Pride
All of us, I mean ALL of us have been guilty of being carnal at times. There is no denying that fact. The key is to recognize it, admit it, quickly ask for forgiveness from God for it and repent from it (completely turn away from it). However, if you can’t see the need for forgiveness, then you have been blinded by PRIDE.
Pride will tell you to blatantly lie to yourself. It will whisper in your ear and say it’s unnecessary because you aren’t that bad. Pride will keep you from seeing a need to ask for forgiveness ON PURPOSE. It will say “God knows your heart. You don’t need to say anything because He already knows what you did.” Yet pride is a tool, a spirit of deception used by the enemy to further distance you from The Father. Pride will show up strongly in your life to usher in and set you up for a fall. A carnal mind is susceptible to all kinds of seducing spirits but pride is a downfall spirit because it causes you to think you are “above all that”. A carnal mind is polluted by the smog of deception and pride. The Word of God says “All of us have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory.” Romans 3:23 (contemporary English version). Therefore we ALL have things we need to confess and repent of daily.
There is no condemnation in Christ. BUT we must go to the Cross and be washed in the Blood of Jesus. If we were walking in a carnal mind all of our lives, even up until 5 minutes ago, God is faithful. He will forgive you. If you invite Him to do so, Holy Spirit will lead and guide you in how to walk in His Spirit and not carnally. He will keep your mind in perfect peace, if you keep your mind on Him and not worldly thinking. What was fruit of the flesh in your life yesterday will be now become fruit of the Spirit today. The change can be just that dramatic, just that quickly.
Humility is necessary and a requirement for the citizens of the Kingdom of God. Abba desires for you to be at peace in your flesh NOW and humility, confession and repentance are the vehicles which will deliver you into that peace. He wants for you to experience the fullness of life in Christ but you have to be willing to find out what a carnal mindset is to Almighty Father/God. You have to work hard with Holy Spirit to have a spiritual mind, which is everything that a fleshly mind is not. Romans 12:2 reminds us to “not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” We need to PROVE what’s acceptable by taking off the carnal mind and putting on the mind of Christ.
The works of the flesh according to Galatians 5 are
- Repetitive, loveless, cheap sex;
- A stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage;
- Frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness;
- Trinket gods;
- Magic-show religion;
- Paranoid loneliness;
- Cutthroat competition;
- All-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants;
- A brutal temper;
- An impotence to love or be loved;
- Divided homes and divided lives;
- Small-minded and lopsided pursuits;
- The vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival;
- Uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions;
- Ugly parodies of community.
If you have done any of these things in either deed or thought, the truth is you are GUILTY. Do not allow pride to make excuses for you. Do not allow the pressures of this world give you license to think you don’t have to repent before the Holy and Righteous Judge. Don’t let your flesh overrule the Spirit of God calling you by conviction to ask for forgiveness. He is faithful to save, but if you don’t think you need saving….
It’s time Church to prove to the world we are different. We are the Children of God who don’t have pride. We are quick to forgive and we are quicker to ask for forgiveness. We aren’t like the world. We don’t think like them. We don’t act like them. WE are the Mind and Body of Christ when we walk in righteousness and Holy Spirit. It is time to look different Church, sound different, act different, just like our Savior and King.
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