For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit (that is a key), even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. Romans 8:18–23.
It is evident that creation waits for us, and what is it that holds us back? We are waiting for the redemption of our bodies, we who possess the first fruits of the Spirit.
Creation has been subjected to futility, and it will not be loosed from it until the sons of God loose it; but meanwhile the sons of God are also groaning within themselves, waiting for the redemption of their bodies, their adoption as sons.
The physical body is the area holding us back. We are anxious to move into divine health and into glorified bodies, but this Scripture is not speaking about that.
Before we can take the steps toward releasing creation from futility, we must first get rid of the futility within us. That futility comes from the flesh.
We have the first fruits of the Spirit, but we are groaning to come to grips with the duplicity of the carnal mind and the things of the flesh and to really overcome them. There will be no manifestation of the sons of God until this redemption takes place in the physical body.
For a man to be a Christian means he has accepted the Lord. No longer is he dead in his trespasses and sins, for now the Lord has made him alive (Ephesians 2:5). In what way is he alive? His spirit has become alive to God.
The first man Adam was made a living soul; the second man Adam was made a quickening or a life-giving spirit (1 Corinthians 15:45). Just as soul life comes through the Adamic nature, so a spirit life comes through Jesus Christ, the second Adam. The eighth chapter of Romans conveys this idea. The spirit comes alive first and then the soul.
The spirit is created in the image of God, but the soul causes us quite a bit of trouble. It is the seat of our emotions, and it affects our decisions and our will. It reacts quite freely to the spirit world and to the mental world.
The Greek work “psuche” means soul and is the origin of the words psychic and psychology. Psychology means the science of the soul. Strangely enough, psychology today does not recognize the soul, so even its name is a contradiction.
From the minute that your spirit becomes alive through Christ, your soul goes through a process of being saved—spirit, soul, and body, following in that order.
In the day that Adam sinned, he died, because God had said, “In the day ye eat thereof, ye shall surely die.” Satan said, “Ye shall not surely die,” but that was a perverted lie, because the spirit nature in man did die that day; it became dead and darkened (Genesis 5:5).
His spirit died; his soul made mortal, and it did not die that day, for Adam lived for 930 years (Genesis 5:5). His spirit died; his soul went into an eclipse so that he could no longer communicate with God; and physically, he was in a darkened mortal state with death upon him from that time on.
In Christ Jesus this death process is reversed. First the spirit of man comes alive. Salvation is an instantaneous experience in the rebirth or a new birth of the spirit, but it is also the beginning of the process of the soul being saved.
As we read in Acts 2:47, “There were added to the church daily such as were being saved.” If any man is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things are passed away; behold all things are become new (2 Corinthians 5:17). It is true that it is an instantaneous experience for his spirit, but there is a process by which his soul enters into it. It does not happen instantly.
Born-again believers gradually overcome certain habits and emotional traits, temper, pride, and other manifestations of the Adamic nature. Some have a great many of these things broken quickly, and others labor on while the process of salvation is reaching through the soul life.
The spirit is saved instantaneously. The soul is being redeemed; but what about the physical body? What can God do with it? Up to this point the physical body has no evidences of redemption. The physical body is not immortal.
Christians still become sick and die; the physical body was never redeemed. We still catch colds, get headaches, go to the dentist to get our teeth filled; many things happen to us which show that this body is not yet in a perfect state of immortality.
We are groaning and waiting for the redemption of the body, not only the physical body and its processes, but something else besides that. God has made a provision for the old fleshly nature that is inherent in the physical body and its processes.
In Him (in Christ), you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory. Ephesians 1:13, 14.
The Holy Spirit has been given to you by God to guarantee, to seal that He will finish the job. You know you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior, and you are believing on Him to have eternal life. But He wants to give you a guarantee, some indication by which you know that you are sealed to receive redemption, that one day your redemption will be completed. You have received the Holy Spirit as the earnest, the first installment, of that inheritance.
1 Corinthians 6:19 says that your physical body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. The Lord puts a brand on you (just as the rancher brands his cattle), so that anyone who takes a look at it knows you are sealed, sealed for the day of redemption and marked as belonging to the Lord. The Lord has given you the Holy Spirit, and that is how you know He will complete the entire process.
The old flesh is not redeemed yet, but you believe God to destroy everything that comes up through the flesh. You inherit a great deal from Adam and Eve. In Adam all died, and that inheritance is real to you (1 Corinthians 15:22).
That is the reason you look suspiciously on your children as you begin to see them act a certain way; you know they have inherited all those traits from their parents.
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. Romans 8:5. It depends on how you are walking. You are a triune being—spirit, soul, and body (1 Thessalonians 5:23)—but what is going to take the dominant place?
Those who seek after pleasure have elevated the soul and the body above the spirit. Some people get all their enjoyment from things that are strictly physical. They are not happy unless they are active. Their bodies dominate.
Others actually glorify and deify the body. There was a time when the Greeks exalted the body almost to a place of worship. Some people move entirely in the soul realm. It is difficult for them to really walk with God because they are such emotional, soulish people that they cannot break through in the spirit.
For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace. Romans 8:6. Which is going to predominate? There are things in my flesh that God will have to deal with, but I know this: if I walk in the Spirit, I do not fulfill the lusts of the flesh (Galatians 5:16). If the spirit predominates and I do not feed the flesh, the flesh grows weaker and weaker in its appetites and its demands for domination. I can mortify my members which are on earth (Colossians 3:5). I can walk with God; I can walk in the Spirit and not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.
Galatians 5:17 tells us that the spirit wars against the flesh and the flesh against the spirit. They have a tendency to cancel out each other. The force of the physical demands, and the force of the spirit to squash the physical demands, use such an expenditure of energy that we have nothing left for an effective walk with God.
In a civil war, a nation literally destroys its own resources and manpower. In the war between the flesh and the spirit, we find that we cannot do the things we would like to do.
Continuing in Romans 8:7–14: 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. The flesh reaches into the mental level, into that which we call the carnal mind. The flesh covers all these areas: the physical body, the fleshly nature, the reasoning and the machinery of the carnal mind.
And those who are in the flesh cannot please God. However you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Paul is making a distinction between the Spirit of the Father and the Spirit of Christ.
But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. The Spirit of Christ takes over when you become a Christian. You have the Spirit of Christ or you do not belong to Him at all.
And if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin (the old flesh nature in the body—the transgressions in act, thought, neglect, or just the nature of sin), yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. Christ is in you, and your spirit is alive because of the righteousness that Christ brings you, but your body is still dead. It has not been totally redeemed as yet.
But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead (again the Spirit of God, 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 (the flesh) through His Spirit who indwells you. So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh—for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are being led by the Spirit of God (the Spirit of the Father), these are the sons of God. The next portion of the chapter speaks of the manifestation of the sons of God releasing creation from futility.
The complete manifestation of the sons of God comes by one more takeover. First the Spirit of Christ is in us, making us alive to God because of righteousness. Then the Holy Spirit comes to seal the body; but until that redemption comes, we are groaning within ourselves, waiting for the manifestation, our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
We do know that if the Spirit who raised up Christ from the dead (the Spirit of the Father) is dwelling in us, it will quicken our mortal bodies; and if we are led by that Spirit of God, we are sons of God.
In John 14 and 16. Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments; and My Father and I will manifest ourselves to you and will come and take Our abode with you” (John 14:23). Not only are we to house the Holy Spirit and the Spirit of Christ, but the Spirit of the Father is also to indwell us. The takeover of the Spirit of the Father is the process we are seeking.
The gifts of the Holy Spirit begin on a rather low plane of Christian living. When the gifts of the Spirit come in an individual’s life, we do not automatically say that he is perfect. The gifts of the Holy Spirit come while we are still in a state of imperfection, as does the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit begins to move within us to bring us into subjection to Christ’s rule and authority as Lord. The Spirit of Christ brings to us salvation and redemption, but the Holy Spirit comes to bring the Lordship of Christ over our lives.
The gifts of the Spirit operate in a church, not because the church is perfect, but because the church needs perfection; it needs to discern spirits and problems, to bring revelation, to bring deliverance.
The gifts are never a badge of final holiness and yielding, but are a means to that end. No man can say Jesus is Lord but by the Holy Spirit, so the Holy Spirit works in our lives until the day we say Jesus is the Lord (1 Corinthians 12:3), Jesus reigns until His enemies are made the footstool of His feet. Then He turns the Kingdom over to the Father (1 Corinthians 15:25–28).
This is the entire plan of the universe, but it is also the pattern He is using in our lives. When the Spirit of the Father begins to move upon us and we begin to be led, we will find we are truly able to see the subduing of the flesh, totally and completely; but more than that, we will see the mortal body come alive.
Paul says that we are groaning, not to cast off this tabernacle (this body), but to be clothed upon with the spiritual body that is from above (2 Corinthians 5:1–4); for this mortality is to be swallowed up with immortality (1 Corinthians 15:54), not necessarily by a process of death, but by a process similar to that of putting on a slip-on sweater.
The physical body we eventually bury, and it goes back to ashes and dust, back to the essential physical elements and gases of nature. We are not concerned with it because on the resurrection day there will be another kind of body given to us.
We are not concerned about the elements of the flesh, but we are concerned about a fleshly element that seems to live on and attach itself to our spirit. We want that burned out so that the Spirit who raised up Christ from the dead will begin to quicken our mortal bodies also, by the Spirit we receive from Him.
We are close to the manifestation of the sons of God. Never in the history of Christianity have the signs come to mortal bodies as they do now. Never have the eyes been anointed to see in the spirit realm as they are now. Never have the hands been anointed so that when we minister, we actually feel the power of God going through our hands.
There are many signs that come, showing that the mortal body is coming alive. No longer is the moving of the Spirit simply a hunch or joy or emotion of the soul, but it is manifested in the physical realm.
The Spirit of the Father is beginning to quicken our mortal bodies—the same Spirit who raised Christ from the dead and the same Spirit who will raise us from a death-doomed condition to begin to function in God.
We are groaning for our adoption as sons, to wit, the redemption of our bodies; and we are anxious to get this redemption of bodies as quickly as we can (Romans 8:23).
The more we yield to the Spirit and the more we follow His leadings and directions, the closer we come to our adoption as sons and the redemption of our bodies.
When I recall what bitter contests have been taking place in my body, I am aware that Satan is constantly warring against my physical body. He does not do much to me as far as my spirit is concerned, and rarely does he get through to me on the soul level; but most of the harassment comes to me through the physical.
Our walk with God is a struggle, but much of the battle we do not have to accept. We find many miracles, healings, and deliverances in the physical realm. As we take the dominion in the realm of our spirits, we actually find it reaching down into the physical.
The demonic assault coming against us involves physical pain, because the body is the last frontier, the last area of conflict. Never in any previous generation was the battle as focused on the physical bodies of the saints of God as it is now.
We are groaning for that redemption of our bodies, and soon we will be in the place where the wicked one touches us not (1 John 5:18). No longer will we have any openness to demonic assault—only immunity.
How do you receive immunity? Do not be discouraged. Seek for the revelation of it to your spirit, hold it in your heart and mind, and keep groaning and crying to God. And in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Romans 8:26, 27. That intercession is coming forth as a deep groaning.
God is very much concerned that you come into complete redemption. He Himself is groaning and interceding. There are many matters, however, that God is not too concerned about, unimportant questions you bring for counsel, such as whether you should buy a new car or fix your old one.
God is not so much concerned about such matters as He is about your relationship to His Kingdom and your relationship to Him.
I do not counsel with people just to work out their little problems. I counsel with them to get them to relate to the will of God. When they are in the will of God, then God becomes concerned about anything that comes to keep them from doing the will of God. Do not merely cry for God to help you. Believe to relate to the Kingdom of God, want what He wants in your life, and measure up to that.
I learned a long time ago that if I would please God, I had to be interested in what He was interested in and not in my own ideas. I found when I related myself to His ideas and sought first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, He added all the other things to me. It was not that He did not want me to have the other things, but He did not care whether I had them or not until I was related to what He wanted and was seeking first His Kingdom.
The sons of God will not come forth by seeking their own interests. As long as you are living your own life, pursuing your own ideas, and doing your own thing, you are not going to get much help from God.
You will struggle with your problems until you relate yourself to what God has called you to be and what He has called you to do, and you begin to groan to get into it. You must believe for the limitations of the body to be loosed, so that you can follow the leading of the Spirit and do the will of God.
For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren; and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified. Romans 8:29, 30. The key is in verse 28: And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
God is working out His eternal purpose: first to bring creation into futility, and then for the sons of God to come forth and to loose creation from that futility. That is the purpose of which Paul speaks. For those who love God and are called according to his purpose, those who are to be manifested sons of God, God will make everything work for their good. They will have a purposeful life and they will be led, but they must be dedicated.
It is quite difficult to give up this ambitious, fleshly life and your own interests. You will find yourself consumed in it day and night. Young lady, though you say that you want only God’s will, are you only interested in finding the right guy to marry and the fulfillment of your natural instincts?
Do you want only what you want? Are you using God and calling it submission? The same question applies to young men. Turn your desires around and really seek God first. Come to the place where God is everything.
The old flesh fights your walk in the Spirit. The carnal mind is enmity against God; and even though you are a Christian, with the Spirit of Christ in you, your body is still dead because of sin.
If someone leaves the house of God and takes a path of deliberate sin, all the signs he has felt in his body will disappear instantly. The grace of God is very real, but those signs are gone, and that man is back in a mortal death-doomed condition. God is anxious for you to crucify the flesh.
Those who desire to walk with God love righteousness. They want their lives to be right. If they are overtaken in a sin, they refuse to cover up. They admit they have sinned. They refuse hypocrisy that covers over the old carnal flesh, for it has to be dealt with.
We must walk with God, and there is nothing else we can do but get the problem out in the open and believe God for a work of His precious grace and His righteousness to cover it. His blood to remove it.
What can you do to overcome futility? You can be diligent to live as a blesser. I do not know a time, day or night, that I cannot lay my hands on someone and bless them. I am always receptive to people who reach out to me spiritually for a blessing or help.
I can bless cars, machinery, food. I can bless little children and little babies. You may think that very unimportant, but this is where you start.
Creation is under futility. The more you realize that the Spirit who raised up Jesus from the dead is making alive your mortal body and you start blessing things, the more creation is loosed.
You may bless things and then see the devil attempt to destroy them, but do not be discouraged. Satan is trying to discourage you from moving in the authority God has given you.
The physical realm is the area of warfare. We must believe to see the old nature of the flesh overcome, believe to house the Spirit of the Father, the resurrection Spirit, and believe, not only to overcome, but also for God to make alive this mortal body.
We do not look upon the flesh as only an enemy that must be crucified somehow, but we expect God to take it over, the Holy Spirit to make it a temple, and the Father to bless us and to quicken the body and to make it alive so it is not mortal any longer.
You must wait on the Lord and invite Him to have His perfect will. A walk with God is not merely a matter of trying to get rid of a few fleshly habits and lustful thoughts, and to get yourself going for God. It goes far beyond that.
If you could only get one glimpse of what God really has for you, you would never again bite on that empty hook that Satan throws in front of you. You would look to God, you would curse that old carnal mind and refuse it absolutely, and you would let the Spirit of God take over your mortal body and make it alive to God.
The enemy comes against your body, and you bear many scars from the battle, but at the same time the body is coming alive to God. The devil comes to harass and to lie, but as long as you see God moving through you, do not despair.
Reach your hand out and bless someone, and they will be blessed. God is making alive this mortal body, not for the glory of the flesh, but rather to show that the flesh is being put in subjection and God is taking over.
I believe this physical redemption is an actual experience, but I think it is also a process. My salvation was an experience, but it is also an expanding reality in my life, and it continues to grow.
In the same way, the great manifestation of the sons of God to loose creation will not happen overnight. It is going to happen with a people who have come alive to God, who walk with God, who begin to bless and to loose.
Take a step! Be audacious to believe! The Spirit who raised up Jesus from the dead will bring you into an experience that may not be similar in actual physical actions, but identical in nature.
Just as Jesus came alive and is alive forever more, so He will make you a partaker of that resurrection life. The Spirit who raised up Jesus from the dead will begin to give life to your mortal body. It will come alive.
It will be wonderful when the five senses are alive to God again. The mortal body is becoming alive. Do not be a follower after signs. They can be an amazingly true indication of what is happening, but rejoice in the fact that you are coming alive.
There is nothing worse than to endure a half-dead condition when you do not have to. Believe. Walk into all God has as quickly as you can. There is so much that you can be walking in now.