In this meeting, we need to touch another crucial point in Romans which is basically related to the Body of Christ. I don’t know how much you have really entered into this book. Many Christians do have some understanding of the book of Romans. Even we ourselves had the Life-study Training of Romans, and over the years we have put out sixty-five messages on this book. In this Training I consider that all of you have read through those sixty-five messages. Based upon this understanding, I want to ask a question: Besides the organic union, which is very much implied in this book concerning the Body of Christ, what is another vital item in Romans that has so much to do, not only with the Body of Christ, but also with the organic union? Actually, the organic union, strictly speaking, does not bring us into the Body of Christ so directly. The organic union first brings us into something prior to the Body of Christ. Romans does not tell us in such a direct way that we are the Body of Christ. The Body of Christ is not mentioned or touched or revealed before chapter twelve. In the preceding eleven chapters there are many basic items. No doubt the first basic item is justification by faith, including reconciliation with God. Then after justification by faith there is the matter of the organic union, because there is such a phrase as, “unto justification of life” (5:18). The organic union is a kind of issue from justification. Justification is not for justification itself; justification is unto life, for life. This is in chapter five.
In chapter eight there is a big and vital item that has been neglected by nearly all the Christians. This is the matter of sonship. In at least one of the messages on Romans, we did point out strongly that the focal point of this book is not justification by faith nor sanctification but to make sinners into the sons of God. The focal point of Romans is to produce sonship for the Body. In reading the Bible you may first touch the surface, but then you need to dive into that part and get to the bottom. In every chapter of the Bible there are these two aspects: the aspect of the surface and the aspect of the depth. Many Christians have touched the surface of Romans 8, but they have not seen something that is deeper.
Every Christian realizes that we need the Spirit. So, when you come to the Bible and you read any chapter which has this term, the Spirit, it is easy for you to see. This is because the matter of the Spirit is already in your Christian realization. But one thing is very strange and very foreign to the Christian realization. In a sense it is absent. This is the matter of sonship. For many years I read the book of Romans and I especially paid much attention to verse 23 concerning the redemption of our body. That term I picked up easily. But I never picked up the thought of sonship. Let us read verse 23: “And not only so, but we ourselves also, having the firstfruit of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan in ourselves, eagerly expecting sonship, the redemption of our body.” In this verse the redemption of our body is in apposition to the matter of sonship. Although I had picked up the matter of the redemption of the body I never saw the matter of sonship. Some translations of the Bible even use the word adoption rather than sonship. The word adoption confuses the concept. Actually, it is the sonship to be a son of God. Yes, chapter eight is a chapter of the Spirit but there is some progress. It goes from the Spirit to sonship. Verse 2 first speaks of the Spirit of life. According to verse 10 the Spirit of life is first in our spirit. Then verse 6 points out that the life of the Spirit spreads into our mind and in verse 11 it even saturates our mortal body. From verses 14, 15, and 16 we could see that the Spirit of life is the Spirit of sonship. This Spirit makes us sons of God. The Spirit of life produces sons of God. So the Spirit of life is eventually the Spirit of sonship making us sons of God.