Spiritual Warfare and Sin

To be entirely safe from the devil’s snares the man of God must be completely obedient to the Word of the Lord. The driver on the highway is safe, not when he reads the signs but when he obeys them.

That Incredible Christian, 51.
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Spiritual Warfare and Sin: A Saint In Embryo

For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. –Romans 7:22-23

The regenerate man often has a more difficult time of it than the unregenerate, for he is not one man but two. He feels within him a power that tends toward holiness and God, while at the same time he is still a child of Adam’s flesh and a son of the red clay. This moral dualism is to him a source of distress and struggle wholly unknown to the once-born man. Of course the classic critique upon this is Paul’s testimony in the seventh chapter of his Roman epistle.

The true Christian is a saint in embryo. The heavenly genes are in him and the Holy Spirit is working to bring him on into a spiritual development that accords with the nature of the Heavenly Father from whom he received the deposit of divine life. Yet he is here in this mortal body subject to weakness and temptation, and his warfare with the flesh sometimes leads him to do extreme things. “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would” (Gal. 5:17). That Incredible Christian, 53-54.

“Lord, sometimes I could wish I were not ‘still a child of Adam’s flesh and a son of the red clay.’ But I live in this flesh and realize constantly my total dependence on You for spiritual victory. Grant it today, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.”

On this day...

• Malachi 2:4–9 - 2015
• Malachi 2:5 - 2014
• Building on the Rock of Ages - 2011
• TRUE SAINTS, WHEN ABSENT FROM THE BODY, ARE PRESENT WITH THE LORD - 2009
• God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men - 2009
• Peculiar people - 2008
• THE OFFERING OF THE NATURAL - 2008
• THE OFFERING OF THE NATURAL - 2008
• THE OFFERING OF THE NATURAL - 2008
• Psalms 84:6 - 2008