Jimbo's Jots

There are rules in our house as I am sure there are rules in your house. I did some quick social media fishing and here were some of the wackiest family rules:

• “If you drink milk from the carton you’ll get cancer”;
• “I wasn’t allowed to say pregnant, I had to say ‘with child'”;
• “I could only talk on the phone 6:00 pm-8:00 pm Monday and Friday”;
• “Don’t play with matches, you’ll wet the bed”;
• “Never drink anything with warm cheese (cold or room temp was cheese was ok) because it can cause appendicitis”;

In Romans 6 remember, he warned against sinning because of God’s “free flowing grace”. In chapter 7, Paul warns about following rules just to follow rules. Wiersbe (Be Right) calls it a contrast of license (chapter 6) and legalism (chapter 7).

What Paul gets at in this chapter is that when you focus more on the “rules” (law) of God, then you miss out on the relationship with God and with others. “So, my dear brothers and sisters, this is the point: You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead . . . Now we can serve God, not in the old way of obeying the letter of the law, but in the new way of living in the Spirit.” (Romans 7:4 & 6, emphasis mine)

If we continue with the parenting logic from last week, we should be at the “adolescent” stage of our relationship with God. It’s a matter understanding that while we will sometimes “disagree” with the rules, God still has final say, but in that he is building us in  relationship to Him through the Spirit, which is Paul’s next topic.

Be blessed and be a blessing!