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INTRODUCTION

  1.1. GETTING TO THIS POINT

“The inner sanctuary within the cathedral of Christian faith; the tree of life in the midst of the Garden of Eden; the highest peak in a range of mountains—such are some of the metaphors used by interpreters who extol [Romans] chap. 8 as the greatest passage within what so many consider to be the greatest book in Scripture.”1 As the pinnacle of Paul’s letter to Rome, Romans 8 is laden with gold nuggets of encouragement and assurance: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom 8:1); “We know that in everything God works for good for those who love him” (Rom 8:28); “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, will he not also give us all things with him?” (Rom 8:32); “[Nothing] will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:39). Among those verses most cherished is Romans 8:29: “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family.” Like much of Romans 8, Romans 8:29 and particularly Romans 8:29b—“conformed to the image of his Son”—has encouraged, assured, and strengthened Christians throughout the centuries. To some it expresses the goal of salvation.2

But a problem seems to exist, one that confronted me in the early days of my research into what was then a larger examination of the themes of Genesis 1–3 in Paul’s letters. I began to notice a wide swath of interpretations of the phrase and no solidly substantiating arguments for any of them. Within both popular Christianity and academic New Testament studies, there is little agreement as to what Paul means by the arcane or, at a minimum, ambiguous phrase. This lack of agreement is due in part to the fact that Romans 8:29b is often obscured by Paul’s use of foreknew and predestined in Romans 8:29a. More often, though, “conformed to the Son’s image” is used as support for a presupposed theological or eschatological ideal—again, with little to no substantiation for the interpretation. Perhaps it is surprising that, to date, the meaning of the phrase συμμόρφους τῆς εἰκόνος τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτου has received exegetical treatment in only four articles and no monographs.3 Despite the lack of any sustained treatments of the phrase, various interpretations are nonetheless assumed by commentators and authors alike, none of which are upheld by solid literary or theological evidence. And yet many use the phrase to capture what is considered the end goal of the Christian life: conformity to Christ. How can this phrase be used so often within both popular and scholarly conversations, and yet have so few in agreement over its basic meaning? In this book I have one ultimate objective: to examine Romans 8:29b within its own literary and theological context so as to discover what this oft-used but rarely substantiated phrase means within Romans. Due to the multifarious uses of the phrase by practical theologians, biblical theologians, and laity alike, the phrase cries out for some attention.

But not this alone. As we progress through this examination of Romans 8:29, it will quickly become obvious that an interpretation of “conformed to the image of his Son” must be informed by several other theological motifs that are equally as ambiguous and/or assumed. If Romans 8:29 is at center stage, then occupying the front left and front right of the stage will be Paul’s use of glory and glorify, terms that have for centuries been used within Christian theology and jargon basically without question. It is one thing for God to receive glory or be glorified; it is another thing entirely for humanity to do so. Yet this is the heart of Romans 8—a motif that determines how one reads the “goal of salvation” in Romans 8:29. At the rear of the stage, then, is the Pauline motif of union with Christ. More specifically, it is the dual motifs of union and participation with or in Christ, the relationship between the two terms, and what, if any, role they play in deciphering “conformed to the image of [God’s] Son.”

The majority of this book will propose an interpretation of Romans 8:29b that can be substantiated on both literary and theological grounds—one that differs from nearly all interpretations of the phrase thus far offered. Such interpretations are found primarily in commentaries but also in particular monographs and articles. Writers who refer to Romans 8:29b in their work usually fall into one of six common categories, those who offer or propose

  1. 1. no attempt at an explanation of the meaning of “conformity to the Son,” content to say that it refers to being made “like Christ”;

  2. 2. a variety of explanations, often a combination of those listed below;

  3. 3. a physical conformity, i.e., receiving the same “form” as Christ’s resurrected body;

  4. 4. a spiritual or moral conformity, i.e., the process of sanctification;

  5. 5. a conformity to the Son’s eschatological glory, with glory understood as radiance;

  6. 6. a sacrificial conformity, wherein the believer becomes “like Christ” as she suffers with Christ.

An awareness of these six proposals will be important in recognizing how this comprehensive treatment is both necessary and unique.

Those who offer no meaning and those who suggest a variety of meanings behind Romans 8:29b arrive at the same result: ambiguity. We can treat them together for this reason. Leon Morris provides a typically ambiguous description of the phrase, saying,

We are to become like Christ. . . . It is God’s plan that his people become like his Son, not that they should muddle along in a modest respectability. . . . We have been admitted to the heavenly family. . . . We are accordingly to live as members of the family, and that means being made like our elder brother. . . . [God] predestined us . . . in order that we might become like his Son.4

“This is wonderful news!” one wants to exclaim. But what does it mean to be “like Christ”? Likewise, with three times the theology and complexity, C. E. B. Cranfield yet manages to offer the same amount of ambiguity:

Behind the συμμόρφους τῆς εἰκόνος τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτου there is probably the thought of man’s creation κατ᾽ εἰκόνα θεου (Gen. 1:27) and also the thought of Christ’s being eternally the very εἰκὼν τοῦ θεοῦ (not, be it noted, just κατ᾽ εἰκόνα θεου). The believers’ final glorification is their full conformity to the εἰκὼν of Christ glorified; but it is probable that Paul is here thinking not only of their final glorification but also of their growing conformity to Christ here and now in suffering and in obedience—that is, that συμμόρφους, κ.τ.λ. is meant to embrace sanctification as well as final glory, the former being thought of as a progressive conformity to Christ, who is the εἰκὼν of God, and so as a progressive renewal of the believer into that likeness of God which is God’s original purpose for man.5

When Romans 8:29b is approached in this way, it is often the natural result of gathering all the other verses in which these same themes appear throughout the Pauline corpus (1 Cor 15:49; 2 Cor 3:18; Phil 3:10, 21; Col 1:15, 18)6 and packing them tightly into a very stretchy but durable bag, as if Paul intended the phrase συμμόρφους τῆς εἰκόνος τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτου to include every theme at once. Of course, it is possible that more than one referent exists behind Paul’s phrase, and unarguably several of the preferred categories are related to one another, that is, glory and vocation; sanctification and suffering; suffering and glory; glory and body. But it is rarely wise to assume that in six Greek words Paul is packing a ForceFlex trash bag that just keeps stretching.

The four other common interpretations are more narrow in focus. The first is a shared physical conformity to that of the Son. A notable example is Ben Witherington’s translation, “to share the likeness of the form of his Son,” and explanation: “The end or destiny of believers is to become fully Christ-like, even in their bodily form. Paul has just said that the believer’s hope is the redemption of his or her body, and here he explains how God will be working to get the believer to that goal.”7 His explanation comes on the basis of two primary factors: that Paul refers to the physical resurrected body in Romans 8:23 and that, with Paul’s use of εἰκών in Romans 8:29, Adam is most likely in view, which therefore entails a return to Adam’s prefall physical state. I will leave any critique of these suggestions for when I more fully survey the larger literary and theological context.

A second, more focused explanation of conformity is that of spiritual or moral conformity, that is, sanctification. This is perhaps the most commonly assumed interpretation of σύμμορφος, particularly within popular church settings. The general assumption is that to be “made like Christ” is to be “holy like Christ.” What Morris voices in his ambiguous treatment of the phrase noted above is, when fleshed out, an interpretation of Romans 8:29b as moral or spiritual conformity—a present, spiritual conformity rather than a future, physical conformity. William Hendriksen takes this approach in his commentary, writing there: “If gradual renewal into the image of Christ is not what Paul had in mind, are we not forced to conclude that one very important link in the chain of salvation, namely the link of sanctification, is missing? The answer given by some that justification includes sanctification does not satisfy.”8

Hendriksen and Morris are not alone in their interpretation. F. F. Bruce agrees, and, though he offers little by way of explanation of σύμμορφος itself, he does suggest, like Hendriksen, that the reader must note Paul’s lack of mention of sanctification in the “golden chain” of Romans 8:30. Why does Paul choose not to include sanctified between justified and glorified? Bruce suggests that it is because

The coming glory has been in the forefront of his mind; but even more because the difference between sanctification and glory is one of degree only, not one of kind. Sanctification is progressive conformity to the mind or image of Christ here and now (cf. 2 Cor. 3:18; Col. 3:10); glory is perfect conformity to the image of Christ there and then. Sanctification is glory begun; glory is sanctification consummated.9

For Bruce, Paul understands the coming glory as a future instantiation of a Christian’s status. Nevertheless, he primarily views the conformity of Romans 8:29b as a present, spiritual conformity. This spiritual conformity is, more specifically, one of sanctification—becoming holy like Christ.10

This approach is also the most recognizable in popular Christian theology and writing. In fact, a number of popular works even bear the phrase in their titles. Two commonly known examples are Oswald Chambers’s Conformed to His Image and Kenneth Boa’s Conformed to the Image of His Son. Both titles use Romans 8:29b as a shorthand phrase for spiritual formation, but unfortunately neither book offers exegetical attention to the phrase. Rather, the books seek to challenge believers in their spiritual formation and use Romans 8:29b as the text that—the authors assume—encourages that formation. Neither of these will assist us in this more comprehensive investigation of Romans 8:29b; I mention them only for the purpose of demonstrating the prominence of understanding “conformed to the image of his Son” as spiritual formation or conformity within popular Christianity.

Present conformity to Christ’s suffering and death is also a common reading of conformity.11 Ernst Käsemann suggests that

passages like 1 Cor. 15:49; 2 Cor. 3:18; Col. 1:18; Phil. 3:10f. have seduced some to think in terms of the risen Christ and participation in his resurrection body as in Phil 3:21. . . . Against that it is to be objected that in the text Paul consistently establishes the present salvation by use of the aorist and he does not speak merely of the exalted Christ. . . . We are made like him in the birth of which Gal. 4:19 speaks in baptismal language and which leads to participation in his death according to Phil. 3:10. The final clause states unmistakably that this takes place already in our earthly existence.12

He goes on to write,

In baptism the divine image which was lost according to 3:23 is restored by conformation to the Son. Although this statement seems to be in contradiction with his eschatological caution, Paul adopts it here, as in 2 Corinthians 3:18; 4:6, in order that in the context of vv. 19-27 he may paradoxically set forth the link between suffering with Christ and the glory of divine sonship.13

Käsemann argues that Romans 8:28-30 returns to Romans 8:18 and the reality that “the sufferings of the present time cannot be denied.” Käsemann’s argument against a present-future paradox in Romans 8:29b is contradicted by his own argument that conformity is baptismal language and that at baptism this paradox of death and life, suffering and glory begins (see Rom 6:1-11).14

Within this category, Käsemann is unique among those who suggest suffering as conformity. Whereas Käsemann limits conformity to suffering,15 most who suggest that Romans 8:29b refers to suffering suggest that it is part one of a two-part process: part one being suffering and part two being resurrection.16 C. K. Barrett offers: “At present we are conformed (συμμορφιζόμενοι) to his death (Phil. 3:10); we shall be conformed (σύμμορφοι) . . . to the body of his glory (Phil. 3:21).”17 And Ulrich Wilckens writes:

Die Formulierung in Röm 8,29b is so allgemein gehalten, daß man am besten einen dementsprechend umfassenden Sinn heraushört. . . . In der Taufe haben Christen an Tod und Auferstehung Christi teilgewonnen, so daß sie in ihrem gegenwärtigen Leiden und den Leiden Christi teilhaben und in ihrer künftigen Auferstehung an der Auferstehung Christi teilhaben werden.18

Not unlike Barrett’s and Wilckens’s treatment of Romans 8:29b, Michael Gorman says that “conformity, for Paul, is narrative in character, a two-part drama of suffering/death followed by resurrection/exaltation. . . . Conformity to Christ—‘to the image of [God’s] Son’—in resurrection is the logical and guaranteed sequel to a life of death to self and of suffering for the gospel that corresponds to the narrative of Christ’s dying and rising.”19 For Gorman, conformity is certainly a “two-part drama,” but one gets the sense that it is on the first part that Paul is focused with his use of σύμμορφος. Sylvia Keesmaat also argues for a two-part process: “The glory of Adam, the image of God, is revealed in the one who came into this same suffering creation and saved it. The pattern of Jesus is the pattern of the rest of believers; his way of exercising his dominion over creation was to stretch out his arms and die for it. This image of suffering is the image to which believers are conformed.”20 Here, again, suffering takes precedence.

Most scholars who suggest suffering with Christ or sharing in Christ’s sufferings as an explanation for σύμμορφος are primarily dependent on Romans 8:17, where suffering with Christ (συμπάσχω) is deemed a prerequisite for being glorified with Christ (συνδοξάζω). The connection is rightly drawn between Romans 8:17 and Romans 8:29bc,21 as we will see, but the problem with this interpretation of Romans 8:29b will be revealed to be multifold.

Meanwhile, conformity to Christ’s glory is perhaps the most common interpretation of the verse within the New Testament guild.22 This is primarily because it is also the category of understanding “conformity,” which is most commonly combined with others: glory and the resurrection body23 and, as noted above, present suffering and future glory. In fact, as with suffering, the meaning behind “conformed to the image of his Son” is rarely understood as glory alone. Douglas Moo offers an excellent example:

Paul may think of the believer as destined from his conversion onward to “conform” to Christ’s pattern of suffering followed by glory. . . . But the closest parallels, Phil. 3:21 and 1 Cor. 15:49, are both eschatological; and eschatology is Paul’s focus in this paragraph. . . . It is as Christians have their bodies resurrected and transformed that they join Christ in his glory and that the purpose of God, to make Christ the “firstborn” of many to follow, is accomplished.24

So also does Kürzinger’s 1958 treatment of the verse: “Ob dabei nur an die Herrlichkeit des erhöhten Herrn oder ob nicht eher—ganz im Sinn der übrigen Aussagen des Römerbriefes—an das Teilnehmen am ganzen Erlösungsgeschehen (Tod—Begrabenwerden—Auferstehen) gedacht ist, mag offen bleiben.”25 Nearly every scholar suggests that final glorification has some role to play in understanding Romans 8:29b, even if it is joined by sanctification, suffering, or physical renewal.

Support for Romans 8:29 as eschatological conformity to Christ’s glory is, like that of suffering, found in the connection between Romans 8:17, in which Paul says the children of God will be “coglorified” (συνδοξασθῶμεν) with the Son, and Romans 8:30 (see also Rom 5:2), in which glorification is the final result of the process of conformity in Romans 8:29.26 The believer is “conformed to the image of the Son,” usually understood as taking place at the resurrection, at which point the believer is glorified with Christ.

These thematic and textual connections with coglorification in Romans 8:17 are indeed the keys to understanding Paul’s intentions behind συμμόρφους τῆς εἰκόνος τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτου. This being said, however, there is one primary weakness in these suggestions. When scholars suggest that Romans 8:29b refers to believers’ glorification, they often fail to define glory or glorification. And it seems to me that if being conformed means being glorified, then one ought to say what glorification is. Paul’s use of δόξα and δοξάζω has received little treatment within Pauline scholarship and, when scholars do attempt to define glory, they denote it as an eschatological splendor, radiance, or brilliance—words that are sometimes used to connote the manifest presence of God.27 But these definitions of glory are inadequate for their occurrences in Romans. I will argue anon that Romans 8:29b refers to believers’ eschatological glory only if glory is understood as something other than splendor/radiance or the visible, manifest presence of God.

A final suggestion is also proposed, though not widely adopted. James Dunn, Robert Jewett, Tom Schreiner,28 Brendan Byrne, N. T. Wright29—five scholars from diverse traditions and perspectives—have all suggested that conformity in Romans 8:29 refers to a functional conformity;30 that is, when believers are conformed to the image of the Son, they are conformed to his status and function as the Son of God who rules over creation. Each scholar argues his case from a different perspective, but all share the common focus on conformity as function or vocation. I will argue that this suggestion, made almost in passing, is at the heart of Paul’s meaning behind “conformed to the image of his Son” in Romans 8:29b. Nevertheless, though these scholars pose this alternative reading of the phrase, they each do so very briefly and without the substantive support necessary to make their case. I will adapt, expand, and most importantly substantiate this functional reading of Romans 8:29b hinted at by these scholars.

  1.2. A FEW NOTES ON METHODOLOGY

Before proceeding, let me first note a few methodological considerations. First, anyone who has ever dabbled in Pauline studies is aware of the seemingly endless list of scholars, monographs, and articles dedicated to the exploration of Paul’s letters and theology. In an effort to gain both continuity and breadth, I have selected eight primary interlocutors of various perspectives, including Joseph Fitzmyer, Brendan Byrne, C. E. B. Cranfield, Thomas Schreiner, Douglas Moo, James Dunn, N. T. Wright, Ernst Käsemann, and Robert Jewett. With the exception of Cranfield and Käsemann, these selected commentators have one significant feature in common: all are influenced to some degree by the “Sanders revolution” of the late 1970s and the New Perspective on Paul that resulted from it. The New Perspective on Paul has shaped the course of Pauline studies over the last three decades to the degree that consulting a wealth of Romans scholarship prior to Ed Sanders’s 1977 work, Paul and Palestinian Judaism, would do little to carry forward the discussion of Romans 8:29b. Other scholars will of course be consulted as their work becomes relevant.31

Second, the primary path to discovering the meaning of Romans 8:29b will be—first and foremost—through the literary and theological context of Romans in general and Romans 8 in particular. Romans 8:29b is most often addressed in discussions pertaining to Paul’s transmorphic language and use of εἰκών in other Pauline texts. These texts will arise naturally at numerous points throughout the discussion but are not the primary means of discovering the meaning that lies behind Romans 8:29b. Rather, it will be discovered on the basis of its position as the climax of the semantic and theological structure of Romans 5–8 and its relationship to the underlying narrative of glory threaded through the fabric of Romans 1–8.

A third and critical methodological element of this investigation is that, at times, it will rely on the recognition of intertextual allusions within Paul’s argument. For my purposes here, I have appropriated the criteria for the detection of allusions offered by both Richard Hays and William Tooman. In Hays’s 1989 work, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul, he offers seven tests for determining the presence of intertextual echoes in Paul’s letters: availability, volume, recurrence, thematic coherence, historical plausibility, history of interpretation, and satisfaction.32 Though a number of scholars have critiqued Hays’s work, none have provided a set of criteria that has proven to be more useful.33

Like Hays, though approaching the topic of the reuse of Scripture within the Hebrew Bible, William Tooman has also offered a set of what he calls “preliminary” criteria for determining reuse.34 In his 2011 work, Gog and Magog: Reuse of Scripture and Compositional Technique in Ezekiel 38–39, Tooman distinguishes between quotation, allusion, echo, and influence, using allusion in much the same way as Hays uses “allusive echo” or, more typically, just echo. For Tooman, the fundamental difference between allusion and echo is that allusions function as “semantically transformative,” while echoes do not.35 Tooman’s criteria for determining innerbiblical reuse include uniqueness, distinctiveness, multiplicity, thematic correspondence, and inversion.36 Tooman’s criteria have not received scrutiny like those of Hays but do have some significant elements of overlap.

I will appropriate a combination of the proposed methods for determining innerbiblical allusion. Given that Hays’s first criterion, availability, is generally not an issue for Paul’s use of Israel’s Scriptures, it will not be included. Likewise, because I find Hays’s final three criteria (historical plausibility, history of interpretation, and satisfaction) too subjective for determining reuse, these also will not be considered as criteria. And Tooman’s final criterion, inversion, is applicable primarily to issues of scriptural reuse in the Hebrew Bible, so it too will not be included. Therefore, the criteria used in this investigation will be a combination of Hays’s and Tooman’s most valuable suggestions: uniqueness (Tooman); volume (Hays), which includes elements of distinctiveness (Tooman) and multiplicity (Tooman); recurrence (Hays), and thematic correspondence (Tooman/Hays).

It is important to note, too, what Hays says about his own treatment of intertextual echoes: “To run explicitly through this series of criteria for each of the texts that I treat would be wearisome. I trust the reader’s competence to employ these criteria and to apply appropriate discounts to the interpretive proposals that I offer throughout.”37 I echo this sentiment, though I will offer a note on the “shades of certainty” of those intertextual allusions that bear significant weight on my proposed argument.

Finally, the breadth of literature and theological emphases currently driving interest in Pauline theology is vast. Without question all who proceed through this particular contribution will look for discussions on the particularities of those emphases that interest them, especially as they relate to the theological themes contained in Romans 8 in particular and to Romans scholarship and Pauline theology in general. It goes without saying that I will not address a number of such topics, at least not directly or fully; to do so would take us too far afield. Such topics include (1) the meaning or function of προγινώσκω and προορίζω in Romans 8:29a as theological terms either within Paul’s biblical theology or within contemporary discussions of systematic theology; (2) the ordo salutis of Romans 8:29-30 as a systematic and logical rendering of the stages of salvation; (3) the manifold discussions of δικαιόω currently flooding Pauline studies; (4) issues of apocalyptic discourse and Paul as an apocalyptic theologian; (5) Paul’s engagement with empire, the imperial cult, and Caesar; (6) pneumatology and (7) eschatology as discussions in themselves; and (8) a full treatment of environmental ethics. Lengthy discussions of any of these would no doubt add to the discussion surrounding Romans 8:29b; they must nevertheless be reserved for subsequent projects.38

My purpose here is solely to address the meaning of “conformed to the image of his Son” in Romans 8:29b as a phrase that arises out of Paul’s biblical theology—no mean feat even by itself. Romans 8:29b is composed of six Greek words that allegedly comprise the goal of salvation, are determined by motifs that are themselves not easily deciphered, are used in countless side arguments, and yet boast no single, shared interpretation, even within Pauline scholarship.

  1.3. OUTLINE AND AGENDA FOR EACH SECTION

My argument in this book will expand and substantiate the functional reading of Romans 8:29b noted above. The book is divided into two halves, with the first half addressing Pauline and biblical, semantic, and theological concerns, and the second half addressing the interpretation of Romans 8:29b within the context of Romans 8 and on the basis of the conclusions drawn in the first half.

Because believers’ conformity in Romans 8:29b is linked to believers’ glorification (δοξάζω) in Romans 8:30, as well as their coglorification (συνδοξάζω) in Romans 8:17 and δόξα in Romans 8:18, 21, it is necessary to examine Paul’s use of these terms. Chapters two and three will serve this end. Chapter two will offer a brief description of semiotic theory before investigating the semantic use of δόξα and δοξάζω throughout the LXX, and briefly in the apocalyptic texts of Daniel and 1 Enoch. The terms will be analyzed according to their denotative and connotative functions throughout the text, with a particular view to how they function, in particular, in relation to God and to humanity. We will discover that δόξα and δοξάζω are used in ways more variegated than are often recognized.

On the basis of the conclusions drawn in chapter two, chapter three will investigate the meaning of δόξα and δοξάζω in Romans, particularly as the terms are used in Romans 1:23; 2:7, 10; 3:23; 5:2; 8:17, 18, 21, 30; 9:4. After assessing current interpretations of the terms and their inadequacies, I will address a number of considerations that must be made in such discussions, considerations that include the presence and role of Adam in Romans and the significance of Psalm 8 for Paul’s new-Adam Christology. The heart of the chapter will be an examination of what I will call Paul’s “narrative of glory”—the theological storyboard for Romans 1–8 and the context in which “conformed to the image of his Son” in Romans 8:29b will be interpreted.

Chapter four focuses on the Pauline motifs of union and participation. I suggest that throughout Paul’s letters he articulates a motif of what I will call “vocational participation” with Christ, which is believers’ active share in the resurrection life and glory of Christ as redeemed humans in him. I then examine this motif of vocational participation in Philippians 3:21, where the only other New Testament occurrence of σύμμορφος is found. I also examine it in 1 Corinthians 15:49 and Colossians 3:10, where εἰκών is also used within a context of vocational participation. The chapter will conclude with an examination of 2 Corinthians 3:18; 4:4 and a discussion of their usefulness in determining the meaning of Romans 8:29b.

In the second half of the book, I will turn the attention to Romans 8:29 itself. Chapter five will address the identity of the Son within the context of the phrase “image of his Son.” I will suggest that, on the basis of Paul’s references to Jesus as the “Firstborn” and the significance of Psalms 89; 110 for Paul’s identification of the Son elsewhere, in Romans 8:29 the Son should be understood as the long-awaited Davidic king, Israel’s Messiah. Additionally, I will argue that Paul’s εἰκών-language elsewhere, particularly in contexts of his new-Adam Christology, and his use of πρωτότοκος designate the Son as the new Adam in Romans 8:29, an identity that picks up Paul’s Adam-Christ typology of Romans 5:12-21. As he is both Messiah and new Adam, I will argue that he reigns over creation as the highest of the kings of the earth and that he stands as the representative of a new family of God and a redeemed humanity.

Chapter six will serve as the heart of the investigation. Here I will draw together the conclusions of the previous five chapters into an examination of Paul’s vocational participatory motif latent in Romans 8:17, 29, 30. I will address the theological significance of adoption and sonship in Romans 8 and its relationship to Romans 8:29bc. The chapter will then suggest that Paul’s references to being “co-inheritors” and “coglorified” in Romans 8:17 and “glorified” in Romans 8:30 all refer to believers’ participation with the Son in his unique role as sovereign over creation. Because of the semantic link between Romans 8:17, 29, and 30, I will argue that, in being conformed to the Son, believers participate with the Son in his rule over creation as people renewed in the image of God.

Chapter seven will examine the structural and theological relationship that exists within Romans 8:28-30. There I will propose that, despite its importance, Romans 8:29b does not constitute Paul’s main point. Rather, Paul’s point in Romans 8:28-30 is in Romans 8:28b, where Paul articulates that God’s children are called with a purpose. This purpose is their glorification—a future reality, no doubt, but also a present reality. I will argue that this motif of present glorification, if only in part, is implied in the preceding verses: in the prayers of the believers and the Spirit in Romans 8:26-27, and in God’s working all things toward good in Romans 8:28. God’s children are called to function as vicegerents of God, not only in the eschaton but, however paradoxically, also in the present.

With our path laid out, let us now take the first steps. We begin by entering into the world of semiotics and glory.