The Flesh

 The Flesh Third Revision 

 

As a follower of Christ, our desire is to find favor with both God and man.  Micah 6:8; “He has told you O man what is good and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love mercy (kindness), and to walk humbly with your God.”

 

I believe that verse in Micah unmasks a problem that is common to all men.  Who is going to run the show it is called the flesh, so we are going to chapter 7 of Romans, Read Romans 7:18 and 25.

I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right but not the ability to carry it out.” (The defeated follower of Christ verse)  (Roman 7:18)

 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh, I serve the law of sin. (Romans 7:25)

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. (Romans 8:8)

For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. (Romans 8:13)

For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. (1 John 2:16)

For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. (Galatians 6:8)

For 27 years of my life I was getting my needs met outside of Christ's power, I had learned well how to do this in the world set on WIIFM (What in it for me).  Now I had to learn how to let Jesus do it all for me, and the Scriptures tell us that a battleground.  Not a white dog and a black dog and the one I give the bone to wins, I did not have a sin nature and a God nature that would be a civil war that is not supported in Scripture.  What is going on is found in Galatians 5:17, For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. (Galatians 5:17)

I. Two ways for Christians to Walk in this World: According to the flesh, and in the Spirit.   

 

A. According to the flesh

1) What it is not: just doing bad things.

2) What it is: depending on yourself and your abilities to get your needs met apart from Christ.

B. In the Spirit

1) What it is not: religious activity.

2) What it is: allowing Jesus to live His life through you.

C. Key Concept – The Christian life is not difficult to live; it is impossible.  Jesus Christ is the only one who has ever actually lived the Christian life.  He is the only one who can live it today, and that is exactly what He wants to do – through you (see John 15:5 and Galatians 2:20).

 

II. Three Basic Points

1.    Point 1: God is love.  You were created by God to be loved 

unconditionally.  Only God loves unconditionally, therefore you need God.

2.    Point 2: God created laws (ways) to govern the universe.  All of His ways are good.

3.    Point 3: Each of you showed up on planet Earth with the need to be loved 

(Point 1).  Instead of getting your need met God’s way (Point 2), you developed your own ways of getting your need met.  This is what the Bible calls “flesh.”

 

4.    Key Concept – The cardinal sin of man is independence from God 

(reference story of Adam in Genesis 3).

 

 

III. The Death of the Old You is a “Done Deal.”

How to appropriate the truth that your old self has been crucified with Christ (Romans 6:6)  “We know that our old self^[a] was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.”

A.     

 

1)    Question: How many of your sins did Christ take to the cross 2,000 years ago?  Answer: All of them.

2)    Question: How many of your sins had you committed 2,000 years 

ago?  Answer: None of them.

 

3)    In the same way, you claim He took your sins to the cross; you claim that He took you to the cross.  The old you (who you were in Adam) died.

 

     B.    The death of the old you from Romans 6:

1) Verse 2: you have died to sin

2) Verse 3: you have been baptized into His death.

3) Verse 4: you have been buried with Him.

4) Verse 5: you have been united with Him in the likeness of His death.

            5) These verses are all past tense!

 

We all believe that there were two thieves crucified with Christ, but there is a lot more “ink” in the Bible about you being crucified with Christ than there is about those two thieves.

 

As a new creation in Christ, God is intensely interested in your depending on Christ as your life and reflecting this in the way you perform (Ephesians 2:10).  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

 

  There is nothing about who you are – your identity – that concerns God.  He took care of everything He could not stand about you  - the sinner – in Christ on the cross.  He also made provision for you to walk in the power of the Spirit and, in the process, learn how to depend upon Him to reflect who and what He has made you.  God took care of your identity – done deal.  On an ongoing basis, He is helping you clean up your performance to more accurately reflect who you actually are: a saint by calling!

 

Saint vs. Sinner

 

The word “sinner” is often used to describe both performance and identity, which becomes confusing.  As Christians, (I prefer “Follower of Christ) we have received a new identity.  We are no longer sinners, but saints who sin – and hate it.

 

My pray is you and I have come to this point, and you understand you’re a mess and that we are all a mess, save, redeemed, and set free from the control of sin.  But we each have our own version of flesh.  And it’s a battle, isn’t it?