature of Jesus [Portland, Ore.: Multnomah Press, 1992], 40).
[41] ‑‑Robert Jewett, "Competing in the Creedal Olympics: Pauline Resources for Cross‑Cultural Ministry" in Young‑Il Kim, ed., Knowledge, Attitude and Experience: Ministry in the Cross‑Cultural Context (Nashville: Abingdon, 1995), 30‑31.
[42]
[43]
[44] (Paul C. Doherty, King Arthur, New York: Chelsea House Pub., 1987, p. 73 and 96)
Liked the way you used bridges. This is a good exposition on the end of Romans 8. No doubt God has elected His people to fulfill His purposes. Your view of ecstatic experiences is typical of those who do not understand those who participate in them. While such experiences are to be in order and not confusing to the church or to the world they are non the less real, normative to the early church and to many christian today. There are abuses but then humans manage to screw most things up.
ReplyDeleteIt is a difficult passage. I think I know what I meant by ecstatic, but I am not sure I know what you mean by the word in this context. If you mean speaking in tongues, we are speaking of two different things.
DeleteI am speaking of tongues and more. I am speaking of the demonstrative gifts, I'm speaking of people "slay" in the spirit and people who generally have a ecstatic experience that is in public usually in public worship.
ReplyDeleteI thought so. I was using the word more in the way Tillich and Pannenberg do, which emphasizes the event of the Spirit as a controlling dimension of Christian life, peace, and power. Think of "spiritual presence" in a way that gives authentic freedom in contrast to the freedom promised by fleshly existence. I do think that when we talk this way, we always need the caveat that such freedom does not mean absence of structure, but placing structure in its proper place. I am not sure that we disagree as much as your original statement suggests. In the future I might use a different term, but I hate for Pentecostal and Charismatic parts of the Christian family to have a monopoly on the word.
DeleteI don't think we disagree at all.
ReplyDelete