Our verse today is direct and simple. Written by the Apostle Paul to the Roman Christians, in a time when flesh was on a rapid rampage. Much like the church is today. When the spirit of compromise has entered behind the platform, to be preached to a flock of hungry dying sheep. While the whole time, the spirit of the antichrist is so smoothly slipping into the hearts of the flock. As the message of true heart holiness is being watered down to simply a casual “lets blend in with the world” message. And young people are birthed up into a way so liberal, that the only thing they know is “God loves me just the way I am, forever. He doesn’t give me a bunch of laws to live by. We are free from bondage.” Yes young person God loves you… but he hates the way you are. He hates all sin that lives in you. He desires for you to be separate from the world. And none of us will ever be free unless we practice this verse… Romans 8:13, For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
Now studying this verse out deeper, there is some things we need to understand. One… what to “live after the flesh” is. To live after the flesh beloved, is simply this, to indulge in the pleasure of sin, and things that are not at all Christ-like. To choose ones own self… over the cross of Christ. To have it “my way” over His way.
We must also understand what kind of death this is speaking of. This death is more than just an eternal death. This is speaking of a spiritual death. The way this verse is translated in the original meaning is this, “for if ye live after the flesh, ye must die.” In other words God is speaking through the writer, and saying this, “if you live in your flesh, (your own desires and wants) and not through my spirit, I will have to turn your spirit away, (back to the death of sin I saved you from) and you will spend a life on earth without the life of me in you, and a eternity in hell without me as well.”
The second half of this verse is a promise for those that desire to take heed, and not only listen, but do as well. God is saying through the writer, “if you will, through the Holy Ghost I have placed upon and in you, mortify (completely destroy, crucify and completely kill out) the deeds (wants, ways and actions of, and the sinful desires of) the body (the flesh) you shall live.” This living here is just the opposite of the death mentioned in the first half. It is to truly live here while on earth, as well as eternally in heaven one day.
Beloved, this is the true key to life. We must die to this flesh, before we can ever live in the joy of the Spirit. Each day we must wake up and die out to our wants and ways. We must kill them, and start to live through the Spirit. This is when we will learn what living in the Spirit means. It goes beyond a born again experience, it is a continual living and moving, inhaling and exhaling, of His Love and Holiness. But we will never learn this true life in the Spirit, without first killing our flesh. So hear me! This is the key to true life on earth.
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