The Mind of the Sinful Nature & Spiritual Nature - Like
Wrestling Children
Like many of you, I am a skeptical person; especially
against possible, personal imagination and ideas. Face it. Most times, we
Christians, we whom have the Spirit of God within us, can't trust our natural
way of thinking in these flesh bodies to do the will of God. Our body desires
what it wants when it wants! It can be very demanding! Like, right now. My
tummy (flesh nature) is growling to eat, yet I desire (spiritual nature) to
finish this post! Although the Lord created our body the need to eat to sustain
it; it doesn’t have to be fed…right this second! It can and will wait. For I’ve made a choice to allow my spirit thinking to control my flesh thinking and
execute that choice. This should be applied to all natures of the sinful flesh such
as; lust, pride, idolatry, lying, fear, unrighteous anger (wrath), spiritual
doubt, unforgiveness, etc. It's about opportunity and recognizing (be aware)
which nature is attempting to be in control and captivate every thought unto
obedience to the will of God, His spoken Word.
Knowing God's Will
"How can I know the will of God", you might
ask? Read and study God's Word! The Bible is our road-map to God's will. Let it
get down into your spirit. It is a powerful weapon against Satan and the flesh!
When you know the Truth of God's Word, it is very difficult for the lies of
Satan to get through. Your mind becomes a wall of protection for you. Pray for
God's strength when yours seems to fail. Ask Him for guidance and discernment
in the situation. As a Christian growing in relationship with the Lord, you
will come to understand when it is the Lord helping you as you get filled-up
with His Word and speak it and do it. This takes practice in everyday life. Use
these six methods I practiced in college to study for the best way to learn;
See it (read), hear it, speak it, believe it, do it, teach it. You will have
victory! I was a top student in my class because of practicing this method in
every area of my college years and even use them in my life today.
Don't Trust the Sinful Nature
So, why can’t we trust our rebellious, sinful mind or
nature? Let’s look at it in a spiritual way: Our carnal, flesh mind belongs to
the sinful nature and only concerned with the comforts of our body's desires,
needs, and emotions. The spiritual mind desires to be obedient to God and do
what’s right to please Him, according to His will and not our own sinful,
natural will. Some of you may understand this; two ‘minds’, (inward, natural
thought) war against one another within us, spiritual and flesh, and it is a
most powerful struggle! It’s like when kids wrestle with each other wanting
their own way.
Speaking of children: Do you know a three year old
child can lie to you without ever being taught how? Well, how can that be? We
are all born with three types of natures; sinful, human, and spiritual. One
nature of willfulness (natural way of thinking) always wins over one of the
others according to the power we allow one to have over us in a particular
situation. The strongest willfulness will rule. Such as the child choosing to
lie rather than tell the truth. It's called rebellion. If our child seems
controlled by bad behavior against what is good for them, or others they
effect, because of the sinful nature (rebellion against what is good and
right), we discipline them; such as...don't lie anymore, etc. God does that
with each of us as well. He will discipline us because, as you love your own
children, He loves us. The Lord will cause our conscience to feel bad; like
something is wrong. It's the spiritual nature feeling that pain in your heart.
For, the sinful nature will demand its way every time. It will pitch a tantrum
to have its way. Do you know any rebellious children in your life?
Jesus Tempted as the Son of Man
The Lord Jesus understood, and understands, temptation
(time of testing) very well. For He Himself was tempted (tested) (Read Matthew
Ch. 4) in every way, as a human being. Yet, He controlled it by drawing on the
power of Scripture from God’s True Word by applying (speaking) the exact verses
addressing each, specific temptation to overcome the sinful desires of the
flesh by speaking God the Father's will in every situation. And, His
temptations were very great after no food for forty days and forty nights and Satan attacking His
mind every step of the way! Jesus was in a battle! He desperately needed our
Father’s strength to survive such an awesome struggle His tortured spirit, mind and
body must have endured as not the Son of God, but the Son of Man (mankind). Christ
believed on the Word of God with perfect, unmovable faith. To Him, when God
said it...it is done! That's it!
Jesus Led into the Wilderness
Matt.
4:1 "Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit (of God)
into the wilderness to be tempted of the Devil (Satan)". Who led Jesus
to the wilderness? God the Father did. Why was He taken to the wilderness? The
Father desired to test by fire Jesus' faith the desires of His flesh body and
mind. God does not tempt anyone! However, He will allow us to be tested by various situations or various entities
that desire to test our faith and to prove if we will do His commandments. Why
must we go through times of testing? It is to build our faith in Almighty God, so we might learn to trust Him.
To give opportunity for spiritual change for the better in us to shine as Christians. It
is God's will to melt off the old sinful nature and for us to become more like
Christ in perfect spiritual maturity and faith. Water cleanses, but fire
purifies. Before this event, Jesus had just been baptized with water. Now, was
the testing by baptism with fire.
Side Note: The word 'led' here is the same as 'lifted up and
taken away'. This happened to Ezekiel as it is written in Ezekiel 3:14 "So
the Spirit (of the Lord God) lifted me up, and took me away, and I went in
bitterness, in the heat (anger) of my spirit; but the hand of the Lord was
strong upon me".
Forty Days & Nights of
Fasting
Matt.
4:2
"And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He was afterward an
hungered". Why forty days and nights and not thirty or ten, or some other
amount of days? Deuteronomy 8:2
"And thou (Israel) shalt remember
all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness...".
Jesus' forty days was a type-and-shadow of the nation of Israel's forty years
wandering in the desert after coming out of Egypt. Jesus had to be tested and
proved what was in His heart, just as they were. He was also tested to prove if
He would keep God's commandments or not.
Side Note: Fasting while being tested is like
spiritual mind and body 'purging'. A conditioning akin to a 'purge diet' where
one attempts to purge all the poisons from one's body and/or mind to better
purify it and make it healthier. Not allowing any 'bad' food to enter the body,
but only choosing the best, good food to enter it. During the process, the
poisons are, thereby, expelled.
John the Baptist said in Matt: 3:11-12 "I indeed
baptize you with water unto repentance: but He that cometh after me is mightier
than I, Who's shoes I am not worthy to bear: He shall baptize you with the Holy
Ghost (Spirit), and with fire: v12 "Whose fan is in His hand, and He will
thoroughly purge His floor, and gather His wheat into the garner; but He will
burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire".
Satan Visits Jesus
Matt.
4:3, 4 "And, when the tempter (Satan) came to Him
(Jesus), he said, If thou be the Son of God, command these stones be made bread".
v4 "But He answered and said, IT IS WRITTEN, Man shall not live by bread
alone, but every Word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God". The
false statement here is, "If thou be
the Son of God". While in His mortal, flesh body, Jesus was not acting
under the authority as the Son of God, but as the Son of Man. Jesus never referred to Himself as the Son of God. He only referred to Himself as the Son of Man in Scripture. Satan was
attempting to persuade Jesus to take on that authority again after He had
already laid it down in Heaven before coming to earth as a man. Doing this
would have gone against the Word of God in Deuteronomy 8:2, 3. Jesus desired
God’s will, hence, He quoted this Scripture to combat Satan to extinguish his
fiery dart. *See side note below.
Jesus answered with the Word, which is the will of
God: It is written in Deuteronomy 8:2, 3
"And thou shalt remember all the way
which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble
thee, and to prove (test) thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou
wouldest keep His commandments, or no". v3 "And He humbled thee,
and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knowest not,
neither did thy fathers know; that He might make thee know that man does not
live by bread only, but by every Word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord does man live".
*Side Note:
Although Jesus is the Son of God, He had laid down His Deity power and position
as God when he came to the earth from Heaven and became the Son of Man in the
flesh. It is written, Psalms 8:4, 5
"What is man, that thou art mindful
of him? and Thou Son of Man (Jesus), that thou visiteth (us upon the earth)?
For Thou (spoken Word) hast made Him a little lower than the angels, and hast
crowned Him with glory and honour". Psalms 81:14-17 "Return,
we beg thee, O God of hosts: look down from Heaven, and behold, and visit this
vine; And the vineyard which Thy Right Hand (Jesus sits at the Father's right
hand in Heaven) hath planted, and the Strong Branch (Jesus) that Thou madest
strong for Thyself. It is burned with fire (tested), It is cut down (crucified
on the Cross): they perish at the rebuke of Thy countenance. Let thy hand be
upon the Man of Thy Right Hand (Jesus), upon the Son of Man (Jesus) Whom Thou
madest strong for Thyself". Jesus is the Branch, or shoot, that came
out of the vine of Israel through the ancestral line of Jesse.
He lived as we live, as a human man, yet was without
sin. How could he live like us and be without sin? Because Jesus breathed,
believed and/or spoke the Word of God every moment of every day. He lived it!
Every thought was captured into submission to God's will and not His own. This type of testing
was about much more than food. It was about idolatry. For, to speak and act
against the will of God by putting anything between us and God's will is
idolatry. Satan knew the great faith Jesus had in the Father that whatever He
Himself spoke, it would happen! The Word spoken in great, perfect faith...is
going to happen, if one only believes.
*Side Note:
But Christ knew this old enemy's strategies. He was spiritually prepared by
fasting and praying. Jesus was well aware that Satan knew the Scriptures by
heart and could recite them. Because, Satan heard the Lord Jesus speak all of
them into existence in Heaven. Satan was
an Archangel, Cherubim, over the Mercy Seat in Heaven (he fell from from Grace
and was removed from that authority!) which made him a ‘guy in the know’, as
the saying goes. And the Devil is very subtle, crafty; the father of lies and
deception.
Disciples Tempted
Jesus could understand when the disciples were
tempted. Mark 26:34 Jesus said “Then saith He unto them (Peter, John &
James), My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death: tarry (stay) ye here, and
watch”. v37, 38 “And He cometh, and findeth them sleeping,
and saith unto Peter, Simon (Peter), sleepest thou? Couldest not thou watch one
hour? Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The spirit truly is
ready (willing), but the flesh is weak”. The Lord came back to them a few
times and found them sleeping. I’m sure the disciples’ heart’s desire was to be
obedient to Jesus to stay awake and keep watch, but their flesh body was
struggling against sleep. However, they could have fought against that sleep by quoting Scriptures, singing praise songs together, etc. They gave into the the flesh body instead. The flesh can be a powerful rudder that steers our ship!
Why do I do what I do not want to do?
Why did their flesh win over the disciple's heart’s
desire to do right? We need to recognize what is coming against us and make a
choice! The Apostle Paul explains this struggle very well in Romans 8:19-25 “For the good that I wish to do, I do not: but the evil which I do not
wish to do, that is what I do. Now if I do that which I wish not to do, it is
no more I that do it, but the sin that lives in me (flesh desire has a mind
of its own; selfish, stubborn, and punishing). For I find then a law (a sinful nature), that, when I would do good,
evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God (God’s Spirit
steering inward natural thought) after
the inward (spirit) man: But I see another law (sinful nature) in my members, warring against the law of
the (inward spirit) mind, and
bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched
(miserable) man that I am! Who shall deliver me from this body of death
(sin leads to spiritual death and separation from God)? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the
(spiritual) mind I myself serve the law
of God (spiritual nature); but with
the flesh (sinful nature) the law of sin.”
Victory with Spiritual Armor in Jesus
To have victory over the sinful nature and Satan, we Christians
must put on the whole armor of God, as Apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 6:10-18
(KJV) "Finally my brethren, be
strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might. v11 "Put on the whole
armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against all the wiles of the Devil".
v12 "For we wrestle not against
flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers
of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places".
v13 "Wherefore take unto you the
whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil (time of
testing, temptation), and having done all, stand".
The Armor of God, Described:
v14 "Stand, therefore, having your loins girded (belt) about with truth, and having on the
breastplate of righteousness".
v15 " And
your feet (boots) shod with the preparation
of the Gospel of Peace (the good news of Jesus);"
v16 "Above all, taking the shield of faith,
wherewith ye shall be able to quench (put out) all the fiery darts of the wicked".
v17 " And
take the helmet of salvation,
and the sword of the Spirit, which is
the Word of God:"
v18 "Praying always with all prayer and supplication
in the Spirit, and watching thereto with all perseverance and
supplication for all saints". (emphasis added)
The Rock We Stand On
Where is our hope? It is in Christ Jesus for He is
with us and He overcame the temptations of the flesh nature. When our hearts
fail us against temptation, we should pray to the Father, in Jesus' Name, and
ask Him for help and boldly proclaim Scripture against that specific
temptation. He is our strength and our Rock! Philippians 4:13 states "I can do all things through Christ which
strengthens me”.
