My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God’s Spirit. Then you won’t feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are contrary to each other, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don’t you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence? * * * It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn’t the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God’s kingdom. But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified. Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original.
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Compare All Versions: Galatians 5:16-26
3 Days
In this world, we war against three main enemies: the world, the flesh, and the devil. The most difficult and personal enemy we face is what the Bible calls our flesh. The flesh cannot be conquered in any other way except by denying the wrong desires that entice us. Surrendering our lives to Christ gives us a new nature, and our old nature is to live in subjection to it.
Do you ever struggle to believe you’re truly forgiven? Do you feel like you need to work up a bit of a good streak in your life before God will really be pleased with you? Check out this 3-day plan and find out how you can have assurance that you are truly forgiven, loved, and free.
Hearing the gospel inspires us to be thankful to God, and hearing about the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives stirs us up to keep in step with Him. Spend three days reflecting on the work of the Holy Spirit with us and be inspired to respond to His work by walking with Him.
This is part 4 of 4 in the Feed Middle School series Unboxed: Created in God's Image. This plan unpacks Lesson 4: God's Masterpiece. God identifies us as his children. He designed us as his “masterpiece,” and through Christ, we are set free to do the good things he planned for us long before sin entered the world. We don’t need to cling to our own ideas of who we should be or what we must do. Being in Christ is enough.
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