CROWN OF LIFE EV. LUTHERAN CHURCH
Pastor John C. Schneidervin

15th Sunday After Pentecost September 1, 2002

Live By The Spirit
1. Wage The War
2. Make The Break

Text: Galatians 5:16-24

16 So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. 17 For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.

19 The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires.

Sermon:

Do you know what these books are? They are textbooks. School is back in session. You young people are getting back into the school books. Some of you are starting college, or a tech school, or high school. You children are back in elementary school and have been issued books like these. You small children may be just starting kindergarten or preschool.

As the children go off to school, you parents are seeing your children growing up. As you watch them growing up, you want them to become like you, having your Christian faith and values and morals.
In a sense all of us believers in Jesus are children. We are the children of God. Being God’s children, we all can grow up some more. As you parents desire your children to become like you, so our gracious God desires us to become like him. This is the goal of your Grow Vision of Ministry. It says: “Grow--My Lord wants me to become like him.”

Being the children of God who are to grow to become like him, we need to get into the most important book of all -- the Bible. Through the Word we grow by the Holy Spirit in our knowledge. As we grow in our knowledge, we grow in our understanding of our Lord and his will. As we grow in our understanding of our Lord and his will, we grow in our convictions. As we grow in our convictions, we see matters in the world and in life as our Lord see’s them. When we see matters as our Lord sees them, we make God-pleasing choices and decisions. In this way we grow to become like our Lord himself.

To be like our Lord is, we must be different than we naturally are. Our desire to be different than we are and to be like our Lord is comes from the gospel of God’s grace in Christ. God has saved us sinful people from hell and has blessed us with eternal life through the redeeming life and death of his Son, Jesus Christ. In Jesus our eternal salvation in heaven is guaranteed. We have come to believe this gospel by the Holy Spirit. Through this gospel he creates in us the desire to be like our Lord is.

We cannot make ourselves like the Lord is. You have probably heard individuals say that they have given themselves to the Lord; or, that they have made the Lord the Lord of their life; or, that they decided to accept Jesus as Lord and to walk with him. These are fine sounding statements. The problem with them, however, is that the statements credit the individuals themselves with having made those choices and decisions. The truth is the Holy Spirit creates within us such a new spirit that desires to be like our Lord.

To be like our Lord, what does verse 16 urge us to do? Let’s read aloud verse 16 together. It says: “So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature.” What do we need to do to become like our Lord? Verse 16 urges us to live by the Spirit, doesn’t it? When we live by the Spirit, we will not gratify and carry out the desires of our sinful nature. We will then display in our daily lives the same virtues our Lord himself has and be holy like he is.

But now look at verse 17. It states: “For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.” This verse can be translated with a capital “S” on the word “Spirit,” so the verse refers to the Holy Spirit. This verse could also be translated with a small “s” on the word “spirit,” so the verse refers to our new Christian spirit that the Holy Spirit created within us when he brought us to faith in Jesus. Our new Christian spirit desires to be like our Lord.

To live by the Spirit to become like the Lord, however, we must wage the war. What war? Look at verse 17 again for the answer. Who is in conflict with whom? Our old sinful nature is in conflict with our new Christian spirit, and our new Christian spirit is in conflict with our old sinful nature. We are, then, at war within ourselves. Thus we do not do what we want to do. Our old sinful nature wants only to sin all the time. But our new Christian spirit opposes our sinful nature and prevents it from doing the evil it wants to do. On the other hand, our new Christian spirit always and only wants to do what pleases God and is holy. But our old sinful nature too often rises up, gets the best of us, and prevents our Christian spirit from doing the good it wants to do.
The only way for us to wage the war and fight off our sinful nature with its evil desires is to live by the guiding influence and power of the Holy Spirit. With the Holy Spirit living in us and guiding our thoughts we will not carry out the desires of our sinful nature. As verse 18 then tells us, when we are so led by the Holy Spirit, we are not under the law. We are not under the law’s condemnation for living sinfully, because we are living in harmony with the law’s commands.

When we live by the Spirit, we will make the break to be different. Verse 24 says, “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires.” We who belong to Christ crucify, put to death, our sinful nature with its evil desires. This means we renounce our past sinful ways. We want no part of those sinful ways. We make a clean break from them. We become different. We become like our Lord is.
Verses 19 to 21 tell us what kind of deeds our old sinful nature causes us to do. “The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.” This list of sinful acts is a catalog of sins. The list could contain many more sins than those listed, as indicated by the words “and the like.” Any and all sins could be added to this list. Our sinful nature is responsible for them all.

Sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery are sexual sins against the sixth commandment. Idolatry and witchcraft are sins against the first and second commandments. Hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy are sins against the fifth commandment. Drunkenness and orgies are sins of lack of self-control.

No doubt we Christians, because we always have our sinful nature within us, can sometimes slip into such sins. Thanks be to God that he had Jesus his Son redeem us from our guilt of those sins of weakness. In Jesus we find and have the forgiveness of our sins. But verses 19 to 21 teach us that those who live in these sins, who continue to do them and to practice them and to make them their way of life, will not inherit the kingdom of God. They will perish in hell.

When we live by the Spirit, we make a clean break from all such sins. We become different. We become like our Lord. We display the fruits of the Holy Spirit in our daily lives. Verses 22 and 23 tell us what those fruits of the Spirit are. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” When we grow to become like our Lord, these virtues will be evident in our daily lives.

Over the years I have counseled husbands and wives whose marriages had fallen on the rocks of adversity. Their marriages were a troubled mess. They complained they did not love one another anymore. What do you think ruined their marriages? Their sins against one another. Their sinful natures had gotten the best of them and produced the sinful acts we heard listed a minute ago -- adultery, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy. In counseling those husbands and wives I encouraged them to grow spiritually through the Word of God in the Spirit, so the fruits of the Spirit would become evident in their lives and marriages. Do you have any idea how blessed our marriages will be when the virtues of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control are evident?

From time to time brothers and sisters in Christ within a congregation have conflicts over this or that matter, end up at odds with one another, and their relationships become strained. What can prevent those situations from occurring? Growing spiritually through the Word to live by the Spirit, so the fruits of the Spirit are evident in their relationships with one another. Those virtues will make a blessed congregational life.

As I said earlier, school is back in session. It’s time to hit the books. Above all it’s time to get into the most important book of all -- the Bible. Through the Word we will grow to live by the Spirit, so we wage the war against our sinful nature and make the break from our sinful ways. Through the Word and by the power of the Spirit heed your Vision of Ministry, which urges you: “Grow -- my Lord wants me to become like him.”

Amen.