“The Power of the Spirit of Life” by the Rev. Dr. Don Wahlig, July 12^th, 2026, Year A / Proper 10 – Romans 7:15-25a  ¨  Romans 8:1-11

THEME:  The indwelling of the Spirit empowers us to live with true freedom and joy.

Do we have any philosophy majors here? Anyone ever take a philosophy course?  When I was deciding on a major in college, the common wisdom was that majoring in philosophy was an expensive route to unemployment. You may have heard the old joke about the college sophomore at the University of Michigan. He comes home at Thanksgiving and tells his parents he has decided to major in philosophy. After a deep sigh, his father says, "Oh, well that's good, because they just opened up a philosophy factory over in Detroit." I just read an article, however, that turns this joke on its head. It seems that technology firms specializing in Artificial Intelligence are hiring philosophy majors. These firms need philosophy majors to solve the complex ethical and behavioral challenges of building AI models that work like the human brain.

It is fascinating and scary all at the same time, isn’t it? They are trying to get machines to think like human beings. Inevitably it comes down to answering the fundamental question that philosophers have asked for thousands of years. What is the best way to live our lives? In the western world, the early Greeks laid out the foundation for this endeavor. In 400 BC, the Greek philosopher Socrates declared that the best way to live is by continuously examining ourselves in the pursuit of virtue.  Socrates famously said "the unexamined life is not worth living."

A century later, Aristotle took a slightly different approach. Aristotle said the best way to live is by practicing virtue until it becomes habit. The best way to do that is by cultivating friendships that support one another’s quest for virtue. The most satisfying life of all comes from achieving a balance of these virtues, avoiding both excess and deficiency. He called this the Golden Mean. Ever since, philosophers of every age have taken up this question. They have answered it in numerous ways. But to us as Christians, the best answer – in fact, the only answer – is the one Paul gives us in today’s passage from Romans. 

Paul is writing to the church in Rome. At the time he writes, Rome is the center of the known world. He has never been there. He does not know these Roman Christians. But he is very eager to appeal to them. After 10 years of evangelizing in the Eastern Mediterranean, Paul begins to look west.  His vision is to establish a missionary base in Rome to take the gospel to Spain. In order to do that, he needs the financial support of Rome’s Christians. To get that, he first has to solve their immediate problems. And boy do they have problems.  Roman Christians have been persecuted from without and divided by schism from within. A decade before Paul writes this letter, Emperor Claudius expelled Jewish Christians from Rome.  When they were finally allowed to return years later, they discovered that the church had grown tremendously under Gentile leadership. This caused serious division and conflict between the two groups.

Paul addresses this division by emphasizing that Jewish and Gentile Christians are on an equal footing before God. Both are equally sinful. Both are equally liable to judgment. Both are equally subject to condemnation under the law of sin and death. But death is no longer the final word. By sending Jesus to deal with sin, God has taken care of that. For those who have faith, there is no more condemnation. By God’s grace, through faith, all Christians – Jew and Gentile alike – are equally saved in Jesus Christ. This is what Paul calls the law of the Spirit of life. He reminds them that they all have all been given the Spirit. This changes everything. Paul puts it rather dramatically, as he should.  “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 through his Spirit that dwells within you.” 

 Paul is answering the fundamental question philosophers have asked for ages. What is the best way to live? According to the Spirit. Today we ask the same question. We just frame it differently. Some ask, “How can I live a purpose-driven life?” Others ask, “How can I live my best life?” It is all the same question. And, as Paul tells us, there is only one answer. Set your mind on the Spirit and live for the things of the Spirit. The reward is true life and lasting peace.

I thought about that this past week as we struggled to recover from those fierce storms that blew through here on July 4^th weekend, one after the other.  Over 200,000 households and businesses in our area were without electricity. Did any of you lose power?  Wouldn’t it have been nice if restoring power to your home was as simple as plugging your house back into the grid? That is exactly what Paul is suggesting. All of us have the Spirit within easy reach. In fact, it is already inside us. It is up to us to plug into it.  We do that by setting our minds on the Spirit. It is the ultimate power source for living our lives. We do that by cooperating with the Spirit, yielding to its nudges to do the work God would have us do. We become God’s co-workers, laboring to make this world more like the next one.

Living in the Spirit boils down to relationships. It is a life lived in right relationship with God, with our neighbors, and with God’s glorious creation.  It is the only way to a life of true peace and joy. Few have ever understood this better than the early church’s greatest theologian, Augustine of Hippo.   Augustine was born in North Africa in the 4^th century.  Based on his early life, you would never suspect that he would become one of the most prominent voices of Christian faith. As a young man, Augustine's life was a misguided search for that which truly satisfies. At first, his pursuit led him to a life of hedonism and sexual immorality. 

He had a first-rate mind, however. He found that loose living did nothing to satisfy his intellectual pursuit of a life of meaning. So, he began to follow various philosophers. For nine years he followed a Persian sect called Manichaeism. Eventually, he realized that it had no answers to his most probing questions. By this time, Augustine and his mother had moved to Milan.  In Milan, he became a well-known professor of rhetoric.  He was outwardly successful, but inside he felt a profound emptiness, a spiritual malaise. He began to sense that this inner void was the result of pouring his heart and mind into things that did not truly satisfy.

Fortunately for him, his mother was a devout Christian. One day, she suggested that Augustine go to worship to hear the preaching of the local bishop, a man named Ambrose. Bishop Ambrose was renowned for his rhetorical skill and eloquence in the pulpit. Initially, Augustine went to hear him preach purely out of professional interest. But as he continued to go, the content of the Bishop's preaching began to take hold. In the persistent prayers of his mother, and the profound preaching of Bishop Ambrose, God worked through the Spirit to change Augustine from the inside out, drawing his heart closer to God.

It took a while for his growing faith to translate into Christ-like living.  Then one day, with the Spirit’s guidance, he opened his Bible to Paul’s letter to the Romans. There he found Paul’s message of salvation by grace through faith.  Augustine embraced it. The more he allowed the Spirit to shape his desires and his way of living, the more satisfying his life became. His relationship with God and others deepened. He had finally found the secret to a life of true meaning.  It convinced him that the only satisfying way to live is according to the Spirit.

Friends, the same is true for you and me. Living in the Spirit taps into the Spirit’s power to purify our desires and to reorder our living. It leads us to form friendships of love and mutual care. The result is a truly satisfying life of peace and joy. This is what Augustine meant when he famously prayed to God, "You have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you."

How about you? Would you like to live a life of great joy and lasting peace? A life of deeper relationships, greater meaning, and more profound satisfaction? We all want that, don’t we? God wants it for us, as well. It is the only life worth living.  In his Spirit, we have the power to live it. The Spirit’s power is as close as your next breath and your next thought. It is there for all of us to tap into.  The question is will we?

May it be so.