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by Bible League International,
Narrated by Artificial Intelligence,
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Scripture
So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. – Galatians 5:16-17 NIV
Devotion
There is a war going on and the battlefield is every person on the face of the earth. On one side there is the flesh and on the other side there is the Spirit. The flesh is the Apostle Paul’s metaphor for the sinful spiritual state of individual human beings. The Spirit, of course, is the Holy Spirit. They conflict with one another over each person.
Those who do not belong to Jesus Christ are still living in the power of their flesh. The flesh, one might say, represents their true spiritual state and the Spirit is an alien factor to them. Those who do belong to Jesus, on the other hand, have been “crucified with Christ” (Galatians 2:20) and have “crucified the flesh” (Galatians 5:24). They have been “baptized with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 1:5) and their flesh is now the alien factor. This does not mean that the flesh is no longer operative in their lives, because Paul still finds it necessary to say that we shouldn’t “gratify the desires of the flesh,” but it does mean that it no longer represents our true spiritual state.
Paul’s recommendation for avoiding the gratification of the flesh is to “walk by the Spirit.” When those who belong to Christ walk by the Spirit, they are following the lead of the Spirit by the power of the Spirit. When you walk by the Spirit you will not do “whatever you want,” as the flesh would do, but you will do what the Spirit wants; you will be open to the leading of the Spirit.
You can tell if you’ve been successfully walking in the Spirit if your life reflects the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23).
Today, since we live by and in the power of the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
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