Living in the Spirit

The true Christian life is that which is lived in the Spirit of God. In order to live in the Spirit of God we must set Christ before us at all times, looking to Him throughout every day and night, asking His wisdom and help in everything we do—I mean, everything! The true Christian life is one of total, complete obedience to God through the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are in Romans, Chapter Eight. Notice Paul’s statement:

Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. (Romans 8:5)

How many Christians in America live in accordance with the Spirit? We have a multitude of distractions, the media in particular. Our culture is one of a frenzied desire to make money. This secular race carries over into our religion. We attend church; sing the songs, give in the offering, listen to the sermon. This is it. But Monday morning, do we have our minds set on what the Spirit desires?

Probably not!

We are facing a horrendous future in America. While the politicians wrangle, each striving to keep his position of power, our nation is declining morally at a rapid rate. A significant part of our population desires to return to earlier American ideals. Another significant part of our population desires to cast off all biblical restraints and indulge in every kind of physical lust.

The difference between these two populations is noticeable and increasing. An intense hatred is developing between the two points of view and may result in some sort of civil war. It is not a contest between Republicans and Democrats, or between liberals and conservatives, or one race and another. It is between Bible morality and the morality of a democratic society.

There may be no problem in a democratic society with homosexual marriage, or abortion on demand without a medical necessity. But there certainly is a monumental problem when viewed in terms of Bible morality.

For myself, I refuse to fret. I am drawing closer to Jesus. My citizenship is in Heaven. The Law of the Spirit of Life is my guide. Whatever the secular community does, it does. If I can help anyone I will. But I absolutely refuse to be drawn into the existing moral confusion. I do not desire to change America. My desire is to walk humbly with God, and set a good example wherever I can.

This sort of breach between God’s people and the secular society has occurred previously in history. The problem in America is that we regard ourselves as a Christian nation and are appalled when we observe the evidences of Satan’s work. We may think it is our responsibility to change the secular population. It is not.

I believe it may be said truthfully that, by and large, our nation in the past has given at least lip service to the concept of America being a Christian nation. It appears obvious that Christianity has been the dominant religion.

However, over the past hundred-or-so years there has been an accelerating weakening of our moral values. I believe this is due to the confusion in Christian preaching. There are millions of Christian church-attendees who hear every Sunday that under grace we do not have to live a righteous life. Christ has done it for us.

Now if you were a professor of sociology, what would you predict would be the end of such preaching? You would predict that Christian people who sat under such preaching would not be careful to lead a disciplined moral life.

If you add to this the current interpretations that the church and the government must be kept separate, and freedom of speech must be honoured to the point of worship, even though moral abominations are presented to us, including to our children, we have the formula for social disaster.

Today, America is not a Christian nation. There are numerous Christians living in America, but many of them are casual—actually world lings who attend a Christian church.

It is my point of view that the true, fervent disciple of the Lord Jesus, must recognize that he or she is a member of the worldwide Body of Christ. This Body knows no national or denominational boundaries. His or her first loyalty is to the one Body of Christ.

The world is hastening on its way to destruction. Sooner or later our government will hand over its sovereignty to the United Nations. America is destined, because of sin, to become a third-class nation.

We Christians are not to fret ourselves over what sinners do. America rapidly is becoming their country now, though we may be slow to recognize this. Our responsibility is to be a true witness of Jesus Christ. The closer we draw to Jesus in these dangerous days, the clearer our witness becomes. Then it is God’s responsibility to draw people to Jesus who is revealed in us.

The only manner in which we can live a righteous life as a Christian is by living in the Spirit of God. Living in the Spirit of God requires continual fellowship with our living Lord Jesus. When our mind is controlled by the Spirit of God we have life and peace. The battle today is largely for control of our mind.

If we really belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Spirit of God is living in us. It is our responsibility to keep looking to Jesus so that the Spirit of God is controlling our thoughts, words, and actions. We simply are not to fret because of Satan’s activities in the non-Christian population of America. If Christ is living in us, our physical body is dead, separated from the Life of God because there is sin dwelling in it. This is true, even though we profess faith in Christ.

However, if we choose to obey the Law of the Spirit of Life in our thoughts, words, and actions, our inward nature is alive with the Life of God. The righteous Christ is being formed and is dwelling in our inner nature.

Here is our great hope: If we continue to sow to the Spirit of God by looking to Christ continually throughout the day and night, when Jesus appears from Heaven He will make alive even our physical body. The same Spirit that has made alive our inward nature will make alive our body.

It is because of the hope of the adoption of our body by the Spirit of God that we are under no obligation to obey the lusts and passions of our flesh. To live fully in the Spirit of God we must deal with two forces in our personality. The first force consists of the sinful compulsions that reside in our flesh. The second force is not sinful. It consists of the desires of our adamic personality, our human nature.

The first force includes sexual lusts, rage, envying, pride, sorcery, fear, cowardice, lying. These often are unclean spirits and can be driven out as we confess, denounce, renounce them and vigorously turn away from them.

The second force includes what we are as a person. There are the imaginations and schemes of our mind, our desires and goals, our ambitions, loves, joys, pleasures, and so forth. It can be seen that these human drives can be intensified and warped by unclean spirits. But they themselves are what we are as a person. God’s plan of redemption proceeds to crucify and renew in Christ our mind, our desires and goals, our ambitions, loves, and pleasures. The life lived fully in the Spirit of God has been delivered from uncleanness, and then crucified and born again in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Our spirit then is one with the Holy Spirit. Our character is formed from the body and blood of Christ. Our consequent actions are righteous, holy, and obedient to God.

When this is true, then, at the coming of the Lord, the metabolism of our body will be changed from flesh and blood to flesh and Spirit, the Spirit of God. This is the overcoming of the last enemy and the fullness of redemption. If we continue to obey our sinful inclinations we will die spiritually, even though we are a Christian. In the Day of Resurrection, our body will not be made alive by the Spirit of God. We will slay our own resurrection if we continue to behave sinfully.

If we continue in our uncrucified personality we will not attain to the Kingdom of God, because flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.

If instead we choose to put to death our sinful inclinations, as the Spirit of God directs and enables us, and choose to live as crucified with the Lord Jesus, we will grow in eternal life. We will attain to the resurrection of our body.

When the Holy Spirit points out to us a sin we are practicing, we are to confess it as sin. We are to describe it clearly. Then we are to denounce it as wicked, belonging only in the Lake of Fire. Next we are to renounce it vigorously, declaring that we do not want to have anything to do with it for eternity. Christ will help us do this if we ask His assistance.

If we have faithfully cooperated with the Spirit of God in putting to death the deeds of our sinful nature, and present our body a living sacrifice in order to do the will of God completely, then, in the Day of Christ, a robe (body) from Heaven will clothe our resurrected flesh and bones. The new body has been created by the Spirit of God as we have sown to the Spirit throughout our Christian life. The new body will obey Christ by nature, unlike our present body that resists Christ at every turn.

But for those Christians who continue to live in the sinful nature, and in their adamic nature, no such reward awaits them. They have sown to sin and to the flesh and soul and will reap corruption. The corruption will be revealed in the state of their body in the Day of Resurrection.

It will be true also for all the citizens of the new world of righteousness. They will have a measure of Christ in them and will live by the Spirit of God. The Church is a firstfruits of what one day will be true of all people. All of the creation shall die and then be raised in Christ; summed up in Christ. In regard to the dispensation of the fullness of the times, to bring into one the whole in the Christ, both the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth -- in him; (Ephesians 1:10–Young’s)

With these facts in mind, let’s you and I set Jesus before us at all times, looking to Him for His guidance and help in every activity of our day and night. Our reward will be an inward and outer nature that is filled with eternal life and is an expression of the Person of our Lord Jesus.