What’s on your mind? In today’s passage, Paul tells us that there are basically two answers to the question. Simply put, we can focus on the things of the flesh, or the things of the Spirit. Everything that occupies our time and attention falls into one of these two categories.

And that’s because the difference between the things of the flesh and the things of the Spirit is primarily a relational one, one that has to do with our relationship to God. For how does Paul describe the carnal mind, the mind focused on the things of the flesh? In verse 7, he says people who have such a mind are at enmity with God – they are hostile toward God. These people do not believe they are subject to God’s law – they do whatever they please and reject God’s righteous rule. Because of this rebellion, verse 8 tells us that they are unable to please God.

But opposition to God has consequences. As a result of their hostility toward God, verse 15 says that these people are trapped in fear, a not unreasonable fear of God. And such fear perhaps explains the rather intense opposition that non-Christians have toward the gospel.

But there is, of course, another source of their fear – the fear of death. Verse 6 tells us that to be carnally minded, to make this world our heart’s desire leads to death. Verse 13 repeats this thought – living according to the flesh means that we will die – and sense a fleshly viewpoint thinks this world is all that matters, being separated from the material world in death is the worst possible thing that can happen.

There is, of course, an alternative to living in such paralyzing fear. Verse 1 tells us that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. And if we are no longer condemned, that means those who are trusting in Christ no longer have any need to fear God’s judgment.

Why is that? Because of the basic truth of the gospel that we find in verses 3 and 4. For the good news is that God sent Jesus, His own Son, into this world in the flesh – that means He has a body just like ours. Because He had a fleshly body that could suffer and die, He could take on Himself our punishment, the death penalty that our sin, our continual breaking of God’s law, deserves.

But our freedom is inseparably connected to our continued fellowship with the Holy Spirit of God as we live according to the Spirit’s leading. We see this connection clearly in verse 4 – the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in those of us who walk after the Spirit, we live according to the power of the Spirit.

What does all this mean? That forgiveness from Christ and union with Christ always goes along with a filling, an indwelling of the Holy Spirit of God. Verse 9 makes this quite plain – the Spirit of God dwells in, lives within all those who belong to Christ. The opposite is also true – if you don’t have the Holy Spirit within you, you don’t belong to Christ.

And it is presence of the Holy Spirit Who makes all the difference in our lives. Verse 11 gives us the wonderful promise that if the Holy Spirit dwells within us now, we can be sure that He will one day raise our bodies from the dead just as Christ has risen from the grave.

But the Holy Spirit also makes all the difference in our lives here and now. Verse 5 tells us that those who are filled with the Holy Spirit will naturally come to set our minds more and more on spiritual things – finding God and His truth more interesting and more attractive than anything else. Verse 10 reminds us that those who trust in Christ have died to the power of sin, but at the same time we have the new life of the Spirit within us. It is the power of the Holy Spirit who enables us to overcome the remnants of sin in our lives, to win the victory in the struggle Paul describes so vividly at the end of chapter 7.

So, what’s on your mind today? Why not put aside the temporary things of the flesh that can only lead to fear and death? Why not set your mind on the things of the Spirit? Whatever the world may say, that’s the only true way to life and peace.

Romans 8:1-11 (NAS)

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,
4 in order that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.
6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so;
8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
10 And if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you.