Illus: There's a man trying to cross the street. As he steps off the curb, a car comes screaming around the corner and heads straight for him. The man walks faster, trying to hurry across the street, but the car changes lanes and is still coming at him.
So the guy turns around to go back, but the car changes lanes again and is still coming at him. By now, the car is so close and the man so scared that he just freezes and stops in the middle of the road. The car gets real close, then swerves at the last possible moment and screeches to a halt right next him.
The driver rolls down the window. The driver is a squirrel. The squirrel says to the man, "See, it's not as easy as it looks, is it?"
Every day we walk in a world that is filled with sin. It is not easy to walk in the Spirit. The opposite of walking in the FLESH is walking in the SPIRIT.
In this passage of Scripture Paul has a great deal to say about:
• Our choice to WALK IN THE SPIRIT
• Our choice to WALK IN THE FLESH
Let me show you three things about this in this passage of scripture. We are going to deal with all the verses in this passage, but not in the order they are given to us. For example, let us first look at:
I. THE PROBLEM OF THE FLESH
Look at verses 19-21, we read, “Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Something we often fail to teach about the works of the flesh is that the flesh in itself is not sinful.
There are cults who teach that the flesh is filthy and they believe that to please God:
• We have to cut our flesh
• We have to abuse our flesh in different ways
I want to say again, there is nothing sinful within this flesh, this human body is a gift from God for God’s use. There are some who feel this flesh is sinful and must be despised and abused.
But if they would think about it, they would know this is a mistake. For example, did you know you have the same body after you were converted that you had before?
• Conversion does not put new flesh upon the old spirit but a new Spirit within the old flesh
• Conversion does not propose to bring new flesh to the old mind, but a new mind to the old flesh
Victory is not gained by despising the flesh, but by receiving the divine nature to subdue and have dominion over the person, not by the taking away of the sinful flesh, but by the sending in of the sinless Spirit to conquer and condemn sin in the flesh.
• The Scripture does not say, “Let this flesh be upon you which was also upon Christ,” but it does say, "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus." Phil. 2:5.
• The Scripture does not say, “Be transformed by the renewing of your flesh,” but it does say, "Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." Rom. 12:2. We shall be translated by the renewing of our flesh, but we must be transformed by the renewing of our minds.
The Lord Jesus took the same flesh and blood, the same human nature that we have, and lived a sinless life within it.
The Bible tells us that at conversion, this human body becomes the temple of God.
Look at 1 Cor. 3:16-17, we read, “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.”
Because this body becomes the temple of God at conversion, we as Christians should do everything we can to keep it pure.
• We are not told to cleanse ourselves from the flesh
• But notice, we are told we are to cleanse ourselves from the “Lust of the flesh.”
The lust of the flesh dwells within the heart of mankind. This is why the Bible says, in Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”
There is so much wickedness in the heart of man, it is beyond man’s ability to understand it.
Illus: The national news reported on May 12th, 2003, that Saddam Hussein had literally killed thousands and placed them in an open grave. After examining these bodies, they believe that 20% of these were men and women that were buried alive.
Every day we read and hear things on the news that shock us, because some folks have so much evil in their hearts, as the scriptures says, that we can not comprehend it.
Sin is born into the heart of man, but it manifests itself through the flesh (these bodies in which we live).
Paul lists some of these sins (17 of them) that you find in people’s hearts. Such as:
• ADULTERY. This is unfaithfulness in a marriage relationship. While some folks pride themselves in not falling into this sin, the Bible says, in Matthew 5:28, “That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” This talks about a man looking at a woman and lusting, but it also applies to a woman looking at a man. There are folks that use their body to commit PHYSICAL ADULTERY or MENTAL ADULTERY. In the sight of God one is as bad as the other.
• FORNICATION. This is a broad word used for sexual sins. It is pre-marital sex but also includes all kinds of immoral and sexual acts. All sexual sins that are considered to be abnormal sex acts are considered to be sins of fornication. It is the word “Porneia” from which we get our word “Pornography”.
• UNCLEANNESS. Moral impurity, committing acts that are dirty, pollutes and soils your life. For example, there are men and women today that can not look at the opposite sex without mentally undressing them.
• LASCIVIOUSNESS. This is unrestrained evil thinking. It is giving in to any brutish or lustful desire. The person who sins usually tries to hide their sin, but a lascivious person does not care who knows about what he does. There was a time when the homosexual sins were closet sins, but as our nation becomes more lascivious, these sins become more open.
• IDOLATRY. The worship of idols mentally or of those made by hands.
• WITCHCRAFT. The use of drugs or evil spirits to gain control over the lives of others. Such things as astrology, cards, palm reading, seances, fortune telling, and crystals are used to do this.
• HATRED. It is enmity, animosity, and hostilities held in the heart of a person.
• VARIANCE. Strife, discord, contention, fighting, struggling, quarreling, and wranglings.
• EMULATIONS. Jealousy, it is wanting and desiring what someone else has.
• WRATH. Bursts of anger, violent or explosive temper.
• STRIFE CONFLICT, CLIQUISH SPIRIT. If you are not willing to become a part of their click you can become a target of conflict.
• SEDITIONS. Rebellions, splitting off from others.
• HERESIES. Rejecting the truths of God’s Word.
• ENVYINGS. This word goes beyond jealousy. It is not just wanting what someone else has, but begrudging the person who has it. That is, they not only want something to be taken away from a person but want that person to suffer because it is taken away.
• MURDERS. To take an innocent life. But like adultery, you can commit PHYSICAL MURDER and also MENTAL MURDER. There are folks who have as much hate in their heart as the man who commits the act. The only reason they do not commit the act of murder is because they are afraid of the consequences of their deed.
• DRUNKENNESS. Taking a drink or drug to affect one senses.
• REVELLINGS. Uncontrolled behavior in wild parties.
Notice, when Paul closed this list, he used the word “…and such like”. In other words, this list does not represent all the evils that you find in a man’s heart.
But we are to be aware that evil is within the heart and wants to manifest itself if we allow it.
We have looked at THE PROBLEMS OF THE FLESH, but let’s look also at-
II. THE SOLUTION OF THE FLESH
Look at verses 16-18, we read, “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.”
Contrary to what some folks think, we do not have to walk in sin, the Bible says we have a choice, and this is why the Word of God commands us to WALK IN THE SPIRIT.
WHY SHOULD YOU WALK IN THE SPIRIT?
If we take this body that God has entrusted to us and use it for the things of God, we will not have room in our life for the things of Satan.
One of the problems with many Christians today is that they have too much SPARE TIME ON THEIR HANDS. This age of technology has given people a lot of spare time. What used to take a person all day to do, can now be done in a matter of minutes.
For example, suppose I had to write ten letters to ten different people. They were all going to receive the same letter. Before we had typewriters, computers and copy machines, it would have meant that I had to spend hours writing ten different letters. But now in this computer age, we can type one letter and duplicate the other nine in a matter of minutes.
Technology has given us an abundance of spare time which can be GOOD and BAD!
Illus: We need to always be conscious of time. On some air bases:
• The military is on one side of the field.
• Civilian aircraft use the other side of the field.
• With the control tower in the middle.
One day, on just such a field, the tower received a call from an aircraft asking, "What time is it?"
The tower responded, "Who is calling?"
The aircraft replied, "What difference does it make?"
The tower replied, "It makes a lot of difference.
• If you are a commercial airline flight, it is 3 o'clock.
• If you are an Air Force aircraft, it is 1500 hours.
• If you are a Navy aircraft, it is 6 bells.
• If you are an Army aircraft, the big hand is on the 12 and the little hand is on the 3.
• If you are a Marine Corps aircraft, it's Thursday afternoon.
• If you are in the National Guard, it's still a couple of hours until quitting time." - Author: Anonymous
Many folks today can not comprehend the importance of time.
Illus: They remind me of the blonde that said, "Excuse me, what time is it right now?"
• The person she was asking said, "It's 11:25PM."
• The BLONDE: (confused look on face) "You know, it's the weirdest thing, I've asked that question thirty times today, and every time someone gives me a different answer."
Illus: Speaking of time, someone said it this way; “If you had a bank that credited your account each morning with $86,000 that carried over no balance from day to day, allowed you to keep no cash in your account, and every evening canceled whatever part of the amount you failed to use during the day, what would you do? Draw out every cent every day, of course, and use it to your advantage! Well, you have such a bank, and its name is TIME! Every morning it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it rules off as lost whatever of this you failed to invest to good purpose. It carries over no balances, it allows no overdrafts. Each day it opens a new account with you. If you fail to use the day's deposits, the loss is yours. There is no going back. There is no drawing against tomorrow.” -Source Unknown.
In this age of the AVAILABILITY OF SPARE TIME, we have lost our appreciation for time. But spare time can be a dangerous thing.
I believe this is why God’s Word says we are to WORK SIX DAYS and REST ONE.
Illus: King David was man that greatly loved God, but it was when he had some spare time on his hands that he gave in to the evil desires in his heart and committed:
• Lust
• Adultery
• Murder
Every child of God needs to get busy WALKING IN THE SPIRIT of the Lord each day, and then the devil can not use their bodies to fulfill the lust of the flesh.
You can go into any church in the world and you will find that people who are not doing anything but running their mouths and who have a lot of spare time on their hands are those living in the flesh.
THE SOLUTION OF THE FLESH is to spend every waking moment WALKING IN THE SPIRIT. But let us look at one more thing before we close, and that is-
III. THE JUDGMENT OF THE FLESH
Look at verse 21b, we read, “…as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Is Paul talking about salvation by works? Some will say Paul is saying that if we do these works, they will keep us out of heaven.
No, Paul is not teaching salvation by works. Remember evil is in the heart and it manifests itself through the flesh. That is:
• If a person has an evil heart it will manifest itself in some of the ways that Paul has already listed
• If a person has a pure heart it will manifest itself in the fruits of the Spirit that we will be talking about in the next sermon
You can tell what is in a man’s heart by what the flesh produces. And while some profess to be saved, their flesh manifests nothing but evil which indicates they have never been born again.
Now some are quick to point out that Christians are not perfect, and that is absolutely true. A Christian commits sin out of weakness sometimes, but not out of desire.
The ungodly has no desire to please God, they can commit all the sins that Paul listed and it does not bother them in the slightest!
The flesh is only a manifestation of what is in the heart! And Paul said he told you before and he is telling you again that if your produce such evil things, it is a indication your heart is evil and you are not going to heaven with an evil heart.
Conclusion:
I. THE PROBLEMS OF THE FLESH
II. THE SOLUTION OF THE FLESH
III. THE JUDGMENT OF THE FLESH
