The Final Step
Walking in the Spirit
Are ye so foolish having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?
The greatest problem within the church today is the same problem that has plagued it since it's inception:
And that problem is Carnal Christianity!
And I brethren could not speak unto you as unto spiritual but as unto carnal even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk and not with meat for hitherto ye were not able to bear it neither yet now are ye able for ye are yet carnal for whereas there is among you envying and strife and divisions are ye not carnal and walk as men? (1Co 3:1-3)
Now somewhere around 49-50AD the apostle Paul visited the Corinthian Church where he "pastor-ed" for some 18 months., (Act 18:1–18). His first letter to the church was written some two years thereafter to the church leaders at Corinth who were still babes in Christ after close to 4 years of existence.
Now if the church leadership in Corinth was still carnal after all of that time, what condition would you expect to find church doctrine in? Even more importantly what condition would you expect to find the sheep in?
If you want the answer to that question just look at the condition of Christianity in America today!
Raise up a child in the way they should go
and when they are old they will not
depart from it!
Proverbs 22:6
The Pharisaic Spirit
Throughout Jesus' earthen ministry he pointed out the flaws in the Pharisaic ministry, not so much for their doctrine rather for their ministration of it. More specifically because their ministration was based on the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law.
When Jesus stopped the prostitute from being stoned, were the people wrong under the letter of the law to stone her?
Absolutely Not!
When the Pharisees were angered with Jesus for "working" on the sabbath, were they wrong to admonish Jesus according to the letter of the law ? Not In The Least Bit!
When the apostle Paul was persecuting Christians, was he wrong for doing so under the letter of the law?
Again, Absolutely Not!
This truth brings to light the importance of these words spoken by our Lord Jesus:
the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life
In each situation our Lord illuminated the spirit of the law with his response to the situation:
He that is without sin among you let him first cast a stone at her.
have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests
in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless?
Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?
I am Jesus whom thou persecutest it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
The ends of these events are as follows:
In the case of Mary Magdalene vs The Law, the people dropped their stones, walked away and Mary became a disciple of Jesus.
In the case of Jesus working on the sabbath vs the Law, no immediate action was taken because the spirits of the Pharisees were convicted by Jesus's truth.
And in Paul's case, well, that's obvious.
So What Is The Point Here?
The Letter Kills and the spirit gives life!
Walking in the Spirit
The last thing that the enemy of God's people want's is for mankind to live up to what our Father God and our Lord Christ has made us to be. And just as he did with Eve in the garden he has distracted mankind from "the way" of God by using the things of this world.
He got her eyes on the tree which she "saw" was good for food, and pleasant to the eyes, a tree to be desired to make one wise.
MY WORDS are spirit and they are life!
To learn the way, the truth, and the life of our Lord, we have been given precious gifts. We have been given new heart's, new spirit's, God's Spirit, and the spiritual gifts necessary to live the life that God desires of us and the life that Jesus gave up His life for us to have.
To truly understand this however, to get it out of the gray matter into the depths of our hearts and ultimately into our spirits, we must have renewed minds!
Why?
(Isa 43:18) Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old.
(Isa 43:19) Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.
What was Jesus rebuke of the scribes, Pharisees, and lawyers?
That they shut the kingdom of heaven from the people and themselves!
How did they do so?
Through their hypocrisy. They were teachers of the law, condemning those who fail to do the law while they themselves didn't do the law. They laid grievous burdens upon the backs of the people that they themselves could not and did not bear!
Why?
The Chosen People of God did not know the old was passing away because they didn't see it.
They didn't understand the types and shadows within their scriptures:
Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me and ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.
I receive not honor from men. (Joh 5:39-41)
You see this new thing, which began by the revealing of Jesus Christ in the days of Moses, is a continuous thing which will end when God closes the book of Revelation, and through that time God is going to be making and doing New Things!
It is in this area in-particular where those who are seated in Moses's seat within the church have failed the body of believers!
2Pe 2:17 These are wells without water, clouds that are carried with a tempest; to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever.
2Pe 2:18 For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were clean escaped from them who live in error.
2Pe 2:19 While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.
2Pe 2:20 For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning.
2Pe 2:21 For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them.
2Pe 2:22 But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.
No matter what God did for His people throughout their history they rejected any change because they were a proud, arrogant, and stiff-necked people. They rejected the prophets of God and the the knowledge of God delivered through them, even murdered them, and subsequently God rejected them (for a time).
I submit to you that biblical history has again repeated itself within the Christian faith because the
sheep have been led back to the way of the Jews rather than the way of Christ.
As it was with the Father and His people so it is with Jesus and His people:
Their Lips Give Praise But Their Hearts are Far Away from Him!
because God is Spirit, and His Words are Spirit, but man is yet carnal
I Receive Not Honor From Men
(Joh 14:15) If ye love me, keep my commandments.
Jesus tells us that the spirit is quickened but the flesh profits nothing.
In other words, we have been made spiritually complete and perfect in every way in Christ. Completely acceptable to our Father God.
The flesh however remains the same, and the same old desires of the flesh remain in-tact as does the focus on the letter of the word
rather than the spirit of the word.
Jesus instructs those who love Him are to "keep" His Commandments and if we truly love Him and honor Him we will obey His words. Yes?
Then why don't we do so?
