Victory Over Sin Class 1

 

 

VICTORY OVER SIN SERIES
PART 1

In this 2-part series, we will answer the following questions:

Do Christians Have An Evil Heart?
Where do the works of the flesh come from?
Does the flesh have its own nature?
Do Christians have two natures?
How do I guarantee victory once and for all?

Key verse:
“Walk after the Spirit….”
…THEN you WON’T fulfill the lusts (works) of the flesh (senses).

THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE STATEMENT!
Accomplishing this is very simple.
It is just a matter of CHOICE!

Galatians 5:16 from some other translations:
Live by the Spirit (spirit) and you will NEVER carry out the desires of the flesh. (Lexam)
Here is my advice, live your whole life in the Spirit. (Phillips)
Live in the Freedom that Christ gives you….  ‘let me explain further, live your life as your spiritual nature directs you.’ (God’s Word)
….walk AFTER THE SPIRIT (He is leading, you are following.) (Ann Windsor trans)

“Gentlemen, THIS is a football!”
Vince Lombardi never had a losing season as a head coach in the National Football League….he was legendary for his commitment to mastering the basics.  At the beginning of every season, even if his team had won the Superbowl, he would walk into the locker room, take the football out from under his arm and say, “Gentlemen, this is a football!”  No one laughed, no one snickered.  They had learned, that being strong in these basics that he taught them over and over, is what made them WINNERS!
It is no different spiritually.  There are a few basics, which if you master them in the game of life, will always make you come out a winner!  Here is the ‘this is a football statement’ for a Christian:

“YOU ARE A SPIRIT”
Gen. 1:26:  ‘Let Us make mankind in Our image and after our likeness.’

Normally, the main thing people think of when reading this verse is that we ‘look like God’:  body, hands, feet, face, etc.

There are TWO words in this verse:  image and likeness.  Only ‘likeness’, means our shape or form.  ‘Image’ has another meaning, and if you will notice, this is the word that appears first in the above verse.  Here are the two words and their definitions:

Image:  OT:  Strong’s #6754         (spirit)
tselem (tseh’-lem); from an unused root meaning to shade; a phantom, i.e. (figuratively) illusion, resemblance; hence, a representative figure

Likeness:  OT:  Strong’s #1823          (body)
demuwth (dem-ooth’); from OT:1819; resemblance; concretely, model, shape

So…….
You ARE a spirit…..you live in a body.
Jesus said:  “God is a spirit, and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” (KJV:  note lower case ‘s’, meaning with your spirit) Jn. 4:24
Paul said:  “we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit…and have no confidence in the flesh.” Phil. 3:3
James said:  “the body without the spirit is dead.”  Jas. 2:26

Again:  You ARE a spirit

Jesus said:  “God is a spirit”.
Gen. 1:26:  God said:  “let Us make mankind in Our Image”, (spirit)
God made us spirits like Himself.  He gave us a soul like Himself (mind, will & emotions).  He placed us (the spirit being) in a physical body.

YOU ARE a spirit….
Why am I emphasizing this so much?
Because the spirit you is the REAL you.
Victory, total victory, in the Christian walk is founded upon this fact and your revelation of it:  that you ARE a spirit, you possess a soul and you live in a body.

Paul SERVED GOD WITH HIS SPIRIT, or ‘as a spirit’, conforming his soul and body to the desires of the Holy Spirit coming from his spirit.
Romans 1:9:  “I serve God with my spirit in the Gospel of His Son”.

Spirit, soul and body: notice the order
“I pray God your whole (1)spirit, and (2)soul and (3)body be preserved blameless unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.”  (1 Thess. 5:23)
Paul stated these in this order for a reason.  Most of the time you hear people say:  body, soul, spirit.  That is because they are more ‘body’ conscious than ‘spirit’ conscious.  When you really realize that you ARE a spirit, you will never say, ‘body’, firsst.

The spirit and the soul CAN BE DIVIDED, they are not the same:
“The Word of God divides asunder spirit and soul.”  (Heb. 4:12)

MANKIND:  THE TRIUNE BEING IN GOD’S IMAGE
God is triune: Father, Son, Holy Spirit

The next question:
What ‘kind’ of spirit are you?
Spirits are of two natures:  the Nature of God and the nature of the Devil.
Every person has one or the other, for we are not a vacuum or the source of our own animation.
As a Christian (born again), you have passed from the nature of the Devil and received the Nature of God.

John 5:24:  “He that hears My word, shall not come into condemnation but IS PASSED from death (spiritual death, the nature of the devil) into (spiritual) Life, the Nature of God.

Looking at this question again:
As a Christian, what kind of spirit are you? According to:
2 Corinthians 5:17
(20th C. R.) Therefore, if any one is in union with Christ, he is a new being! His old life has passed away; a new life has begun!
(AMP) Therefore if any person is [ingrafted] in Christ, (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old [previous moral and spiritual condition] has passed away. Behold, the fresh and new has come!
(TLB) When someone becomes a Christian, he becomes a brand new person inside. He is not the same any more. A new life has begun!
(Wade) So if anyone becomes united to Christ, he is a fresh Creation; the original conditions have passed away; mark! they have been replaced by new conditions.
(NEB) When anyone is united to Christ, there is a new world; the old order has gone, and a new order has already begun.
(Cony.) Whosoever, then, is in Christ, is a new creation; his old being has passed away, and behold, all has become new.

What kind of spirit are you if you are in Christ:  “A NEW CREATION”

And according to Galatians 2:20:
WHO is that new creation?
Galatians 2:20
(Noli) I have been crucified with Christ. Now it is not my old self, but Christ Himself who lives in me.
(Barclay) I have been crucified with Christ. My own life is dead; it is Christ who lives in me. True, my physical life goes on, but its mainspring is faith in the Son of God…
(Lau.) …Christ took me to the cross with Him, and I died there with Him.
(Mar.) With Christ I have been co-crucified…
(Deane) …it is faith in Christ which gives life, and my life is mystically united to his…
(Abbrev. Bible) I was crucified with Christ so that he might live in me…
(Dist.) I consider myself as having died and now enjoying a second existence, which is  simply Jesus using my body.

“GENTLEMEN, THIS IS A FOOTBALL!”
Knowing these facts is your basic tool for winning every spiritual battle!
Fact 1:  Jesus said in John 4:24 that God is a spirit.  In Genesis 1:26, God said, ‘let Us make mankind in our image’.  If God is a spirit and He made me in His image, then I am a spirit.
Fact 2:  According to 2 Cor. 5:17, if I am in Christ, my spirit is a new creation that never existed before.
Fact 3: And According to Galatians 2:20, that new creation is Christ IN ME!

After renewing your mind with these new creation realities, you are ready to walk out WHO YOU ARE IN CHRIST.  Here is one verse, that if you will practice it all the time, you will have one victory after another and grow in grace exceedingly.

ONE Truth!  And God makes it simple enough even a child can understand it & live it!
And what is that ‘one’ truth?

“Walk after the spirit…..” Galatians 5:16, our ‘key verse’.

…in other words, “put on the new man”!
Eph. 4:24:
Put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. (NIV)
Put on your new nature, created to be like God–truly righteous and holy. (Living)
Put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. (English Standard)
Clothe yourselves with the new nature.  (Intn’l Standard)
Having put on the new man (Darby)
That new and better self which has been created to resemble God in the righteousness and holiness which come from the truth. (Weymouth)

Notice:  Paul is saying to do something positive, put on the new man….
…pour in the clean water, put on the new nature, to put off the behavior of the former man, who you were, the habits of life you learned before you were born again.
Notice Paul does NOT say: ‘put off the flesh first, then you can put on the new man’!

When you learned the 3 basic facts, that you are a spirit, that you are a new creature in Christ, and that this new creation is Christ in you, you have begun the process called mind renewal.

‘MIND RENEWAL’
Romans 12:2
Weymouth New Testament
And do not follow the customs of the present age, but be transformed by the entire renewal of your minds, so that you may learn by experience what God’s will is–that will which is good and beautiful and perfect.

…the renovation of your mind.
…change the way you think.

Renew the mind so that it becomes God’s suitable companion, and so that your mind can be a co-laborer in serving God with your spirit.

From this information, what you are, what kind of spirit you are (new creation), and who that new creation is (Christ in me), how would you answer
this question:

Does a Christian have two natures?

Well, reasoning this out:
If I AM a spirit, possessing a soul and living in a body, and I get a new nature  in my spirit when I am born again, and the sin nature goes out of me….
If my soul, (mind, will and emotions) are to be ‘renewed’,
If my body is an instrument through which I (the new creation) am to manifest Christ,
then I would have to come to the conclusion that since I am born again, I don’t have two natures.

Well then:

Where do the works of the flesh come from?
Since a Christian has only ONE nature, the Nature of God received in the new birth, and we know that the works of the flesh are a spiritual force (or nature) where do they originate from….. within a believer or outside of a believer?

We really have answered this question already, but let’s look at it again from James:

In James 1:14, notice 3 words:
Tempted
Drawn away
Enticed

Yes, you are still able to sin should you so choose, but the force, the temptation, the enticement, the drawing away is no longer coming from INSIDE you.  The very word, ‘entice’ indicates an outer force at work AGAINST you…i.e.  Eve in the garden.

1 Cor. 10:13:  there is no temptation taken you but such as is common to man, and God will, with the temptation make a way of escape.

…no temptation seized, overtaken, come upon, taken hold on you.
Taken you – Seized upon you, or assailed you. As when an enemy grasps us, and attempts to hold us fast. (Barnes notes)
God gives grace sufficient to endure and stand up under it, yea, to get the victory of it, to be more that conquerors, and triumph over it.  (Gill’s Exp)

These commentary notes show that the temptation is coming from without, not rising up from a sin nature still ‘within’.

With Christ in us, we are to ‘condemn’ sin in the flesh.
I see that verse like this:
sin comes to tempt me, but since ‘greater is He that is in me’, I look at the temptation and I ‘condemn’ it, I shame the sin that is trying to bring shame upon me, this is what it means to ‘resist the devil and he will flee from you’….you condemn him to defeat.

The whole purpose of Jesus suffering and death on the Cross, and His glorious resurrection, was to enable us to triumph over sin while we are still in the days of our flesh, as He did.

Consider this verse:
“Sin…condemned in the flesh”
New Living Translation (©2007)
The law of Moses was unable to save us because of the weakness of our sinful nature. 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.
Weymouth New Testament
For what was impossible to the Law–powerless as it was because it acted through frail humanity–God effected. Sending His own Son in a body like that of sinful human nature and as a sacrifice for sin, He pronounced sentence upon sin in human nature;

How do I guarantee victory once and for all?
You ARE A NEW MAN, NOW just make the choice to put on Christ  Who is IN you, by:
Renewing the mind
Walking after the Spirit in each situation of life.
When you do this, this is the fulfillment of the 1st and greatest commandment….loving your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.

In the wrestle with principalities and powers keep it:
SIMPLE….”KISS” (keep it simple, Saints)

Can I have victory EVERY TIME?  Yes!
Going back to our ‘key’ verse: “walk after the Spirit and you WON’T FULFILL THE LUSTS (WORKS) OF THE FLESH”, GUARANTEED!

2 Cor. 2:14    GOD’S WORD® Translation (©1995)
But I thank God, who always leads us in victory because of Christ. Wherever we go, God uses us to make clear what it means to know Christ. It’s like a fragrance that fills the air.

“Gentlemen, this is a football…”
In conclusion, remember your ‘football’:
I am a spirit
What kind of spirit am I?  According to 2 Cor. 5:17, if I am in Christ, I am a new creation.
Who is that new creation?  According to Galatians 2:20, it is Christ in me.
With Christ in me, I can conquer all things in this world.
All I have to do is ONE thing:
“walk after the Spirit”, Gal. 5:16

KISS:  keep it simple saints!