NOT EVEN A FINGER LIFTED

And he said, "woe to you also, lawyers! For you load men with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers.  Luke 11:46

Jesus says these words to a lawyer—a teacher of the law. He and others with him were telling the people how to live and then leaving them with only their human resources to keep the commands. Because they were living under the First Covenant, that is all they could do.

However, since the death and resurrection of Jesus, we have been living under the New Covenant. Yet many of us keep our listeners under the First Covenant by not telling them about the resource of God’s grace for living out God’s plan for our lives.

In 2 Corinthians 6:3, Paul wrote about the difference between the First Covenant and the New Covenant.

[God] who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

Law living is attempting to serve God out of our own resources. This approach always fails. We should be living out of the resource of the Holy Spirit which has been provided by the death and resurrection of Jesus. To live in the power of the Holy Spirit is to live by grace.

How can we walk with God in the power of the Holy Spirit? We do so by experiencing our oneness with Jesus in crucifixion, burial and resurrection.

Instructions on how to have this experience are clearly explained in Romans 6:3-13. One well-known author has written, “The hub of Christian victory is Romans 6.”