Live by the  Spirit!

In the Bible, Christians are encouraged to “live by the Spirit.” What exactly does that mean? For many of us, overcoming sin is a struggle. God understands that. If you were brought up in a good Christian home, count yourself blessed. You will probably avoid many of the pitfalls that others of us have fallen into. If you have gotten off the path somewhere along your journey through life, you especially, MUST learn to live by the Spirit….

This is because Satan, God’s enemy, is not one to easily give back ground you have yielded to him in the past. Ephesians 4:27 tells us, “do not give the devil a foothold.” The Greek word for foothold is topos, and literally means a specific place; territory, area, or land” (TDNT- Theol. Dict. of the NT). Regardless, all of us must learn to follow God’s Spirit if we are to attain a truly blessed life on this earth. In this blog, my aim is to share experiences and teachings from the Word to help us all “live by the Spirit [so that we] will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature” (Galatians 5:16).

The King James version translates Ephesians 5:25 this way- “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” If you have received Jesus as your Savior and payment for your sin, then you already live in the Spirit, because when you first believed in Jesus, the Holy Spirit made your human spirit alive again. He now lives within you. We all have human spirits—it’s how God made us. (If we were just material, we would have no free will!) So, God’s Spirit now lives permanently in our bodies, and he has made our human spirit alive again toward him. So you literally are living “in the Spirit” right now. But there are degrees to which you can be “walking” in the Spirit. The NIV84 translates Eph 5:25 this way: “Since we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.” That’s the key. We need to train ourselves to be sensitive to what the Spirit is saying to us, and to always try to follow his leading. Romans 8 says that those who live with a constant sensitivity to God’s Spirit are mature sons and daughters of God. We can use the power of God’s Spirit to overcome sin in our lives and, in time, make us more Christlike, which is what God so deeply desires from us.

If you are a believer in Jesus, ask God to make you more aware of his Spirit, and to help you live in touch with the Spirit moment by moment. It’s exciting!