Lesson 16 God’s Spirit and Our Unredeemed Flesh
Question 4
In my past, I would overindulge in food to relieve the pain of my very difficult upbringing, my guilt, shame I carried from my sins, out of boredom, loneliness, or for no reason at all. Maybe you’ve turned to food because you were bullied, or to try to manage a painful relationship, to find love and comfort, or any number of other reasons. I, personally, had a defeated way of thinking, and my emotions were out of control. I would sin, feel terrible about it, and then the guilt just took me right back to the pit of sin again. Like the Israelites in Numbers 11, I was living in Kibroth Hattaavah, which means “Graves of Craving.” Can you relate?
But then, the Holy Spirit turned the light on for me, showing me that Jesus bore my pain in His body when He died on the cross; it was not a burden for me to carry. He opened my heart to understand that I was not condemned for my sins because Jesus was condemned in my place, my guilt was nailed to a cross, and my sins were buried in a tomb, that Jesus had made an end of my sin. He told me, “I do not condemn you; now go and leave your life of sin.” This good news encouraged me and lifted me out of the grave, and I felt as if I were soaring in the heavens. No more defeatist thinking. No more believing the lies of the enemy. No more letting my emotions rule over me and drag me into sin.
Friend, I want you to hear the voice of freedom today. I want you to truly embrace this good word from Jesus Christ: “I do not condemn you!” Hear it with your heart, feed on it, savor it, relish it, rejoice in it. And then, let that message be used by God’s Spirit to set you free from the law of sin and death. “Go and sin no more.”
“For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” Romans 8:3-4 (NIV)