GORDON FEE: God’s Empowering Presence

Rom 12.2 Do not be conformed to this world

outside the citadel at Prejmer, Romania

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This is the context:

I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.

We look to Gordon Fee for an explanation of the passage, from his book God’s Empowering Presence. It is a book on Pauline theology that arose from Fee’s lifetime as a Pentecostal, with dissatisfaction on the one hand that the crucial role of the Spirit in Paul’s life and thought is so often either overlooked or given mere lip service, and on the other hand that the Pentecostal movement, in many instances, lacks a sound exegetical basis. Fee has devoted his life to studying Paul in his letters, so it will be interesting to see what he says here.

Fee’s purpose in God’s Empowering Presence is to correct the modern church’s lack of emphasis and understanding of the Spirit as an experienced and living reality. He says that any understanding of Paul that does not recognize the crucial role of the Spirit in his theology quite misses Paul’s own concerns and emphases. And he finishes his introduction by saying that:

My ultimate concern, for myself and for the contemporary church, is to persuade that we would do well to return to our biblical roots on this matter, if the church is going to count for anything at all in the new millennium that lies just around the corner.

With such a starting point we can expect Fee to have a certain perspective on things, and from the outset I admit it is not mine. Yes, I do agree the church needs correction, but I do not agree that the problem is a lack of emphasis and understanding of the Spirit as an experienced and living reality. I think the church emphasizes the Spirit far too much. I did not choose Rom 12.2 as one of the difficult passages in order to go up against Fee, but here we are, so let’s see the differences.

Fee’s comments here are abstracted and paraphrased, but hopefully nothing in his argument has been changed. This is the gist of what he says:

Although there is no direct reference to the Holy Spirit in this passage, the Spirit is presupposed everywhere and is especially evident in “holy” in verse 1 and “be transformed by the renewing of the mind” in verse 2.

The sacrificial language of verse 1 speaks to a new, radically transformed Torah. Under the old Torah, the sacrifice was of live animals that were killed. But now we (those who are alive from the dead), give ourselves wholly to God as a living sacrifice.

As a living sacrifice, we have a renewed mind that allows us to test and thereby approve the will of God, which refers to walking in his ways.

It is difficult to find an appropriate translation of λογικἡν [logicon] at the end of verse 1. The ASV, RSV, NASB, NAB, NW, and NRSV translate it as “spiritual” worship. Others, such as the KJV, translate it as “reasonable” worship. Some say it should be “rational” to stand in contrast to unthinking: either animal sacrifices or merely ritual religious observances. But the phrase must be traced back to 1.21: those who worshiped the creature instead of the Creator and in so doing evidenced their foolish reasonings and senseless minds. But we worship God in a way radically the opposite of that fallenness: with a mind that is renewed. Hence it is best understood as an anticipation of the “renewed mind” in verse 2.

How then do we translate it? Not as “spiritual”, for that is thoroughly misleading, nor as “reasonable”, for that too contains many pitfalls. Possibly it cannot be translated as a word at all and instead must be explained as a phrase: “the service that a rational being created in God’s image, with a mind renewed by the Spirit, can offer.”

About the phrase: “be transformed by the renewing of the mind”: For Paul, the phrase denotes the work of the Holy Spirit, for having a renewed mind is equal to having the Spirit. The renewed mind is in contrast to those who exist in “this age”, who live in the flesh and cannot please God. The “rational worship” of verse 1 is the direct result of a mind that has been renewed by the Spirit.

The renewed mind moves in two directions. On the one hand, through the action of the Spirit in “transforming” believers, we no longer live in conformity to the present age. On the other, we are now equipped to discern what God’s will is: what is the good and pleasing thing we are to do.

We should note that in 11.34 the mind of God is described as past finding out. But what may have been true of God’s dealings with the Jew and Gentile, Paul says that those with the Spirit can know what God’s will is. But that cannot lead to arrogance, for in verse 3 Paul argues vigorously that the renewed mind is not an arrogant mind, but a sensible one.

I hope I have done Fee’s work justice. It is quite lengthy and involved, and you should read it yourself to get the full impact of his argument. I will give first my explanation of Rom 12.1-2 and then reply to Fee.

Rom 12.1 stands as a “therefore” to chapter 12, much the same as Heb 12.1 is a “therefore” to the list of heroes in chapter 11. Paul is warning us to not follow the example of Israel. They thought that the godlessness of the Gentiles disqualified them from God’s mercy, but in fact it was the Jew’s disobedience that caused them to be broken off. Paul warns us that we stand only through faith. We take that as an assurance, but Paul takes that as a vulnerability. If we act as the Jews did, we too will be broken off, for it is easier for God to graft Israel back in than it was for him to graft the Gentile in.

It is essentially the same image and message as 1 Cor 10, where Paul says that Israel had the same baptism as us, the same spiritual food, the same spiritual drink, and the same Christ—and still, God struck them down. And so Paul warns: we have the advantage of seeing what God will not tolerate. We must learn from their example, not repeat it.

So, when Paul says “by the mercies of God”, he is appealing to them to see the sense of it. After all God has done for you, does it make sense to regard it so lightly? After you have been brought from death to life, does it make sense to show so little gratitude?

The only logical, reasonable, thinking response is to take this life which you have been given and use it for God. Anything less is senseless, irrational, ungrateful. It does not take someone with the Spirit to see this: anyone would say that someone whose life has been saved requires a response; at the very least to have a different attitude from then on.

So what Paul is addressing is a correction to 11.25 and 12.3: the absurdity of thinking that you have your position before God as a right. God says of Israel, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.” Do we really think he will tolerate a new batch of disobedient and contrary people? He broke that branch off. If we also are disobedient and contrary, what will he do then? Pay no mind? Would he not then have to apologize to Israel for punishing them for what he tolerates in us?

A disobedient and contrary people live in the world rather than for God. Paul says that is what we are doing. That’s why he makes his appeal. Would he use such language if nothing was wrong? Wouldn’t he say instead, “I praise God that you are doing this”? We all want to think that God is pleased with us, but Paul says that if your life is largely the same as your neighbor’s, then you look like the world instead of the people of God. If we live in the same kinds of houses, drive the same kinds of cars, and devote our lives to the same pursuits (jobs, toys), then we are not living for God, we are living for ourselves, just like everyone else.

Paul says “holy and acceptable” because God demands to have the first and the best, not our leftovers. God said of lame and sick sacrifices: Go ahead and present that to your king: See what he says! The gift of God is the very best he has: his Son. To reply with only the most meager of gifts is thoughtless.

And so our “reasonable worship” is what a normal, good, intelligent person would do when someone does something spectacularly nice for them. Anything less is stupid and rude, both because it makes no sense in light of all that has been done for us and because good people don’t act that way. But here, in the hypernormal elevation, the people who are supposed to know and love God, it is astonishingly unreasonable because we know what happened to Israel when they acted badly.

In church we have a worship leader to lead us in singing and prayer. This is not that. There is a time and place for singing and praying, but this worship is the reasonable, expected response people would make in light of what has been done for them. Paul says the same thing in 2 Cor 6.15:

He died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.

He died for you and your response is to come to church? Not reasonable. Giving your life to him who gave his life for you is reasonable. Coming to church and singing and praying is not.

If the life of sacrifice was appropriate for Jesus, it is appropriate for his people also. Every step he took was in obedience to the Father. His will was not his own; his life was not his own. True worship is giving ourselves to God, as if our lives are no longer ours. Heb 10.5-9 says this:

When Christ came into the world, he said,

Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired,

but a body you have prepared for me.

Jesus explicitly says it: “Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired.” If God doesn’t want it, why do we insist that he takes it? He continues:

In burnt offerings and sin offerings

you have taken no pleasure.

Then I said, ‘See, God, I have come to do your will, O God.”

We must ask again: If Jesus says God takes no pleasure in offerings and instead is pleased with the person who does his will, then why do we give offerings instead of doing what he wants? The vast majority of churchgoers think that if they give some money other people will do what needs to be done. And yet, after insisting on this distant relationship to the work, we insist on a close relationship with him. It doesn’t work that way.

If you insist on distance, that’s what you get. If you come close, he’s already there. The important thing is not that Christ prayed but that he obeyed. If Christ had only prayed for you, you would still be in your sins. You have life because he came, suffered, died, and rose again. Responding to that with songs and prayers is not reasonable.

It might be asking too much to aspire to the impossible example we have in Christ, but neither can we say that singing and praying is the same thing.

It is the work of the Spirit to transform us, but he does not do it for people still cocooned in the world. The only reason we need a transformed mind is to live for God. If you’re living for yourself, your natural mind is good enough.

For those who leave the world and do the will of God, then yes: the Spirit is absolutely essential, because the Spirit helps us to know what God wants. But it is a joint effort, and it is always possible to turn back. In Phil 3.13-14 Paul said he strains forward toward the goal. It is not an easy thing to start; it is much more difficult to keep going; it’s almost impossible to make it to the end.

My response to Fee:

We have a problem as soon as he says “What is surprisingly missing is any direct reference to the Holy Spirit. Nonetheless, the Spirit is presupposed everywhere.” Granted, he announced at the beginning that he is a Pentecostal, but as soon as any commentator of any stripe says “it’s not there, but it’s presupposed everywhere” we have a problem, because he has arrested the suspect he wants, which means it’s very likely the real guy is still out there. We are never allowed to look at a passage of Scripture wanting to see something. For Fee to admit it and wade in anyway is astonishing.

And so Fee sees the Spirit in the word “holy” and in “reasonable worship” in verse 1, and in “transformed” and “renewing” and “the will of God” in verse 2, and just about everywhere—as he said he would do. But Paul in Phil 2.14-15 tells us what holy and acceptable means, in roughly the same language:

Do all things without murmuring and arguing, so that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, in which you shine like stars in the world.

Paul says that if we live too much in the world we will inherit its bad traits and then lose our light. In Eph 5.25-27 he says it again:

Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, so as to present the church to himself in splendor, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind—yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish.

Yes, the Spirit has a significant role in this, but the responsibility is also upon us. Paul never says that it is the work of the Spirit to take us out of the world.

And that goes to the heart of my problem with Fee. The tenor of his explanation is that we, as believers, will do this—or possibly have already done it, just by being Christians. He is looking at the demand in reverse: saying that since we are Christians and have the Spirit we already fulfill the demand. So why does Paul spill so much ink talking to Christians then?

Following is a lengthy quote from page 602, but it speaks to the heart of the matter so it is reproduced here in full. I have added footnote reference numbers to point you to my comments below.

Scholars have regularly (and rightly) noted that the key phrase, “be transformed by the renewing of the mind” denotes for Paul the particular work of the Spirit.1 First, we noted on 1 Cor 2:16 and 7:40 that “having the mind of Christ” and “having the Spirit of God” are nearly interchangeable ideas,2 suggesting that to have a renewed mind is equal to having the Spirit.3 Moreover, the verb ἀνακαίνὀω (lit. = “make new again”) is specifically attributed to the Spirit in Tit 3:5,4  an understanding that is surely presuppositional here, especially in a letter where life in Christ vis-à-vis Torah observance is described as “in the newness of the Spirit” (7:6).5 Not only so, but the verb Paul uses regarding the renewed mind (“transformed”) is found once elsewhere in the corpus (2 Cor 3:18) where the Spirit causes us to be “transformed” into God’s own likeness.6 That the “renewed mind” represents eschatological existence over against “this age,” 7 plus its place in the argument (picking up from 8:1-30), also seems to point to the Spirit as presuppositional; over against those who belong to this age, who live in the flesh and therefore cannot please God (8:8),8 the Spirit person 9 can discern and do what is pleasing to God. Thus in a variety of ways the Spirit hovers close to the surface in this language.

My remarks:

1. Certainly the transforming of the mind is not a human endeavor, for how could the natural mind make itself into something it is not? It is only God who can make us into something that we aren’t. But, this means only that it must be God, not that God must do it.

Paul is appealing for us to give ourselves wholly to God so we can be made valuable to his work. We cannot do his work with a mind that is not being transformed, but we cannot be transformed without first presenting ourselves to him. Step 1 is to present your bodies as a living sacrifice. If verse 2 can happen without verse 1, why did Paul even mention it?

2. In 1 Cor 2.16 Paul is talking about himself and his fellow workers, not everyone, and certainly not the Corinthians, for he says in the very next verse that they are not spiritual people and do not have the mind of Christ.

In 1 Cor 7.40 Paul is again talking about himself. Sometimes when he gives instructions he says it is a command of the Lord, sometimes not, and so it is only his opinion. Here he says it is his opinion, but they should nevertheless pay attention because his judgment is that of a man who has the Spirit of God. He does not say that our judgments are also trustworthy in the same way, and the insinuation is that the Spirit of God is not undergirding their judgments, otherwise his guidance on these matters would be unnecessary.

Even if for Paul “having the mind of Christ” and “having the Spirit of God” are nearly interchangeable ideas, that says nothing about us. Paul was an apostle and an author of Scripture. We cannot say that what was true for him is also true for us. We must learn from him, but we cannot make ourselves his equal just because we too are Christians.

3. This is a huge problem! Fee says that “to have a renewed mind is equal to having the Spirit.” He is saying it will happen: if you have the Spirit, you will have a renewed mind. That’s impossible, both because I have been in the church long enough to know that if everyone has a renewed mind then it means nothing, and because the New Testament spends most of its time making the point that the people of God do not have renewed minds, are not doing the will of God, and are not pleasing to him. Are we to believe that the warnings in Rev 2 and 3 are to people with renewed minds? Or that Paul’s sarcasm in 1 Cor 4 is to people with renewed minds? Why was Paul’s warning in 2 Cor 13 necessary if the people had renewed minds? Paul’s letters to Timothy on what to expect in his ministry assume that people will not have renewed minds.

his is a serious, even fatal, flaw in Fee’s reasoning. To say that having the Spirit inevitably ends in a renewed mind is fantasy. It’s not the way it happens, not in Paul’s day, not now.

4. Titus 3.5 may share the same word, but it does not share the same idea. Titus 3.5 speaks of how we are saved. Rom 12.2 speaks of how we live. Those are two very different things.

5. Rom 7.6 does not speak of “newness” in the same context as 12.2. This is the context (v 3-6):

If her husband dies, she is free from that law so that she is not an adulteress if she marries another man.

In the same way, you have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that we may bear fruit for God. While we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are discharged from the law, dead to that which held us captive, so that we are slaves not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit.

Being discharged from the law and given new life is not the same thing at all as having a renewed mind. Fee has a Spirit-spot on his glasses. Everywhere he looks he sees the Spirit. This is disturbing. If he doesn’t see the word “Spirit” it is presupposed. If he does see the word “Spirit” it means the same thing as “Spirit” somewhere else. He doesn’t even bother to look at what who is talking, who is being talked about, or what is being said. This is astonishingly poor exegesis.

6. 2 Cor 3:18 is difficult. Here are some translations:

NRSV And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected

in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to

another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

NIV And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being

transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord,

who is the Spirit.

NASB But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being

transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.

Fee says “the Spirit causes us to be “transformed” into God’s own likeness.” That is not what the verse says. Paul says the transformation comes from the Lord, the Spirit, but he does not say the Spirit causes it. That is a very different thing.

Paul says that if we are not conformed to this world and if we present ourselves to God as living sacrifices, and if that sacrifice is holy and acceptable, then our mind can be transformed and we can do what God wants. For Fee to use the word “causes” considerably changes the Scripture.

7. It is a serious issue for Fee to say that the “renewed mind” represents eschatological existence over against “this age”, meaning that a person inhabits one but not the other. In 1 Thess 5 Paul is talking about the end times and tells the church that they are all children of light and children of the day; not of darkness or of the night. This is on point to Fee’s argument: the children of the day are the children of the new age; the children of the night are the children of “this age”.

But Paul does not use this as an encouragement: he uses it as a warning, saying that they must not act like the children of the night. His warning means it is possible to act like those who are of “this age”, and in verses 4-6 he tells them to not do it, with sobering words:

But you, beloved, are not in darkness, for that day to surprise you like a thief; for we are not of the night or of darkness. So then let us not fall asleep as others do.

Paul’s tells them that those who have fallen asleep (died) will be resurrected when the Lord returns, and then those of us who are still alive will be caught up with them to meet the Lord in the air. But he says that if they fall asleep (go back into the world) they may be caught by surprise. He doesn’t say what that will mean to their eternal fate, but it is rather terrifying to consider, and he tells them strongly to not do it—which can mean nothing but that they can do it. Paul gives the same warning in 1 Cor 10.11-12:

These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down to instruct us, on whom the ends of the ages have come. So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall.

For Fee to say that the children of light live in the light is terribly wrong and a bit painful, both because he should know better and because people might actually believe him.

8. In Rom 8.8 Paul does say that those who are in the flesh cannot please God, but he uses it as the lower limit: something the people of God are to stay above.

In Rom 8.9-11 Paul talks about who we are. He says we are not in the flesh; we are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in us. He makes the separation between two types of people very clear: Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. All this is true, obviously.

But in the verses preceding and following he talks about what we do. In 8.9-11 he uses the word “in” constantly. In 8.5-7 he never uses “in”, nor in 8.12-17. Yes, if Christ is in you, you are a child of God. Full stop. But Paul says in verses 5-7 and 12-17 that we must then also act as children of God. Rom 8.8 says that those in the flesh cannot rise to a level where they can please God, but it does not say that those in Christ are not able to lower themselves to where they once were.

Fee confuses things terribly here. It simply is not true that a person who is in Christ automatically acts like Christ. To make a claim like that is just bizarre. Fee has to only open his eyes to see how completely untrue that is. What can 8.13 mean except that it is possible to living according to the flesh? What can 8.15 mean except that it is possible to fall back? Fee has closed his eyes to any contrary word.

Possibly the most glaring example of that is his avoidance of Rom 8.17b. This is the verse in context (v 16-17):

It is that very Spirit that bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.

That “if” standing in the middle of verse 17 is critical. Paul conditions things up to that point on this “if”. Paul says clearly that we are joint heirs with Christ if we suffer with him. Paul says that we are glorified with him if we suffer with him. Strong words. Yet Fee gives them no weight.

For 55 pages, from page 515 to 570, Fee examines verses 1-17a in detail, but when he comes upon that “if” he only repeats the words and then goes on to verse 18. He gives Rom 5.3 (we also boast in our sufferings) similar light treatment and says nothing of Paul’s sufferings in 2 Cor 11.

He knows the words are there, but he spends no time on them. A person might argue that he doesn’t discuss what’s not necessary to his argument. I don’t agree. It’s not that it doesn’t fit; it’s that it goes against what he is saying.

Paul puts that signpost in the middle of chapter 8 intentionally. It is there for a reason. He talks about suffering in ch 5 for a reason too. And the whole picture of 2 Cor 10–12 simply falls apart if we skip past 11.23-33.

Paul’s important point in all of his discussions of sufferings is that it is the way to know Christ. Heb 5.8-9 says that Christ learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him. (Fee doesn’t cover that in his book either.) Christ would not have been the perfect sacrifice if he had not stayed inside the suffering. He had to do the will of the Father perfectly in order to be the perfect sacrifice, and that meant horrible sufferings.

Fee wants our living sacrifice to be spiritual only. No despair, no difficulty, no pain. Fee’s sacrifice is one that exists in the mind only. He doesn’t know the sufferings Paul speaks of—and doesn’t want to—and so he only repeats the words.

The sufferings of Christ made him a worthy sacrifice. The sufferings of Paul helped complete the sufferings of Christ (Col 1.24). Without Christ’s sufferings we would have no salvation. Without Paul’s sufferings we would have virtually no New Testament and might have no church. Yet Fee can see nothing of value in it so he just parrots back the words.

The “if” in 8.17b is there. Tiptoeing past it doesn’t make it go away. Paul said very clearly that we are “joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.”

Christ’s sacrifice would have been worthless if it was in his mind only. Our sacrifice is worthless if it is in our minds only.

9. I don’t like this. For Fee to use a term like “Spirit person” makes too much of it. Throughout his book he uses terms that elevate the person with the Spirit, as though such a person glides over this dark age in a bubble. It’s too much. To set up this superman model for people to expect means they are in for a disappointment when they can’t achieve it (for it is not achievable if one follows Scripture), and I suspect that most people who think they are experiencing the Spirit in the way Fee says are doing so only on Sunday morning with the orchestra, choir, and entire church singing, praying, and worshiping at full volume to provide them this elevated experience.

Fee’s treatment of 2 Cor 11 and 12 is painful to read. He skips completely 1 Cor 11.23-33 and enters directly into 12.1, where Paul speaks of his visions and revelations, because that’s what interests him. He makes an astonishing remark on page 348 that “revelatory experiences per se have nothing to do with his apostleship; they have only to do with his own personal relationship to God (5:13)”. There is no reason for Fee to say something like that unless he wants to insure that every Spirit person is also able to have the same visions and revelations. And if you can’t see his point in 5.13, you’re not alone because it’s not there—until you read his explanation and see that he takes “beside ourselves” as an ecstatic experience.

Paul did not glide over the hardships and the stench; he was up to his eyebrows in it. Fee distorts what Paul wants to tell us. The sufferings were key to Paul’s life and message. To disregard that and create an elevated life for the Spirit person that never touches the world or the flesh is just wrong.

In selecting experts for each of these difficult passages I hesitated to use Fee because he is a formidable intellect. Critiquing him is not something someone does lightly.

And so I was surprised to find his explanations of Rom 12.1-2 such a misrepresentation of the actual Scripture. His scholarship here is shabby. To see the Spirit everywhere, draw cross references that do not speak to the point, and race past verses that could weaken his point is disappointing.

I am not anti-Pentecostal. The village church we work in is Pentecostal. I was raised in an Assembly of God church and graduated from an Assembly of God university. It is not being anti-Pentecostal to expect that the Scripture is handled correctly. To see Spirit everywhere and take words and phrases that could not have a Spiritual component unless a person wants to see it... well, it’s just wrong. Fee says that the “Pentecostal movement, in many instances, lacks a sound exegetical basis.” He has not helped.

Back to the point: Romans 12.2 says this:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.

The goal of every Christian should be to know God better and to live in a way that pleases him. Christ pleased God perfectly by obeying him perfectly. That is the standard. It is not one we can fully achieve, but it is nevertheless the path that we have been given to walk on, and while we can’t do it perfectly, we surely cannot expect to please God by going another direction.

God did not have one plan for Christ and another for everyone else. Paul’s wish was “to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death.” (Phil 3.10) There are many ways we can also have that as our goal—however meager our attempts may be, but it comes only by following Christ.

I chose Rom 12.2 because Christians remaining in the world is a lingering, continuous, deep-seated problem that needs to be fixed. I expected the expert to say there is a way we can live in the world with all its comforts without being conformed to it, and that the Christian can please God while living this way. I never expected for Fee to say that the Spirit person is automatically not in the world and can effortlessly know the will of God simply by having the Spirit.

But in fact it’s actually the same thing. Either way Christians are allowed to stay where they are, and either way the Church is willfully closing its eyes to reality. And Scripture.

Having a job means we show up, do what we’re told, work a full day, and press ourselves to learn more and do better. Being a good worker doesn’t come automatically, and the longer and harder we work the more valuable we become. It is in doing our job that we learn how to do our job.

Paul worked tirelessly. He suffered greatly and literally worked himself into the grave. He then, having forged the way, told us how to do it, because he wanted everyone to get the benefit of his life. There was no reason for anyone to reinvent what he did, because he had already done it. The next generation had all it needed to press on to the next stage of the work.

To now say that Paul is teaching that every Christian already has everything and all they need to do is understand it and claim it is absurd. No job is easy or automatic. No one can go to work one hour a week and expect to provide any value or learn how to be a better worker. It’s not possible in the world; it’s less possible working for God, because the work is so much more difficult.

To expect real results from a mental exercise is lunacy. Understanding and claiming is not the problem. The problem is people staying where they shouldn’t, not doing what they should, and expecting all the benefits and none of the consequences. Fantasy faith. It’s fun, but worth nothing.