Your Life should be Spiritual

"Your Life should be Spiritual" – Galatians 5:17 The Spirit and the flesh are in constant struggle, fight. So the Spirit fights for you. God could have removed the carnal nature from your life when you came to Jesus and His blood washed you away. It is necessary for you to be aware of your own weakness; who wants to keep you continually dependent on Christ, your Priest and Advocate; and makes you give foolish praise to Him who saved such worms that we are.

I. Instead of taking away the old nature.

A. God gave us His own "Holy Spirit" to dwell in us.

1. The Spirit of God and our flesh are at perpetual war and will continue to be until we are taken to the heavenly home.

2. Our part in this conflict is to surrender to the Spirit.

3. (Romans 7:15) In describing the struggle between the two natures, Paul says, "I do not understand my course."

4. It is a divided personality.

5. (Deuteronomy 8:3) The food of our soul, the Word.

6. Spiritual needs are more important than corporeal needs and can only be met through God's Word, a revelation of His will, His grace, His love.

7. And that Word, received by faith and observed with obedience, is the food of our souls.

8. So, the Lord Jesus took from that portion the answer He gave to the devil's first temptation (Matthew 4:4).

9. The spiritual life is guided "by the Word."

10. (John 5:24) Your eternity will come as you live a life as a spiritual believer.

11. The Spirit lives in you and leads you to be a warrior against your flesh.

12. He is the Word of God, that is, the living and personal Word of the Father, by which we live and are saved.

13. (John 5:24) Now we come to know how one can receive a spiritual life from Him and escape "judgment."

14. This verse undoubtedly the reason it is so beloved is because of the way it lays out the way of salvation so clearly.

15. The Lord Jesus began the words of this verse with the expression "verily, truly," calling attention to the importance of what He was going to say.

16. Then He added the very personal announcement: "I tell you."

17. The Son of God speaks to us here in a very personal and intimate way.

18. (a) "He who hears my Word."

19. Hearing the Word of Jesus means "not only listening to it," but also receiving it, believing it, and obeying it.

20. Many are those who hear the preaching of the gospel but do nothing about it.

21. The Lord is saying here that "His" teaching is to be accepted as divine and that He is to be believed to be truly the Savior of the world.

22. (b) "And believe in Him who sent me."

23. It is a matter of believing in God (He is the whole of man).

24. The thought here is that one is to believe God, who sent the Lord Jesus Christ into the world.

25. And what is what we must believe?

26. We must believe that God sent the Lord Jesus to be "our Savior."

27. We must believe what God says about the Lord Jesus, namely, that He is the only Savior and that sins can only be taken away by "His work at Calvary."

28. (c) "He has eternal life."

29. Notice that it doesn't say that he will have eternal life, but that he does, right now.

30. "Eternal life" is the life of the Lord Jesus Christ.

31. It is not only a life that will persist (last) forever, but it is a higher quality (trait, property, capacity) of life.

32. It is the life of the Savior that is imparted to those who believe in Him.

33. "It is the spiritual life received when he is born again," in contrast to the natural life (the flesh) he has received at his physical birth.

34. (d) "And it does not come to judgment" (if indeed you have been born again).

35. The thought here is that it is not condemned now and never will be in the future.

36. Whoever believes in the Lord Jesus is free from judgment because Christ has lowered the penalty for your sins on Calvary.

37. God will not demand twice the payment of the penalty.

38. Christ has paid as our Substitute, and this is enough.

39. He has completed the work and nothing can be added to a finished work (mission accomplished!).

40. The Christian will never be punished for his sins.

41. (e) "If he has not passed from death to life."

42. He who has trusted in Christ "has passed" from a state of spiritual death to one of spiritual life.

43. Before his conversion, he was dead in trespasses and sins.

44. He was dead to anything that was love for God or communion with the Lord.

45. When your faith in Jesus Christ was put in place, he came to dwell in the "Spirit of God" and became a possessor of divine life. Amen.