“They that are in Christ have crucified the flesh with the affections and lust. If we live in the spirit, let us also walk in the spirit. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh and its desires. If we live by the spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. We do this as the church,” Galatians 5:24-25.
As the body of Christ we are to keep in step with the spirit of God as His body, the ecclesia. When we keep in step with the spirit of God, we listen to the Lord in humility, and we are not quick to respond to the ways of this world. We listen to know, and we receive to understand what God is saying and doing in us at all times. We have moved away from all legalism, away from ‘I know what I’m saying without God, just look at my good works, my obedience to the law of man, my actions in daily living, and my own ethical teaching that is on the same level as God’s laws. I have earned my merits for salvation. I don’t need to follow God or His word. This is how people see life and God, because it’s a desire against God—just to live a life designed by the devil. For he has put this desire in our hearts to sin against God. I will not keep God’s word, I will hold to my own word and power.’
But what do the words of God teach us?
Your word have I hidden in my heart that I might not sin against you. If you are going to embrace your own fulness, and say ‘I don’t need Christ,’ I will live by my man-made rules that are above Christ and His gospel. You need to know that your life in for a great fall. When you embrace the fulness of Christ, you will have to embrace the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Embracing the ministry of the Holy Spirit means inviting the Holy Spirit into your life to change you and better you to fulfill your calling in Christ Jesus. This is a full demonstration of the kingdom of God (Psalm 119:11).
“If we live by the Spirit let us also walk by the Spirit.”
They that are of Christ Jesus belong to Christ Jesus and have crucified the flesh, killed the desires of the flesh as true believers as ones in union with Christ. You have put to death the affections and the lusts of the flesh, the evil passions, desires, appetites,
Inclinations: the tender cry, the act, the disposition, and self-will. Your conduct is in alignment with Christ and is in agreement with the leading of the Holy Spirit. Submitting every aspect of our lives to God includes the emotional, physical, social, intellectual, and vocational. You will live saved and act like it.
