Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 6 "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. John 3:5-6 (NASB)
The spirit of man is the part of us that died when Adam and Eve first sinned. God warned Adam that “from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat 
from it you will surely die.” Genesis 2:17 (NASB) God does not lie. They died on the inside that day; even though death did not claim their bodies and souls for many years. God’s great salvation through Christ reverses the death process. When a person places his or her faith and allegiance in Christ and His finished work on the cross and the resurrection, a new birth takes place in the spirit. God makes us new creatures inside, but the full manifestation of that miracle will not be seen until the resurrection.
Just as the death process began in the spirit and later manifested in the soul and body, our new life in Christ begins in the spirit and eventually transforms us in the soul and body.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)
When Adam and Eve died on the inside following their sin, it showed up in their souls (mind, will, and emotions) almost immediately. They experienced guilt and condemnation for the first time. When we are born again in the spirit, something begins to change in our souls, too.
The first thing God takes care of for us is the guilt and condemnation problem.
The Bible says that anyone who is justified by faith has peace with God. Peace is the polar opposite of guilt and condemnation.
Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, Romans 5:1 (NASB)
This peace comes from being in a right relationship with God, which is accomplished by the removal of all guilt and condemnation. Our sins are forgiven, and condemnation is removed. In other words, we are declared “not guilty!” This happens in the spirit, even if we are not fully aware of it or believe it.
Our growth as disciples happens in a large part because we become educated in what the Scriptures reveal about the person and work of Christ in our lives and begin to believe it.
Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Romans 12:2 (NLT)
If a murderer, while waiting on death row, were to receive a visit from the family of the one he murdered and received forgiveness from them, he would still be under the sentence of death at the hands of God’s earthly minister of justice, the government. His sin would have been forgiven, but his guilt would remain. Jesus did an amazing thing for us. God’s justice and wrath were both satisfied when He bore our sin on the cross. God’s wrath was appeased, resulting in forgiveness. This is called “propitiation”. God’s justice was also satisfied, resulting in our justification.
To be justified means to be declared “Not Guilty”! Our names were cleared of all crimes under which we stood convicted and sentenced to die.
That is why Jesus boldly proclaimed:
I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. John 5:24 (NIV)
Paul’s words in Romans completely agree.
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, Romans 8:1 (NIV) [* See note at end of chapter.]
The purpose of the Law is to condemn us for our sins and drive us into the arms of our Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ.
Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. 24 So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. 25 Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law. Galatians 3:23-25 (NIV)
When we come to Christ and receive justification, the condemnation produced by the Law is removed.
Because we have received Christ’s own righteousness, there is nothing left for the Law to condemn.
This is the reason why we can “walk” or live in the Spirit of grace rather than under a set of laws. Sin gains its power in our lives when we succumb to the accusations of the devil and condemnation for our failures pointed out by the Law. In 1Cor.15:56, Paul wrote that “the law gives sin its power,” meaning that God’s prohibitions stimulate the “flesh” to rebel, and, after we sin, it seeks to keep us focused on our failures and under a cloud of defeat. Instead, we are to focus on our Lord and the freedom we have in Christ, allowing the Spirit to work inside us to change our inmost desires into conformity with God’s will. And when we do sin, we are to admit it and repent, but not get mired down in condemnation. Sadly, many believers either do not understand this great truth or simply do not believe it.
It is important that we grasp that justification and the removal of condemnation were accomplished in the realm of the spirit. Our souls (hearts and minds) often feel quite condemned when we fail to live up to God’s righteous standards. Unless our souls are trained to believe what God’s Word says about justification, we will quite likely fall back into a works mentality and measure our worthiness and right standing before God in relation to our perceived success in living uprightly. This kind of Christianity is filled with frustration and condemnation and is not what God meant for us.
God wants to lift us out of legalism into a new realm of walking by the “law of the Spirit of life”. (Romans 8:2) For this to happen, our minds must be renewed to think correctly. The end result with be that we live free of condemnation and the struggle of legalism while actually becoming more godly through the working of the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2 because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, 4 in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. Romans 8:1-4 (NIV)
It is impossible to “walk” in the Spirit while under condemnation.
Condemnation makes us withdraw from God and others, just as happened with Adam and Eve in the garden. They hid from God after sinning and becoming aware of the guilt and failure. Many Christians today are hiding from God because they do not understand justification. Even when we fail miserably, we are encouraged to “draw near” to God to receive his forgiveness, affirmation, and help. It is when we are most obviously a “failure” that we need God the most. He will never reject us because Christ has totally satisfied the requirements of the Law on our behalf. Our relationship with God is sealed and secure. The more we draw near to God, the greater is the liberating and transformative work of the Spirit.
This Lord is the Spirit. Wherever the Lord's Spirit is, there is freedom. 18 As all of us reflect the Lord's glory with faces that are not covered with veils, we are being changed into his image with ever-increasing glory. This comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 (GW)
The new birth is a hidden work of God in our inmost being, the spirit, but ultimately this salvation in seed form will grow and manifest itself in every area. It is like leaven that works its way into the whole batch of dough.
We must have confidence that what God begins in us, though seemingly small and hidden, will eventually conquer and result in our transformation into the image of Christ.
And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. Philippians 1:6 (NLT)
This is what God has planned all along.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified. Romans 8:28-30 (NIV)
From this passage we see how the salvation that begins in the spirit will eventually result in a day-to-day transformation of our thinking and behavior (the salvation of the soul) and finally be manifested in the glorification of our bodies in the resurrection (the salvation of the body). The salvation of the Spirit can be termed a “past” salvation because it was accomplished once for all through Christ some 2000 years ago. The salvation of the soul is “present” because new grace is needed each day as we believe and apply what Christ has done for us. Paul calls this “working out our salvation” in Philippians 2:12. The salvation or glorification of our bodies is in the future. In the next meditation, we will look in more detail at the “once for all” nature of the salvation of the spirit.
* Note pertaining to Romans 8:1 - Later Greek manuscripts added the phrase "who live according to the Spirit", but this addition is not in the earliest manuscripts. We must remember that the Word of God AS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN is the infallible message from God. I suspect later editors who did not fully comprehend the grace of God could not abide such a wonderfully freeing message and felt compelled to add in the legalistic terms that once again seek to place the reader on a performance basis with God rather than allow him or her to fully enjoy the grace of God. John 5:24 has no such addition and further confirms that the earlier manuscripts were correct.
Questions for Further Study and Discussion
- Why would a lesson entitled “Born of the Spirit” end up focusing on freedom from condemnation?
- How would you explain the difference between forgiveness and justification?
- Do you think that a person who feels condemned by God can live in the freedom God intends? Why?
- If you were trying to help someone who feels condemned, what would you tell them?
