October 17 – The Power of Dying to Self
John 10:10: The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
Are you struggling with something you cannot overcome? Have you ever been so consumed by guilt that you felt unworthy to even worship God or pray? Sometimes we tread on thin ice, ready to crash any moment, and feel there are no second chances. Then we try hard to do it right and then fail again!
We cannot give in to the flesh; educate it, monitor, regulate, or renovate it. We often have the ten points to be positive, ten points for success using our will, taming our flesh, trying harder, exercising self-control which are all good, etc. etc. but after a few months, many times these fine attempts at change fade off. Have you noticed people change? Someone who seemed very spiritual suddenly seemed different? Someone who was good suddenly seemed “bad?”
Flesh is flesh, its components are not spiritual, and a fleshly mind can never comprehend the things of the spirit. To live in the spirit, the flesh must die. This is God’s holy highway way. The flesh has to die. The flesh is most defiled in 2 Peter 2.10-22; God does not change our flesh. He does not put perfume on it, renovate it. Even the precious blood of the Lord Jesus cannot cleanse the flesh. We find in the Bible how His blood washes our sin but never washes our flesh. It must be crucified as in Gal. 5.24. Remember, there is no method of deliverance other than to put it to death
We die daily, and live unto God. Now the exit simply follows the entrance. The way of possessing is the way of losing. Since we became flesh by being born of the flesh, the natural course to be free is if the flesh dies. Crucifixion is the one and only way. “For he who has died is freed from sin” (Rom. 6.7). Anything less than death is insufficient. Death is the only salvation. Jesus died on the Cross, and today, we die daily to our flesh. Each day, if we rise and say, I die, Lord, Holy Spirit live in and through me, we are giving space for God to work in us. We will actually find ourselves more ignited, alive and powerful in God.
The secret lies in death to soulish flesh. Death to our demands, death to our complaints, death to our desires. In this we will receive more spiritual life and be more in the designs of the person God created you to be. In losing yourself, you will find yourself.
Rita
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