Works of the Flesh

We are beginning a series on the

works of the flesh. I want to say right off the bat, that I’ll spend

our time today setting up this subject, and that it will require me

to take a couple of rabbit trails.

I said last week, that I hope you will be wearing some steel toe

boots today, incase the Word of God starts stepping on your

toes. Notice I didn’t say, incase I step on your toes. If your toes

get stepped on, it won’t be me that does it. It will be the Word

of God. If you have a problem with it, take it up with God, not

me…He’s the one who said it. I’m just the messenger.

Actually, you know what? Never mind, you should not be

wearing steel toe boots. If you came in here with the attitude of

steel toed boots, I’d like for you to take them off and put on a

pair of flip flops. Because if the Word of God is stepping on your

toes, you should feel it. And it should hurt a little. Change can

be painful, but it’s good for you. No pain, no gain.

That’s what’s wrong with christianity today. We love to

continually be hearing all about how much Jesus loves us. And

make no mistake, He does, but not any more than anyone else.

Why do you think John 3:16 is the most famous verse in the

Bible?

John 3:16 “16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his

only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but

have eternal life.”

That feels good doesn’t it? There is a saying that has been

around in church circles for a long time. It’s this: “Jesus loves

me so much, that if I had been the only person on earth, He

would have come and died just for me.” Is that true? It suredoes sound good. But here’s the issue. It’s not in the Bible. It

comes from C.S. Lewis, in one of his fiction books, that was

written in 1943. The idea feels true, but cannot be supported by

scripture. And scripture is the only place we can take truth.

So, what does the Bible have to say about this idea? Let me ask

you a question. Has there ever been a time when there was

only one person on earth with sin? Yes, there was. It was Eve.

She was the first person to sin. Let’s take it even further and say

Adam and Eve basically sinned at the same time. So, now we

have as close to this scenario as we can get. Only 2 people on

earth…both now sinners.

Now, let me ask you another question. Did Jesus come and

save them after they sinned? Did Jesus show up and give His

life, so they could be forgiven, before sin spread to their sons?

No, He did not. It was never God’s plan to deal with sin like this.

God’s promise was to eventually, send a savior for everyone.

This whole idea that Jesus would have died just for you, is based

on a false premise. Jesus came for all of humanity, not just you.

Maybe the problem is that the modern church has taught us

to think a little to highly of ourselves. I won’t go any further

down that rabbit trail, but it does make the point of how much we

love ourselves and want to make everything about us personally.

You see, the problem is that we stopped reading the Bible right

after the Jesus loves me part. And in doing so, we have

ignored or glossed over all of the other parts of the Bible that

shine a light on our sinful and selfish behavior. These are the

parts we should pay even closer attention to, because they call

us to repentance. It’s the process of sanctification. Those parts

of the Bible are called the works of the flesh.As we go through this series, please do yourself a favor and

make a note when you hear something that you recognize as

your own bad behavior being called out. Remember it as

something that must be changed, if you want to live a blessed

life. It’s not enough for you to just hear me tell you what needs to

change in your life. You actually need to do something about it.

James 1:22-25 “22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers

only, deceiving yourselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the

word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his

natural face in a mirror. 24 For he looks at himself and goes

away and at once forgets what he was like. 25 But the one

who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres,

being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be

blessed in his doing.”

What will you do? Will you see the problem and make a change

or will you forget what the word of God says by the time you

finish lunch today? If so, you are just deceiving yourself into

believing everything in your life is just fine. I certainly hope that is

not what you do.

Let’s go ahead and pick up where we left off last week. We were

talking how the church in Galatia was having trouble because

some of the Jews were reverting back to the law. This will

continue to give us the context for Paul laying out the works of

the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit.

Let’s go to the beginning of Galatians chapter 5.

Galatians 5:1 “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm

therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.What was the yolk of slavery he was talking about? It was the

mosaic law that the Jews were required to follow. There were

613 laws they had come up with. God gave them 10 and they

expanded it a little bit.

Paul warns them that they need to stand firm against this desire

to fall back into following the law, with all of it’s rituals.

Circumcision was the ritual he was talking about. Because that

is what had caused an uproar in their church.

Galatians 5:2-4 “2 Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept

circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. 3 I testify

again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated

to keep the whole law. 4 You are severed from Christ, you who

would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.

Why is it a big deal to bring some of the law into their new faith in

Jesus? Because if you decide that one of the laws must be kept,

then you have to follow all of the laws. And if you don’t want to

do that, the natural question is this: Where do you draw the line?

If you don’t have to follow all the laws, which ones have to be

kept and which ones can you ignore? And beyond that, who

gets to make this decision? Is it just up to each individual to

figure out which laws they need to keep to be saved?

If Christ has set you free from the law, and then you return to

following it, you have made the work of Christ useless. You have

severed yourself from Christ and fallen away from grace.

Galatians 5:5-6 “5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves

eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. 6 For in Christ

Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for

anything, but only faith working through love.Here Paul zeros in on the issue they were having. Circumcision.

He says that if you are circumcised or if you are not circumcised,

it makes no difference spiritually. It counts for nothing since

faith in Jesus is now all you need.

This would have been very difficult for the Jews to accept. But,

of all the rituals found in the law, why was circumcision the one

that the Jews wanted to keep? Why was it such a big deal? It

was because circumcision was the sign of the covenant that God

had made with Abraham, the father of the nation of Israel. Let’s

go down that rabbit trail for a minute.

Genesis 17:6-8 “6 I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will

make you into nations, and kings shall come from you. 7 And I

will establish my covenant between me and you and your

offspring after you throughout their generations for an

everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring

after you. 8 And I will give to you and to your offspring after

you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an

everlasting possession, and I will be their God.”

If the God of all creation has shown up in person and made a

covenant with you…you’d probably take it pretty seriously. This

was God’s way of restarting His plan of having a family of people

of His own here on earth. God promised Abraham a lot of

things in this deal, and then He told Abraham what would be

required of him, to keep this covenant or contract. In any

contract, there are things required from both parties too keep the

contract valid.

Genesis 17:9-10 ”9 And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you

shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you

throughout their generations. 10 This is my covenant, which you

shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you:

Every male among you shall be circumcised.”Circumcision was their part of the contract with God. So you can

see why this was the one part of the law that the jews were very

hesitant to let go of. But that doesn’t stop Paul from going after

the ones who were trying to bring this back into the church.

Galatians 5:7-12

“7 You were running well. Who hindered you

from obeying the truth? 8 This persuasion is not from him who

calls you. 9 A little leaven leavens the whole lump. 10 I have

confidence in the Lord that you will take no other view, and the

one who is troubling you will bear the penalty, whoever he

is. 11 But if I, brothers, still preach circumcision, why am I still

being persecuted? In that case the offense of the cross has

been removed. 12 I wish those who unsettle you would

emasculate themselves!”

This passage is where we see the famous quote: “a little leaven

leavens the whole lump.” Meaning that only a couple of people

teaching a bad doctrine can affect the entire church. In verse 10

Paul calls out whoever has been causing this trouble in the

church. He says that whoever this is, will bear the consequences

of their actions. It was certainly not him, teaching them to

include circumcision as part of their faith, because the Jews were

still persecuting him for going against that teaching of the law.

And then Paul takes it to a whole other level. Do you know what

he was saying when he said “I wish those who trouble you would

emasculate themselves? He was saying that they should not

stop at just circumcision…they should go even further and finish

the job. The word emasculate here means to amputate. He’s

saying, they should make themselves eunuchs. Paul didn’t pull

any punches when it came to people in the church teaching

wrong doctrine.This is why we are careful about who leads small groups at

FUEL. There is a qualification and a responsibility to being able

to teach others the word of God. And there is something else.

James 3:1 “Not many of you should become teachers, my

brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with

greater strictness.”

How does that sound? Would you like to be judged by God

more strictly than He judges everyone else? If you want to be a

teacher, this is what will happen. So, be careful what you wish

for. This is why the Bible says, not many should be teachers.

OK, that’s enough set up. Let’s move on now to what the works

of the flesh actually are. They are listed beginning at Galatians 5

verses 19-21, just before the fruit of the Spirit list.

Galatians 5:19-21 “19 Now the works of the flesh are evident:

sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery,

enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries,

dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things

like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who

do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”

The first thing that I want you to remember is the people who

got this letter from Paul. It was a church. We like to think that

the works of the flesh are a description of how unbelievers live.

But Paul is saying to the church members, that they are the ones

who need to be on guard against these things.

You should not be surprised when unbelievers act like this, but

you should be surprised when Christians act like this.

Also, notice is how Paul ends the list. He doesn’t end the list.

He says, “and things like these.” There are lots more things thatyour flesh wants you to be involved in. But let’s back up a

minute and look at how he sets up the list.

Galatians 5:16-18 “16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will

not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the desires of the flesh

are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against

the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you

from doing the things you want to do. 18 But if you are led by

the Spirit, you are not under the law.”

We talked about the fruit of the Spirit for the last several weeks,

and as you can see, Paul wants us to know that the desires of

your flesh and the desires of the Holy Spirit in you are

working in opposition to each other.

That’s one of the jobs of the Holy Spirit in your life…to battle your

flesh. But how do you know the difference between the voice of

the Holy Spirit and the voice of your own flesh, when it come to

making a decision about something you are considering doing?

Here’s an easy test that will help you decide at least 80% of the

time, who is talking to you. Ask yourself this question. Does my

flesh want to do this thing? If the answer is yes, then it’s

probably not the Holy Spirit telling you to do it. If your flesh does

not want to do it, then it probably is the Holy Spirit.

Your flesh and the Holy Spirit are constantly working against

each other. The Holy Spirit is there to help you keep your

flesh under control. We are supposed to crucify our flesh daily,

not let it run wild doing whatever it wants. If you let your flesh do

whatever it wants, you’ll be operating in the works of the flesh.