I remember Reese. I met him shortly after my parents moved us to the College Park, Maryland, area in the village of Hollywood. My younger brother, Reese, and I spent hours playing together during our elementary school years. We moved away from Hollywood to Takoma Park in my middle school years. One day while I was in college I happened to run across Reese again. I asked him what was new with him. “Well,” he reported, “I just had to get out of the house and away from my folks. I was feeling stifled. I really needed my freedom. So... I went out and joined the Marines.” Freedom? The Marines? Sounded to me like a contradiction--like jumping from the frying pan into the fire! One doesn’t think of Military discipline in terms of “freedom.”
It’s been just in recent years that maybe I understand the apparent contradiction at least a little bit. Our sons, now grown, have four close friends all of whom are Marines and were deployed to Iraq. For years prior to their service they had become part of our extended family: barbecues, vacations, special events and such. So, when they were deployed to Iraq we went through the anxiety, waiting, and scores of talks and emails. They differed in their agreement to the war itself. They had different ideas about why they were going and the worth of it all. But they all voiced the same conviction. In the decision to join the Marines they had chosen a community. They watched-out for their fellow Marines. They entrusted their lives to one another. And they would defend their comrades lives, even at the cost of their own. Maybe, the freedom that Reese talked about was not so much about the routines and rigors of military discipline. Maybe it was in the choice to commit himself to something.
In today’s lesson from the Romans I think that we hear another linkage of discipline and freedom. We hear it in the first two verses of Romans 8: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.” The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free... from the law of sin and death. Freedom! But notice the condition--the reality--of freedom: There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
No condemnation: Paul writes this emphatically. No condemnation now. It’s present reality. Living in the reality of no condemnation is, indeed, our discipline of freedom! Think about it: living our lives so that we are not condemning is a discipline indeed. But we need to tease out what we’re talking about. Throughout the remainder of today’s passage we read an ongoing interplay between the “flesh” and the “spirit”. In fact, the back and forth between flesh and spirit can almost lead one to distraction! It’s easy to surmise that the passage is drawing a sharp distinction, if not opposition, between the two: flesh and spirit. The law, or way, of the spirit is suggested to be the “Christian” way while the way of the flesh is one of immorality, indulgence, lust, etc.
But I’m convinced that it’s not a dichotomy that distinguishes the flesh and the spirit. In fact, let’s go back to the beginning of Romans. In the first verses of the book Paul announces the gospel that he has been preaching and that has literally taken over his life. Listen to how Paul introduces the gospel and especially how Paul uses flesh and spirit in describing this gospel.
Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures, the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 1:1-4).
Now, what do we hear? That Jesus was born--descended from David--according to the flesh. And Jesus’ divine power--being called the Son of God--is in the mysterious event of the resurrection according to the spirit. Now, remember that Romans was written before the Gospels. But, whether or not Paul ever heard about virgin births or pre-existence is not really the issue here. No, the gospel--the good news--in Romans is not about superhuman births or pre-existent divinity. Nor is the spirit set in opposition to a contaminated, polluted human nature. Instead, here, Jesus is descended according to the flesh--according to the biological course of events. But, this same Jesus who was executed by the Romans was somehow raised from death and appeared to Paul and called Paul to follow him. Flesh and Spirit are not in opposition here. They are in tension. The ways of flesh follow the standards, the norms of biology, society and common sense. The ways of the flesh establish boundaries and barriers, establish laws and punishments. As a result, the ways of the flesh are always quite comfortable with condemnation. They are even dependent on condemnation to maintain clear boundaries. How else can good be known, except to define and condemn that which is not good?
Indeed, there is now no condemnation because of the mysterious reality of the resurrection: “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you” (Romans 8:11). Flesh and Spirit are here in this tension between ordinary biology--that always ends in death--and the mystery of resurrection. In the spirit we don’t condemn the flesh. Nevertheless, we see that even the best of our biology, our legal systems, and our natural sciences are incomplete (but not evil). The Spirit of life rips open our world to what is more, what is beyond our own limits. We can’t define or explain what we celebrate! Christ is risen! The best we can do is to worship in the mystery that is God.
Living in the reality that there is now no condemnation is a tough discipline. It is tough to refuse to live by normal boundaries, by normal standards, that honor the “good” and exclude the “bad.” No condemnation: it is the same, though the flip-side, of being a people of extravagant welcome. How can we welcome those whom we condemn--or exclude? Even our enemies, if we condemn them--how can we ever welcome them?
Former Congresswoman Pat Shroeder, of Colorado, is a UCC laywoman. She once announced--tongue in cheek--that the UCC is “Democrats at Worship.” But to the degree that she is correct, if our “gospel” is so predictably politics-as-usual as to be either “Democrats at worship” or “Republicans at Worship,” then to that degree are we not edging away from the discipline of freedom that is ours in the Spirit of life? Resurrection is never predictable. We’re just playing a religion game that draws sides and sets out to make winners of its own and losers of its opponents. But, there is now therefore no condemnation.
I am afraid that in all of the unfortunate hype and misunderstanding surrounding our brother Rev. Jeremiah Wright that we missed a profound statement of truth he uttered. One may well not defend all that he said, connoted, or did. But it was in his Press Club appearance, I think, that he said he had told Barak Obama that if Obama would succeed in attaining the Presidency then Jeremiah Wright would be compelled sooner or later to cry out in challenge against Obama, because Obama will then have become part of the political establishment. Was this not a profound insight into today’s passage? No matter how good the person is in office; political systems will only go so far and will always come up short of the mystery of the Spirit of life. Politics and every other natural human system end up dividing and will lead to injustice and need to be called to repentance. Our political alliances--and campaigns--cannot substitute for Christian justice. Political victories can never substitute for freedom. Whenever we end up with political winners and losers--and those politically or socially in versus out--we recognize how difficult and eternally challenging is this discipline of freedom; this living now without condemnation.
This discipline of freedom, this living out the conviction that there really is now no condemnation cannot be sustained as a private, individual concern. We really can only find our way when we find ourselves in a community of faith convinced of that reality for its own life. As communities we stand or fall together. As a community we show or hide this freedom. That is why we cannot abbreviate our commitments. That is why we recite our litany of who we are. We are open and affirming, just peace, multi-cultural & multi-racial, accessible to all. And we are a safe sanctuary church. In each of these we commit ourselves and are committed to one another to take a stand in freedom for extravagant welcome, against condemnation.
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus; for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set us free from the law of sin and death.
Amen.