In addition to what
has already been said, as one continues to contemplate the nature of these
works of the flesh, it is incumbent upon those that ponder these things to not
lose sight of the fact that the Creator God did not intend for His people
Israel to be separate simply for the sake of being separate, but that through
their being set apart for His purposes He could truly bless them by using them
as a means to bless all peoples. According to the covenant made with
Abraham, which certainly colored the thinking of the Apostle Paul and all
like-minded individuals, this was most certainly His intention for Israel, as
well as for those that are considered to be renewed Israel through their union
with Christ that takes the form of believing in Him as Lord.
Building on his earlier
thoughts concerning flesh, death, life, and peace, Paul goes on to write that
“You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit” (8:9a). This is
not a blanket statement that is addressed to his readers (or more likely those
that would hear the letter read in the setting of a common meal) as some sort
of broad-based compliment, but he qualifies this by writing, “if indeed the
Spirit of God lives in you” (8:9b). This begs the question as to how one
knows, in this context, if the Spirit of God lives in him. This, of
course, is connected with the ability to please God, which one can imagine was
something readily desired amongst those to whom Paul is writing this
letter.
How does one know if
he or she does indeed have the Spirit of God? It would seem that, in the
context of the contrast between death (flesh) and life and peace (Spirit), that
the evidence of the Spirit would be a willingness to fully embrace the tenets
of the Abrahamic covenant. The evidence of the presence of the Spirit is
the ability to rejoice in the ending of the separation between God and man, and
between man and man. It would seem to be the case that, in this context,
at least one evidence of the Spirit would be a vigilance against the
reconstruction of any walls or boundaries that would be erected to separate
those that believe in Christ from one another.
Much of this can be discovered
in the textual dealings concerning the considerably important issue of
table-fellowship between Jew and Gentile, as this become a crucial issue, being
highlighted in Paul’s letter to the Galatians, while also being a source of
much criticism that is leveled against Jesus in the accounts of the
Gospels. When Paul confronts Peter in Galatians---because of Peter’s
withdrawal from eating with the Gentiles---and rebukes Peter to his face, it is
because Peter’s actions, by Paul’s way of viewing the post-Christ,
post-Ressurection world, constitute the unfortunate and hardly intended
resurrection of old and now meaningless cultural boundaries of separation.
For Paul this
erection of separating boundaries did nothing more than drag believers in Jesus
back into the old age (flesh, death) rather than allowing them to fully live in
the new age that began with Christ’s Resurrection (Spirit, life, peace).
For Paul, this resurrection of old standards by Peter nullifies the purpose of
Christ’s Resurrection, and according to the record of the encounter that Paul
provides, Paul will not tolerate it for a second. Throughout his letters,
Paul insists that Christ died and was raised to create a new humanity, a new
creation. Accordingly then, holding to
old ideals and standards that now stood in obviously flagrant opposition to
what God intended---as evidenced by Jesus’ own actions throughout His ministry,
as He demonstrated what it meant to be fully human in the way that God intended
through His own meal practice---was not going to be tolerated.
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