In order to get the full significance of all this, let us pause for a moment and consider the constitution of man, the organism existing on this planet. There are only three things that we can do with this body of ours. We can think, we can feel, and we can act. We cannot imagine anything that will not come under one of these three heads. In other words, we can say that a man as he exists has three centres, three foci of attention: the intellectual or thinking centre; the emotional or feeling centre; the acting, doing or instinctive centre.
Now that is a pretty complicated arrangement and we might be very well employed in directing that complicated machine. But the great discovery that Paul made, and reported in this seventh chapter was precisely that he was not directing the machine; that it was acting quite automatically and mechanically and entirely independent of his will. This state of will-lessness and mechanicality he calls "the old man," being "in Adam," "this body of death."
We must try to dismiss what connotations we have of a theological nature in regard to these expressions, because I am very sure that Paul was not using them in a religious sense, but speaking very explicily and even scientifically. He meant something very concrete. In fact, Chapter 7 of the Epistle to the Romans is a Behaviorist document. We say it might have been written in this century; we think we know so much more than anybody ever knew before. Indeed I should call this the Behaviorist Bible. It is true, too, that "in the world" is equivalent to "without hope," that is, desperate.
But there is something more. Paul did not rest there. Into this body of death there has been breathed the breath of life. We are not simply higher animals, or, at least, we can be something more than higher animals. What this something is, how it is implanted, or developed, is beond the scope of this discussion. There have been endless disputes about it, even among Friends, who know it as "that of God" in man. But the thing that Paul experienced was just the implanting or growth or development, as you will, of this divine or God-like extra-evolutionary function, or an awareness of its existence. I formulate the statement thus broadly not because I myself have any doubt as to whether the function is inherent in mankind or implanted, but in order to avoid controversial issues which have no bearing upon our subject.
The nature of the new state is set out in the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. We are set free from our slavery. Instead of being ruled by our lower nature, our real self is in command. If Christ is in us, though our body be dead because of sin yet our spirit has life because of righteousness. He who raised Christ from the dead will even give life to our mortal bodies through his spirit dwelling in us,.Whereas before we were slaves, now we are "more than conquerors."
Paul points out in unmistakeable terms the ultimate significance to him of the Damascus vision. I Cor. 15:8, "He appeared to me also." Here for "appeared" he uses the word "ophthe," the word used constantly in the Septuagint for the theophanies of the Old Testament. I Cor. 9:1, "I have seen Jesus our Lord." Here he uses the perfect tense, so that he refers not so much to the historical incident but means rather, "I am in the state of one who has seen Jesus." Eph. 3:3, "The mystery of Christ was made known to me by revelation." By "apocalypse" is the word that Paul uses.
The change effected was not a magical transformation, a thing of a moment. It was a matter of growth. Phil. 3:12, "I do not say that I have already won the race or have already reached perfection, but I am pressing on." And it is most important to note that the change was not merely a matter of liberation, of salvation. It meant the awakening of objective conscience, of his sense of his position in the universe, his function in God's plan. Phil 3:13, :I am trying to lay hold of that thing for which also Christ Jesus laid hold of me." Jesus had a purpose in laying hold of Paul and that purpose Paul wants to fulfil, to make his own. The word used is catch, seize, grasp, apprehend. Some light is thrown on it in a rather amusing way by the recently discovered Coptic "Acts of Paul," a work probably considered as canonical by St. Augustine of Carthage. This purports to give an account of the occasion when St. Paul fought with wild beasts at Ephesus. Paul is led into the arena and confronted with a huge lion. "How is it that though wast caught, who art so great?" he asks the beast. "Just as thou too wast caught, Paulus," answers the lion.
The completeness of the change Paul expresses by saying, "If any man be in Christ he is a new creature," or "It is a new creation,"—the words in the Greek have a double meaning. The change was much more than the "repentence" of the Jews with which Paul was familiar, more than metanoia, the changing of the mind, or the development of any of the three natural functions. The new creation Paul also called "the new man," being "in Christ." It was an awareness of God's will, an adoption of His view-point, an impartial emotion not centered in the little self, a co-operation in God's scheme. "If the Spirit of God is dwelling in you," says Paul (Romans 8:9) "you are not absorbed in earthly things, but in things spiritual." We might put it, your centre of gravity is no longer planetary but cosmic.
In the new state the transformation is so complete that it is no longer primarily a matter of the relationship between the individual and God, but the individual recognizes himself as a functioning unit in the universal organism,—the body of Christ Paul calls it. And so important a unit is he, that without his co-operation the universe cannot reach the harmonious and integrated development which God intended. Listen to these verses afresh without ecclesiastical connotation.
All creation is yearning, longing to see the manifestation of the sons of God. Rom. 8:19
He has made known to us the secret of his will—the purpose which He has cherished in His own mind of restoring the whole creation to find its one Head in Christ. Eph. 1:8–9.
His Body, the completeness of Him who everywhere fills the universe with Himself. Eph. 1:23.
And HE IS before all things, and in and through Him the universe is one harmonious whole. Col. 1:17.
The conception of cosmic organization which Paul presents here is so tremendous that the mind staggers before it, and we are apt to calm ourselves by saying that it is all metaphor. It is not that, but I don't know how to explain vividly and concretely the nature and effect of the change which I have called a change in centre of gravity. That expression is quite inadequate unless perhaps we realize that it would mean if all of a sudden we were freed of the earth's gravitational pull and answered only to the sun. With the change we are actually no longer bound by what conditioned us before; we act under an entirely new law. In Romans 6:22 Paul says, "We are emancipated from sin"—that is, from the "old man," from the automatic functioning of our mechanism. But at the same time he says, "We are enslaved to God." And the expression is so strong that some translators actually leave it out. But even God must act under the laws of His being.