Who calls your cadence? Romans 8.5-11

Picture in your mind’s eye the scenes of young cadets, spiffy and shiny, called to attention, ready for inspection, and then to “maa-rch . . . right, left, forward, halt!”  Sound off . . . and march again.  Why do the cadets respond as they do?  Because their cadence has been called. 

Who calls your cadence?  I mean . . . there must be some reason you do what you do.  Do you allow your cadence to be called by your sinful human nature—whose goal it is to fulfill your desires for pleasure, passion, ambition, or something that is fleeting?   Is it the world’s priorities (or lack thereof) that pressure you, trying to squeeze you into its mold?  Hmmm . . . Or have you given yourself to something far greater—the cause of Christ? 

Paul makes the case that we either choose to live for self, or we give ourselves over to God, allowing his ways to dominate our thinking and behavior.  In essence, either we call our own cadence, (sometimes just by default, because we do not order much of anything in our lives!), or we ‘fall in’ and let God call our cadence.

Paul writes, “Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit.  So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death.  But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace.  For the sinful nature is always hostile to God.  It never did obey God’s laws, and it never will.  That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God.

  But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit of God living in you.  (And remember that those who do not have the Spirit of Christ living in them do not belong to him at all.)  And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God.  The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you.  And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.”  Rom. 8.5-11, NLT

[Seldom do I mention the difference in Bibles, but it is an oft-asked question about why we have so many versions . . . some are translated from the original languages (Greek and Hebrew) word for word, others thought for thought, and some are paraphrases.  But as you know, language changes and evolves according to its culture, and so updating manuscripts to fit the understanding of the reader is vital as well.  The above version is the New Living Translation— very readable and user friendly, in today’s language, and still a reliable translation.  The following passage is from “The Message” which is a paraphrase; at times, The Message stimulates my response to Scripture in a totally different way—and I like that.  If you would like to read a little more on this, check out www.Pastorwoman.com, select ‘Powerful Bible Teaching’, then ‘Morning Briefings’, and then ‘On the Bible…’ which has several offerings.)

The Message  Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God's action in them find that God's Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn't pleased at being ignored.

 9-11But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God's terms. It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!”  Romans 8.5-11

So, Friends … your cadence – who calls it?  Your selfish human nature . . . or do you surrender that to God, and allow the Holy Spirit living within you to lead, direct, guide and draw you to himself??  Hmmm . . .

Christine

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