Please notice the next verse:
Please notice the next verse:
Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. (Romans 8:12)
In the above verse the NIV is revealing where our sinful urges are coming from—our flesh. Praise the Lord! The translation did not say, "but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according to it." NIV got it right this time.
Paul reminds us that we are not obligated to obey these sinful spirits:
I am aware that "flesh" can refer to our entire body, as in "flesh and blood." Given that, the term "members" also is employed in other passages, referring to the location of the sinful urges in us. So we are not speaking of sin dwelling in our liver or pancreas.
We need to think carefully about the fact that we are not obligated to obey the sinful spirits that dwell in the members of our body.
For so long the Christian churches have maintained that as long as we are in the world we have to sin. But Paul is telling us this is not true. We do not owe obedience to these spirits that live in our flesh.
Especially now, that we are entering the third day of redemption. Christ is telling us that through Him we have the authority to pronounce an eternal judgment on the spirits that are living in our flesh. We are to put them to death, taking the fire and life out of them, so when we encounter their enfeebled temptations again we can overcome them.
Believe it or not, it is the will of God that we live without sinning, not in worldliness, not in the lusts of the flesh, not in self-will and rebellion against God. We can drive them all out today through the wisdom and power of our Lord Jesus Christ. Try it and see if I am telling you the truth!
A member of our Council last evening said that someone had offended her. She said she felt like picking up the phone and telling her friends about the person who had offended her.
Instead she told the Lord Jesus how she felt like avenging herself, and asked Him to remove the spirit of revenge. "Such power!" she exclaimed. "That spirit left me completely!"
We now are in the beginning of the "third day," mentioned by the Prophet, Hosea. There is power to drive the sinful urges from us. "We shall live in God's sight." Our Council member is continuing to live in God's sight. Had she yielded to the temptation to nourish the spirit of revenge, she would have been permitting death to enter her personality.
The Lord Jesus also spoke of the completion of salvation "after three days."
"Forgiveness" is only half a loaf of the program of redemption. The second half of the loaf has begun in our day. It is deliverance from the urges to sin. Apart from deliverance, forgiveness is not of much use in the Kingdom of God. Think about that!
The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. (I John 3:8)
But the Lord your God will deliver them over to you, throwing them into great confusion until they are destroyed. He will give their kings into your hand, and you will wipe out their names from under heaven. No one will be able to stand up against you; you will destroy them. (Deuteronomy 7:23,24)
You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent. (Psalms 91:13)
I get all excited when I think about Deuteronomy 7:23,24. Do you? I am ready to sally forth and put an end to all disobedience. But I think I would be wise if I waited for God to direct me.
Seventy "sevens" are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin , to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the Most Holy Place. (Daniel 9:24)
Believe it, and its yours! But you are going to have to fight in the Lord, because the demons are under the impression that your body belongs to them.
Now think about the means the Lord has given to you to conquer the spirits dwelling you in your flesh. If you will put them to death, Christ will clothe you with a body free from demons when He decides to resurrect you.
You know, the Gospel of the Kingdom is not the gospel of Heaven. It has little to do with going to Heaven, although one would imagine it does from the sermons and the hymns.
God did not give His Son so we could live forever in Heaven. If God wanted us to live forever in Heaven He would have created us there.
God gave His Son so we could gain immortality and enjoy the physical creation. God has permitted the present miserable conditions on the physical earth for the purpose of selecting and training those who will install and maintain a new world of eternal righteousness, love, joy, and peace.
But, as the Book of Revelation informs us, God is moving toward a new earth, governed by the Royal Priesthood. The Royal Priesthood is the new Jerusalem. The people who live on the new earth, who are under the supervision and blessing of the Royal Priesthood, are individuals whom Christ has saved from the nations of the earth.
As I said, God gave His Son so we could gain immortality in the body and enjoy the good things that God has created and shall create. We would not be happy living forever in Heaven. Heaven is for the angels. The earth is for immortal people. So is the firmament above us. All are for the children of God—the immortal children of God.
Now let's think about the key to the resurrection, to immortality.
The time has arrived in God's plan of redemption when we are to go to war against the aliens who inhabit our flesh.
How do we do this?
When the Spirit points out to us an unclean spirit urging us to sin, we confess it plainly to Christ:
"I have stolen. I have lied. I have fornicated. I have engaged in homosexual behavior. I have taken God's name in vain. I have sown dissension in the church. I have let myself be filled with wrath and have sought revenge."
Then, in prayer, we tell Christ exactly what we have done. We name that behavior as fit only for the Lake of Fire. We renounce it with all our strength. It is an eternal judgment on that spirit of lawlessness.
Then we ask Jesus to help us never to do that again, not for eternity.
If we have been utterly sincere in judging it as evil, and declaring that we never want it near us again, the fire and life will go out of it. The next time we are tempted we will have the ability, through Christ, to resist it successfully.
Try it and see.
Have no more to do with the world than you have to. Have nothing to do with electronic games, for they are filled with witchcraft, sexual lust, and violence. "Redeem the time, because the days are evil."
Tell Christ you want all rebellion out of you, and you will obey Him in anything and everything He charges you to do.
Keep at it until you drive everything of Satan from you. Don't quit!
It is God's will that you gain total victory over sin.
Why keep sinning? You don't have to, you know. Christ has the power. It is up to you.
No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him. (I John 3:6)
All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure. (I John 3:3)
Our hope is to be like Him and to go to be with Him when He appears.
For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live. (Romans 8:13)
"The misdeeds (sins) of the body." NIV got it right again—"live according to the flesh." While our soul has to be reconstructed by having Christ born and come to maturity in it, thus becoming a life-giving spirit, it is our body that is the problem.
Hence the resurrection, the gaining of a sin-free, incorruptible body.
Verse 13 is referring back to Verse 11. "You will die" means when the time comes for the making alive of our bodies we will remain in death. Our body will reveal corruption. We will not be a life-giving spirit.
Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. (Galatians 6:7,8)
Next Part Flesh! Flesh! Flesh!