The Oxygen You Didn't Know You Needed

In 2018, a family in Shelbyville, Tennessee spent three weeks suffering from headaches, fatigue, and confusion before a visiting relative walked into their home and immediately smelled something wrong. A gas company technician found a cracked heat exchanger leaking carbon monoxide throughout the house. The family had been slowly poisoning themselves without knowing it. They had adjusted to the symptoms, assuming the sluggishness was just winter blues.

Paul describes something similar in Romans 8. The mind set on the flesh is death — not always dramatic or obvious death, but a slow, imperceptible poisoning. We adjust. We normalize the fatigue, the restlessness, the quiet despair. We call it "just how life is."

But the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace. When the Spirit of the Living God takes up residence in us, it is like someone finally opening every window in that sealed house. Fresh air rushes in. The headaches lift. Clarity returns. You realize how close to death you actually were.

And Paul pushes even further — the same Spirit who raised Christ Jesus from the dead now dwells in you. This is not a gentle suggestion toward better living. This is resurrection power, the very breath of the Almighty, giving life to your mortal body. The same force that rolled back the stone and filled dead lungs with air is the force now living inside every believer.

You were never meant to survive on poisoned air.