I believe the greatest need in our world is the need for a spiritual change. I also believe even with all the preaching and evangelization in today’s world, many people still don’t understand their need for a spiritual change; they don’t understand their condition, what Christ did at the Cross, or what He offers us. In my experience, such explanations often are too abstract. So I want to take a shot at this, with God’s guidance.
I offer these thoughts to the cynics and unbelievers in hopes they will gain insight to the spiritual battle in their lives and, when faced with truth, they’ll be able to make the right choice for their future. I offer these thoughts to Christians so they can better understand where they came from and the life they now live so they can make purposeful choices, and so they can talk to others more effectively with more clarity.
Spiritually, humans live in one of two conditions. Either we are children of Satan serving sin (Satan) or we are children of God to serve righteousness (God); there is no third option. Christ told the Pharisees, a most prestigious level of Judaism, “If God were your Father, ye would love me, for I…came from God…ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do” (John 8:42, 44). Our father gives us his nature, which determines how we live. John distinguished between the children of the Devil and the children of God in 1 John 3:8–10,
“He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed [Christ] remaineth in him: and he [Christ] cannot sin, because he is born of God. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.”
Paul also established this truth when he wrote to Christians in Thessalonica saying, “Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” (1 Thess. 5:5). Peter acknowledges the two spiritual conditions saying, “Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God” (1 Peter 1:23), showing there isn’t another option. We are born of one seed or the other; there isn’t a state between corruptible and incorruptible, and there isn’t an empty state. These examples can go on and on, using biblical metaphors of light and darkness, life and death, sin and righteousness, and so on.
Without salvation we are Satan’s children serving sin.
“Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others” (Eph. 2:2–3).
That is our natural state without Christ. We naturally serve sin. Paul described the sinner’s condition in several places. He testified of the Ephesians:
“That ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart: who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness” (Eph. 4: 17–19).
Now, just as Earth has natural laws, such as the law of gravity, so there are laws of how spiritual things work. Sin and flesh produce only one kind of behavior and one kind of spiritual existence. You don’t control it; it simply is this way. “For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death” (Rom. 7:5). “Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live” (Rom. 8:12–13). “For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting” (Gal. 6:8).
“Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God” (Gal. 5:19–21).
What about just being a good person, doing good and being kind to others? Isn’t it really about being a good person?
God’s Word says, “To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God” (Rom. 8:8). Lifestyle is a by-product of the nature inside. The spiritual nature inside is what God sees. If it is not His nature, that is not His child, and they cannot produce His fruit.
Also, the two spiritual states are complete opposites. “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would” (Gal. 5:17). These two states fight to destroy each other, which means you can’t have a little of both; you can’t maintain a spiritual relationship with God while choosing to continue in sin; and you can’t continue in sin while focusing on your spiritual life and having a spiritual relationship with God. “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh” (Gal. 5:16).
The deliberate decision to become God's child and serve Him happens at salvation. Salvation is being made spiritually alive by the incorruptible seed living in you (1 Peter 1:23). This is what Christ called being born again (John 3:3–8). A new spiritual life is born inside you. Sinners are spiritually dead, and those who receive Christ are spiritually alive (Rom. 8); for He IS spiritual life. Spiritual life—in time, through the Spirit renewing the mind—produces behavioral fruit, which is evident for all to see. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22–25).
There are only two choices; there are not three. There is no “independence.” All the talk in the world of independence is a lie. Independence is merely a statement of self, denying God His rightful place. It originated with Satan and is a characteristic of Satan’s nature. It’s like a little pot declaring himself as his own person, denying the potter made him. While the little pot denies the potter’s right to his life, he doesn’t know it, but he is displaying the self-serving, self-promoting ego of Satan, who was thrown out of God’s house for organizing a coup to try to displace God from His thrown (Isaiah 14:12–14; Luke 10:18). The potter made the pot for the potter’s purpose. The pot was made in the form of a container for a reason—he is to hold something. As sin took control of the pot, it became a container for sin. However, the potter made it to contain His spirit, to have His righteousness, to be joint-heirs with His Son, so God could have children (Eph. 1:4–5). Anything other than God’s purpose is a distortion and misuse of creation and goes against God’s plan for the created.
