If we continue to live in the sinful nature…as outlined in all the 
previous posts on Living Down…we will die a slow death spiritually. We might look the same in the mirror, go through the routines of life, but find ourselves growing out of touch with God and the things of the Spirit. If we want to be alive in the Spirit, we must pay attention and PUT TO DEATH the misdeeds of the flesh that we live in by habit. This death to SELF happens one choice at a time.
Today’s Truth, Romans 8, from the Message
“God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn’t deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle, but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God’s action in them find that God’s Spirit is in them…living and breathing God!
Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end, attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn’t pleased with being ignored.
So, don’t you see that we don’t owe this old do-it-yourself life one red-cent. There’s nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God’s Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go.”
How do we pay attention so that we can give our flesh a burial and change?
Go to Galatians chapter 5 and look again at the works of the flesh. Read them out loud. Think about them. Ask God to show you if any of these apply to you and in which area or relationship they apply. As God begins to show you, there is a new responsibility to Put To Death, the things that are not living in the Spirit. We put something to death by making intentional choices that will minimize it, and eventually remove it from our lives.
For instance, if you find yourself enslaved in gossip and negative attitudes about people, you are living in the flesh because that is dissension. Even if the dissension is just constantly hovering around your mind, it must be dealt with.
How do you deal with it?
Get Real with God…Go to the Father in prayer and tell him that you realize you have this problem. Tell him how long, though he already knows, confess it all out to him.
- Ask him to show you the best way to remove this from your life.
- Then listen….he WILL give you direction. It will most likely come in the form of a thought pattern that keeps repeating itself…maybe something like
- You must quit speaking negative about anything or anyone.
- The thought repeats, over and over…and you realize this is God’s answer to prayer.
Then you must put feet to faith and actually determine to go on a DIET of not being negative and not speaking negative. That will mean that every time the thought comes to your mind you will have to replace it with something on God’s acceptable list! ( if there is anything good think on these things! Phil 4).
You do this over and over, and yes it can be tiring…but you continue putting to death the habit of negativity within you, until before long the positive of Christ in you becomes more of a rule in your life. Without any negative….there is no room for dissension with others. Does this mean you always agree? Nope. It just means you reserve judgement for the Lord, because He is in charge of people!
That is one example of putting the flesh to death in your life. When we deliberatly walk in a different direction in order to change a habit that has FLESH written all over it…it will be hard and uncomfortable. But the end result is FREEDOM.
“Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! ” Galatians 5:1 TM
Today’s Prayer
Lord, I don’t know how to bury myself. Show me what that means and what it doesn’t mean. Show me the areas in my life that are just human flesh nonsense…old hurts, old attitudes, flesh patterns, addictions, relational issues, etc….I am asking you to show me how to take a stand to live the Free life that is your Best Life for me.
Sometimes I struggle with negative people that are in denial of obvious sin in their habitual way of Living of that I love and are in my circle most weeks.I internally Judge just how wrong they are, Duh, praying for them without ceasing as the Bible says would be the change to Live up that I need to make. Help me Lord, I pray.