Silas
Beloved of All
It is encouraging to read how the Lord has made these three Scriptures so alive for you in this season, and your summary captures the heart of the Christian walk so well.
Living in the Spirit and walking in the Spirit belong together. God created you to live as spirit, mind and body, with your spirit uppermost in fellowship with Him. When sin entered, that fellowship was broken and the spirit died, but in Christ your spirit has been made alive again. His Spirit now bears witness with your spirit that you are a child of God, and He enables you to worship and walk with God in truth. That is why Paul can say you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God dwells in you. If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him, but if Christ is in you, even though the body is still subject to sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
This is where the daily battle you described becomes so real. The flesh lusts against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, and they are contrary to one another. Your mind stands in the middle and can be controlled by either. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. That choice comes up many times each day, whether to yield your body to the desires of the flesh or to yield it to the Spirit of God. There is no good thing dwelling in the flesh that can be reformed or improved, so we learn to have no confidence in it at all and instead to reckon the old self dead and to be led by the Spirit.
You put it well that walking in the Spirit keeps the flesh from winning. Scripture promises that if you walk in the Spirit you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh. By the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body so that you may live. It is not that you fulfill the righteousness of the law by your own effort, but that the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in you through Jesus Christ as you walk after the Spirit. What you sow matters. If you sow to the flesh you reap from the flesh, but if you sow to the Spirit you reap life everlasting. Walking in the Spirit also shows itself in love, instead of biting and devouring one another or seeking to build yourself up by tearing others down. The proof that the Spirit dwells in you is the fruit He produces, and love is at the heart of it.
Your third commitment to pray without ceasing and to give thanks in everything is the very will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Prayer is not just discipline, it is fellowship with your Father. The Spirit helps you in weakness there, bearing witness that you are adopted and teaching your heart to cry Abba, Father. He gives you strength to deny yourself, take up the cross and follow Jesus, and He does for you what you could never do for yourself. As you keep your mind stayed on the things of the Spirit and stay in step with Him, you will know more of His peace and joy and victory, not because the struggle disappears, but because you are no longer a slave to the flesh.
May the Lord continue to keep you walking after the Spirit, guarding your mind, sowing to the Spirit, and lifting your heart to Him in prayer with thanksgiving through each day.
Living in the Spirit and walking in the Spirit belong together. God created you to live as spirit, mind and body, with your spirit uppermost in fellowship with Him. When sin entered, that fellowship was broken and the spirit died, but in Christ your spirit has been made alive again. His Spirit now bears witness with your spirit that you are a child of God, and He enables you to worship and walk with God in truth. That is why Paul can say you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God dwells in you. If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him, but if Christ is in you, even though the body is still subject to sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
This is where the daily battle you described becomes so real. The flesh lusts against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, and they are contrary to one another. Your mind stands in the middle and can be controlled by either. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. That choice comes up many times each day, whether to yield your body to the desires of the flesh or to yield it to the Spirit of God. There is no good thing dwelling in the flesh that can be reformed or improved, so we learn to have no confidence in it at all and instead to reckon the old self dead and to be led by the Spirit.
You put it well that walking in the Spirit keeps the flesh from winning. Scripture promises that if you walk in the Spirit you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh. By the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body so that you may live. It is not that you fulfill the righteousness of the law by your own effort, but that the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in you through Jesus Christ as you walk after the Spirit. What you sow matters. If you sow to the flesh you reap from the flesh, but if you sow to the Spirit you reap life everlasting. Walking in the Spirit also shows itself in love, instead of biting and devouring one another or seeking to build yourself up by tearing others down. The proof that the Spirit dwells in you is the fruit He produces, and love is at the heart of it.
Your third commitment to pray without ceasing and to give thanks in everything is the very will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Prayer is not just discipline, it is fellowship with your Father. The Spirit helps you in weakness there, bearing witness that you are adopted and teaching your heart to cry Abba, Father. He gives you strength to deny yourself, take up the cross and follow Jesus, and He does for you what you could never do for yourself. As you keep your mind stayed on the things of the Spirit and stay in step with Him, you will know more of His peace and joy and victory, not because the struggle disappears, but because you are no longer a slave to the flesh.
May the Lord continue to keep you walking after the Spirit, guarding your mind, sowing to the Spirit, and lifting your heart to Him in prayer with thanksgiving through each day.
