Romans 8:5 Part 3 Defining the Term and Meaning of the Christian Who Walks in the Flesh

 

Chapter 3 What is Flesh 

Flesh in the moral/ethical or spiritual sense is:

 

• that urge within us toward total autonomy and rebellion,

 

• toward being our own little gods accountable to no one,

 

• responsible to no one, obeying no one, respecting no one, and running our own little worlds to suit ourselves.

 

• It is that continual tug of self-centeredness and selfishness within each of us that keeps us from being completely His.   B. Hurt.  Preceptaustin.org.  permission given

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Flesh, in Paul's discussions, means the dominating power of Sin ruling over the soul and body, pressing them to primarily think and gratify self.  

 

Flesh is:  

 

Self is handed lordship,

 

dethroning Christ to a lesser position of need and yieldedness.

 

Flesh will not allow God to rule and destroy the ambitions of flesh. 

 

 

John Piper gives some excellent points about the flesh.  [bullets are mine]:

 

• Flesh is: "the old ego that is self-reliant and does not delight to yield to any authority or depend on any mercy.

• It craves the sensation of self-generated power and loves the praise of men... 

• in its conservative form it produces legalism -- keeping rules by its own power for its own glory...  It can be very religious even in conservative evangelical circles. 

• we see that the flesh also (in its more liberal form) produces grossly immoral attitudes and acts (as defined in Gal 5:19-21 -see notes Gal 5:19; 5:20; 5:21)..

• The flesh is the proud and unsubmissive root of depravity in every human heart which exalts itself subtly through proud, self-reliant morality, or flaunts itself blatantly through self-assertive, authority-despising immorality." (Read the Piper's full sermon Walk by the Spirit)

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3 uses of the meaning of "flesh" in the Bible 

1. the flesh is our human body
2. the flesh of the soul: The flesh is that combination of the Sin nature working through our thoughts, feelings, and will power to express its desire.  

• This is called self[flesh]-gratification.  It may be a tendency to:  anger, lust, greed, bitterness, pride/self-will, violence, etc.  Or, it can be the weak part of the soul bent on worry, fears, anxieties, insecurities, critical spirit, unforgiving, lying, coveting

• Flesh are the sensual appetites of the body and soul not under Christ's control.

• Flesh include the propensities, the bents, the weaknesses that lead to sin.  They are the desires not yet given to action [sin].  Flesh begins with what we feel.  It becomes sin when we decide to obey it.  Flesh may be a heavy desire for sexual sin, some to alcohol, some to attention from others, some to certain pleasures, some to worry, some to unreal fears, etc.  Flesh may be felt and tempting, yet the feeling and temptation not be sin until it is yielded to.

Matthew 26:41 (NASB95)

41 “Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

• There is no way to never act in the flesh.  Though, we aren't created in Christ to walk long-term in the flesh, because we sin indicates we do act in the flesh from time to time.  All of us do.  But not all act in the same fleshly acts.  
• So, we should not judge critically our brothers who act in the flesh.  We tend to judge them for their sins of the flesh, but fail to recognize, though our sins are different and to a lesser degree, we still act in the flesh with a haughty proud attitude because we judge others.  Criticism, an unshowing of God's love and desire to affect someone to experience Christ is as sinful as the deeds we criticize them for.  

1 Corinthians 4

New American Standard Bible

Servants of Christ

4 Let a man regard us in this manner, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. 2 In this case, moreover, it is required [a]of stewards that one be found trustworthy. 3 But to me it is a very small thing that I may be examined by you, or by any human [b]court; in fact, I do not even examine myself. 4 For I am conscious of nothing against myself, yet I am not by this acquitted; but the one who examines me is the Lord. 5 Therefore do not go on [c]passing judgment before [d]the time, but wait until the Lord comes who will both bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men’s hearts; and then each man’s praise will come to him from God.

• Two thoughts to remember

1. You will never get rid of the flesh nature within you.  It can be controlled by learning to walk after the Spirit.  But feelings from the flesh are human.  Do not think you are sinful for feeling or desiring wrong.  If you sin, make it right with God, and if needful to an offended one.  Be forgiven but no longer feel condemned.  The mercies of God are greater than all your fleshly failures.
2. Because you become fleshly at times, never allow your flesh of criticism unfairly respond to and about others.  God will judge each of us one day.  Look unto yourself, not the flesh of others.

• There are moments, days we get into the flesh.  We resist what Christ leads us to do.  We don't act "Christian."  This is not excusable.  It is realistic.  Growth in Christ needs us to recognize when, what is flesh and our responsibility to deny by the way of the cross.  
• It is wise to objectively look at our attitudes, desires, and possible reactions to judge them right or wrong, Christ's way or "flesh's way"?  A wise man is willing to judge himself.  A believer under the lordship of self will only judge others.

• The flesh never wants to repent, to act right, to do right.  It permeates a discouraged will to remain isolated from God, by not doing right.  Flesh sulks in defeat and turns to self-pleasure for pain relief.  So do not be dishearten when your flesh does not want to do right.  It is then we tell God that, then utilize our will to present our body to God as a living sacrifice.  A sacrifice isn't pleasant.  But we offer it because it is right and must.  When we do that God can change the feeling by subduing the flesh.

• How can we enjoy the Christian life?  How do we grow in faith, when by living in the flesh controls us?  How can we get out of a feeling of defeat and barrenness of the soul?  How do we gain the enjoyment of prayer, the Word of God, and fellowshipping with the saints in our local church?

• Confess!  Thoroughly tell God what you feel.  
• Admit all you did wrong.  
• Desire your will to change.  
• Ask help.  
• Choose to believe! 
•  Do this as many times a day as you need to.  By sincerity receive the grace of God which out forgives all the quantity of sins you will commit in a lifetime.  Continue to seek the Lord.  Continue the pursuit of growth!

3. Flesh of a fleshly spirit:  

In summary:

• There is the flesh we know as our human body.
• There is the flesh of the soul; the flesh nature acting upon our thinking and emotions to do what it incites.
• Now, there is a fleshly spirit. 

Fleshly spirit is a display of the mind-absent from the heart--of the form of religiousness. It is a focus on some aspects of religion which comforts and pleases the mind.  It comes by persuasion of a human agent [minister, teacher, author, denomination] who has distorted a truth from God's Word.

How do we know when a religious man, even in Christian circles, is deceiving us?  If we are true believers and growing in prayer and God's Word, our spirit will speak to us.  Our spirit will disturb us by the message.  Our spiritual pallet will become distasteful when we are told to believe their thought, while our spirit is troubled.  

Know that God troubles our conscience with Truth.  If we are disturbed by the lack of clarity then we have not truth.  Truth is clear and witnessed by several other passages of God's Word.  Taking an isolated verse of scripture and making it to mean something it is not disturbs the brothers and sisters. Its lack of clarity rocks faith and freeness in the Spirit.

The answer is to seek God objectively, then intensely study the Word of God.  In our day and age there are numerous mainline thinkers who are proven to wisely explain the words of truth.

A fleshly spirit dismisses objectivity, and is protective of self-beliefs.  It refuses to surrender the entire body [Romans 12:1] but looks to the human messenger in his own church.  He is told not to believe any other, except those who follow in his own beliefs.

Spiritual pride embraces religious practice, religious knowledge, its own circles of fellowship, excluding those who differ or who fail to conform to its own belief system.  

It chooses and believes teachers but will not verify their messages by objective studies from the Word of God and an open teachable heart from God.  

A fleshly spirit  will not talk to God with a whole heart.  They will not ask God for His thoughts.  They will not objectively study the Bible without the direction of their minister.  They adhere to doctrine and attempt to persuade others of doctrine and not Life.  They have no life so they can never share life--only doctrine.

They may talk to God from the basis of a human teaching, unjudged by the Word of God.  Therefore they will not hear from God as long as they worship the teacher than The Teacher.

An unstable fleshly spirit feels secure with human teachers, not spiritual persuasion by God.  

I have discovered that the Jehovah Witnesses are the best example of this.  They are strict on Bible interpretation that is wrong, but feel safe by practicing its teachings.  But I see no inner life from God, only knowledge about what they believe and their differences from other religions.

Another illustration are the fundamentalist and the charismatics.

I have met some wonderful believers in both camps.  I do not want to criticize the whole group or all of them.

• Fundamentalists [your independent churches who pride themselves as being so right they distance themselves from other believes who do. not believe as they do.  Their platform is more about their special beliefs about the Bible than their walk with Christ and their love and responsibility of loving and edifying the brethren.
• Then there are the charismatics, those who follow tongue-speaking and the health and wealth teaching.  Again, there are some who truly are brothers in Christ.  I love them, as I should.  But they are more about experiencing the good feelings and the good experiences of God doing for us in our earthly experiences.  They do not instruct each other about sins which stand in the way of fellowship.  They are short on teaching about inward spiritual growth by abiding in the Lord, walking in the path of the cross.  They believe much on catching the Spirit as if one needs to catch Him for power and profit.  They seek the Lord to gain from His hand not primarily from His heart.  They do not believe living out Christ but living pleasures Christ can offer to make life easier and happier.  They do not believe in suffering but how to avoid and live above suffering.
• In all, these groups as well as with good evangelical Christians, the flesh can become very consistent because of a reiigous belief system which negates relationship with Christ in the totality and honesty of the heart.

• Characteristics:  pride, absence of divine life, spiritual false doctrines [flesh in the spirit distorts the Bible, creating a belief system very similar to truth, even using truths, made to look like real "Christianity" but is false.  There are cults, false religions, and even doctrines in common denominations that are false.  Do your homework in objective Spirit-led Bible study to find the facts of what you believe.  Don't wholly trust your minister unless he is a proven Truth seeker of God.  Commit to objective Bible study from traditional teachers who have for centuries studied the Scripture and all are in harmony about the core of what the Bible says.  We iive in apostate times, false teachers.  Find only the true ones who have not departed from the traditions of evangelical Christianity.  

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2 Thessalonians 2:15

So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught, whether by word of mouth or by letter from us.

• The flesh loves to keep laws because it knows it thinks it can make the human better.  It believes its ways are better than God's. So, it insists on it making the man a better man through its laws and its pleasures.
• Flesh tries to practice and to keep rules.  But life is miserable.  It tries, then it fails.  The flesh keeps indoctrinating the soul to keep trying, finding new ways to submit to the laws it knows to be right.  But failures are a challenge to manage and a temptation to dismiss all religion as irrelevant.  
• The flesh loves knowledge especially when it is void of the knowledge of God. It loves to learn about doctrinal living...It loves to hear from its ministers that tickle its ears, but unwilling to accept Truth that hurts.

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Be careful what rules 

1. your human body
2. what tempts your soul
3. what Bible knowledge is true