Now that we have seen something concerning the fellowship of life, we want to go on to see the sense of life. We saw in the previous message that the fellowship of life is realized by the sense of life and that the sense of life preserves the fellowship of life.
Romans 8:6 says that the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace. Verse 2 of Romans 8 speaks of the law of the Spirit of life and verse 11 of the Spirit who dwells in us. Then we have to read Ephesians 4:18-19. In verse 18 there is the life of God. The unbelievers are alienated from the life of God. Then verse 19 says that they are "past feeling." Hebrews 8:10 says that in the new testament God writes His laws within the believers. Then 1 John 2:27 speaks concerning the anointing that teaches the believers concerning all things. John 15:4-5 speaks of our mutual abiding with the Lord, and Philippians 2:13 speaks of God operating within us both the willing and the working for His good pleasure. These are some of the most precious verses in the New Testament, and they all have something to do with the sense of life. Of course, in the whole New Testament you cannot find a verse that directly uses the term the sense of life. But the sense of life is thoroughly implied and referred to in all the above verses.
First, we need to see the meaning, the definition, of the sense of life.
The sense of life on the negative side is the feeling of death, a kind of negative feeling. This is definitely revealed in Romans 8:6. We have to realize Romans 8:6 is altogether a verse of sensation because it says the mind set on the flesh is death. This is not only a fact, but it is also a matter of feeling, a matter of consciousness. When you set your mind on the flesh, you have the sense of death. You feel that death is there.
The feeling of death is the inner feeling of weakness, emptiness, uneasiness, restlessness, depression, dryness, darkness, pain, etc.—on the negative side (Rom. 8:6a). When you sense that you are weak, empty, uneasy, restless, depressed, dried up, darkened, and in pain within, this indicates that death is there. When death is here, this means that you have set your mind on the flesh. To set the mind on the flesh simply means to live in the flesh. The mind is the key of our daily walk. The key opens the gate for us to walk on the way. To set the mind on the flesh simply means to open the gate of the flesh and to walk the fleshly way. Thus, when you sense death is here, you have to realize that you are living, walking, in the flesh. This is the negative function of the sense of life.