Romans 8:5-17

Some people do what their weak human thoughts want them to do. They think about the things that will make themselves happy. But people who live with God's Spirit as their guide think about what will make God's Spirit happy. People who let their human thoughts rule them will die. But people who think about what God's Spirit wants will have life with God. They will have peace inside themselves. If our weak human thoughts rule us, we become God's enemies. People like that do not want to obey God's Law. They are not even able to obey it. People who let their human thoughts rule them cannot make God happy. But you are not like that. You no longer obey your weak human thoughts. Instead, you obey God's Spirit as your guide. That is true if God's Spirit is really living in you. But if anyone does not have Christ's Spirit in them, that person does not belong to Christ. But, if Christ lives in you, you have a new life because of his Spirit. Your body will die one day because of the power of sin. But your spirit lives because Christ has made you right with God. God raised Jesus, to make him alive again after his death. Now God's Spirit lives in you. So God, who raised Christ from death, will also cause your human bodies to live again. He will do that by his Spirit who lives in you. So, my Christian friends, we must not obey what our weak human thoughts tell us to do. We no longer have to live like that. If you agree to live in that way, you will die. Instead, you should let God's Spirit help you with his power. Then you can stop doing the wrong things that your bodies want to do. As a result, you will have life with God. All those people who live with God's Spirit as their guide are God's children. The Spirit that you have received from God does not make you serve him like slaves. That would make you afraid again. No. The Spirit that God has given to you causes you to become God's children. Now he takes care of you. God's Spirit makes us call God: ‘Abba, our Father.’ God's Spirit himself causes us to know that we are God's children. God's Spirit and our own spirits agree that this is true. Because we are God's children, we also know that we will receive good things from him. Those are the things that he has promised to give to his children. Together with Christ, we will receive the things that God has kept for him. That is true if we agree to have troubles like Christ did. Then we will also enjoy life in heaven like Christ does.