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It’s important to understand the human condition from God’s perspective.
Here’s the human condition apart from the saving work of God in a human being: We are fallen. We are in rebellion against God. We are sinners. Sin is our master. We have a sinful nature. We are dominated by sin which results in death. We can never live a righteous life that is pleasing to God and results in eternal life. On the day of judgment, we will be condemned. After condemnation, we will go to Hell.
However, the Lord made it possible for us to overcome our fallen condition; be victorious over sin and death; live in a way that is pleasing to Him; not be condemned; and live forever.
So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Messiah Yeshua.
All those who are in Messiah Yeshua, who are united to the Son of God because of their faith; who know Yeshua rose from the dead and ascended to the right hand of God the Father; all those who belong to Messiah Yeshua will not be condemned.
All charges against them will be dropped. The case against them will be dismissed. Not guilty. No condemnation. No punishment in Gehenna, Hell, the Lake of Fire. This should bring us joy and shalom rav – great peace.
And those who belong to Messiah are able to experience other great blessings. And because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.
We are freed from the power of sin – not just in the future, when we’re perfect and living in a perfect place, the New Jerusalem, but freed from the power of sin now, in the present.
Sin is no longer our master. We no longer need to yield to the power of sin, like the rest of the world does. We can believe the right things and consistently do the right things.
What has brought about this new and wonderful ability to believe the right things and consistently do the right things and overcome the power of sin that leads to death?
The power of the life-giving Spirit.
He, the Spirit of God, God the Spirit, is powerful – all-powerful. He is full of life. This powerful, life-giving Spirit is working for us and in us, freeing us from the power of sin that leads to death.
The Spirit is able to do this great, saving work for us when the Sinai Covenant couldn’t. The law of Moses was unable to save us because of the weakness of our sinful nature.
If we followed the law perfectly, obeyed all its commandments, I suppose the law could save us. But our weak, sinful nature is unable to do that. All of us have disobeyed God’s laws. All have sinned. Therefore the law can’t save us. Instead, like an angry judge, it condemns us.
God, being the gracious and loving and merciful God that He is, knowing the law could not save us, did something amazing, something radical, that could save us.
So God did what the law could not do. He sent his own Son in a body like the bodies we sinners have. And in that body God declared an end to sin’s control over us by giving his Son as a sacrifice for our sins. He did this so that the just requirement of the law would be fully satisfied for us, who no longer follow our sinful nature but instead follow the Spirit.
God is perfectly righteous. Perfectly just. Sin needs to be punished. All of us could have been punished for our sins, or Someone who is greater than all of us, Someone who is perfect, could be punished for us.
The Son of God’s incarnation and sacrificial death satisfied God’s justice. By taking our sins upon Himself, He was punished for our sins. The requirement of the law was fully satisfied for us.
And now, because we are forgiven and have been made right with God and have a new nature and are able to follow the Spirit – follow the Spirit into righteous living, into God-pleasing living, we are able to fulfill the requirements of the law – the essence of which is loving God and loving people.
The human heart is deceptive. We can deceive ourselves into believing we are following the Spirit when we’re following the old nature. The Rabbi helps discern if we’re following the sinful nature or following the Spirit.
Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit.
We need to ask ourselves: What do we mostly think about? Sinful things? Worldly things? Or, are we thinking about the things that please the Spirit?
What are the things that please the Spirit that we should be thinking about?
Putting off the old self and putting on the new self.
Being dead to sin and alive to God, aware of Him, thinking about Him and how to please Him and serve Him.
Walking in newness of life.
Holy living. Righteous living.
We should be thinking about lost humanity and how we can proclaim the Good New about our risen Savior to those around us.
We should be thinking about what we can do to build Messiah’s Community, help it grow, help it be the best it can be.
Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit.
If we are controlled by the Spirit, we will transform our mind each day. We will renew our mind each day so that we are thinking about the things that please the Spirit and not thinking about sinful things.
We do that by reminding ourselves that we are new creatures. We have a new, godly nature. Our relationship with sin is different. We died to sin. Sin is no longer our master. We do not need to sin. We can choose to sin or choose to resist sin. The Lord is our master and we are slaves to Him and to right living.
We pray at the beginning of each day. We ask the Lord to fill us with His Spirit, so that we will be close to Him and therefore able to think the right way and live the right way.
We pray that we would walk in the Spirit, live in the Spirit, resist sin, be more heavenly minded and less earthly minded.
During the day, we continue to pray. We talk to the Lord about the things that interest us. We praise Him for who He is and what He has done, is doing and will do. We thank Him for all the many things He does for us. We talk to Him about the things that concern us. We ask Him to meet our needs and the needs of others.
We pray for all of our brothers and sisters in Messiah’s Community, that they would walk in newness of life. We pray that we love the Lord the way we should, and love each other the way we should.
And we renew our mind each day so we are thinking about the things that please the Spirit with the Word of God. Each day, hopefully at the beginning of the day, we read the Word of God. Then during the day, we think about the Word of God and try to apply it to every situation we face. We let the word of Messiah richly dwell in us.
Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things, but those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about things that please the Spirit.
What kind of thinking is dominating your mind? Thinking about sinful things, or thinking about things that please the Spirit?
There are only two ways of living: following the sinful nature or following the Spirit. And there are two very different outcomes for each way of living. So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace.
Hmmm … death, or life and peace now, in this life, followed by eternal life and eternal peace in the world to come. Which to choose?
Therefore, it makes sense to exert effort, battle, fight, focus on letting the Spirit control our minds.
Why does letting the sinful nature control our minds lead to death? For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God’s laws, and it never will. That’s why those who are still under the control of their sinful nature can never please God.
The sinful nature, which we are born with, is hostile to God, antagonistic, opposed to God, at war with God, in rebellion against God.
It doesn’t want to obey God’s laws. It’s defiantly disobedient to God’s laws.
And the sinful nature is not able to please God. That’s not surprising. How can God be pleased with those who are hostile to Him and refuse to obey His laws?
The Lord will not accept those who remain under the control of the old nature, who are hostile and disobedient to Him, and who displease Him. He will reject them. He will condemn them to death.
However, that’s not us! We’re not like the non born-agains. We have a new nature. We have the Spirit of God living in us, and He changes everything for us!
But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you. (And remember that those who do not have the Spirit of Messiah living in them do not belong to him at all.)
Everyone who is saved by God’s grace because of their faith; every born again believer – belongs to Messiah and has His Spirit living in him.
Wonderful results come from the Spirit living in us, and us following the Spirit so that He is controlling us.
And Messiah lives within you (and Messiah lives in us by means of His Spirit living in us), so even though your body will die because of sin (our bodies have been affected by sin. They are decaying and will die), the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God. The Spirit of God, who raised Yeshua from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Messiah Yeshua from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.
The Spirit of God is perfect, powerful and full of life. He took a dead body, the body of Yeshua, and raised it back to life. And the life Messiah lives after His resurrection is a better life, a stronger and more powerful and more glorious life. That same Spirit with those same powerful, life giving and life-enhancing abilities lives in us.
And that Spirit is willing to live in our decaying, dying bodies and give us life – not just eternal life in the future, but life now, in the present. What kind of life now, in the present? The life of Yeshua kind of life. Closeness to God life. A more powerful life so we can resist sin and live a righteous life.
Here’s the application of these truths.
Therefore, dear brothers and sisters, you have no obligation to do what your sinful nature urges you to do.
Unlike those who only have a sinful nature and don’t have the Spirit living in them, who live according to the old nature, those of us with a new nature and have the Spirit living in us have no obligation to sin. We have no obligation to give into the urges of our sinful nature. We can choose to resist sin. We can choose to live a God-pleasing life.
Again, there are two vastly different outcomes for choosing to live according to the sinful nature or the new nature and being controlled by the Spirit.
For if you live by its dictates, you will die. And by die, the Lord’s divinely inspired representative means die forever, eternal death. No eternal life.
But if through the power of the Spirit you put to death the deeds of your sinful nature, you will live.
The Spirit of God is powerful, very powerful, almightily powerful. He has all the power He needs to help us put to death the deeds of our sinful nature, to resist sin, to overcome temptation, to not give into our sinful urges – so that we will live an abundant life now and then live forever.
How do we do that? How do we, through the power of the Spirit, put to death the deeds of our sinful nature so that we will live?
By reminding ourselves each day, that we are dead to sin; that our old nature died; that our relationship with sin is different. Sin is no longer our master. We have a new master. We are slaves of the risen and powerful Son of God. We are slaves of righteousness.
We seek the presence of the Lord: Psalm 27: You have said, “Seek my face.” My heart says to you, “Your face, Lord, do I seek.” When we seek the Lord so that we are close to Him, we will put to death the deeds of our sinful nature.
When we fix our eyes on God, we will be able to overcome sin. Psalm 25: My eyes are continually toward the Lord. When Peter was walking on the water, when he looked at Yeshua, he was able to walk on the water. When he took his eyes off of Yeshua, he started to sink.
When we are waiting on God, aware of Him, attentive to Him, like a good waiter is attentive to his customers, like a servant watches for the slightest signal from his master, we will have the power to live a holy life. Psalm 123: As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a female slave look to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God.
When we focus our minds to talk to the Lord from the time we get up in the morning, throughout the day, to the time we go to sleep – when we pray without ceasing, we will have the power to resist temptation.
Final verse for today: For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.
We are to be led by the Spirit of God and we are to follow. Led where? Where will the Spirit lead us? To right living, holy living, overcoming sin living, serving God living.
If you are concerned that you are not being led by the Spirit, talk to one of the elders. We’ll do our best to help you be led by the Spirit.