God’s Provision of Redemption From The Flesh and Sin
The Problem of Sin and Flesh
From the day Adam and Eve fell in the Garden of Eden, man has been under the bondage of sin and flesh. Every man born of woman, with the special exception of Jesus, has suffered from the trouble of sin and flesh since the fall in the Garden. This was the fall that infected Adam and Eve with the contamination of sin and flesh, and made them strangers to God and banished them out of God’s presence. Since Adam and Eve were the first humans created by God, every other person born of them has shared in this experience of contamination and banishment. Every single person in the human race has one time or the other being a sinner and an enemy of God.
We must understand very clearly that we are born sinners, and that no one, save Jesus, is born righteous. The Psalmist wrote: “I was brought forth in [a state of] wickedness; in sin my mother conceived me [and from my beginning I, too, was sinful]” (Psalms 51:5, AMP). Romans 3:23 likewise affirms that “for all [men] have sinned, and fallen short of God’s glory” (KJV).
So we all, ever before we are born, have been in the bondage of sin and flesh. It is not after we are born that we pick up bad characters and sinful behaviours and become sinners. We are not the ones who make ourselves liars, stealers, haters, murderers, fornicators, adulterers, proud, backbiters, etc. NO. Rather, we were born with these sinful acts and behaviours running in our blood, we were born with sin in us. Sin is a natural reaction and affection for us. We have been genetically wired to commit sin. It is unnatural for us not to sin.
God’s Position about Sin.
God hates and despises sin. The Bible tells us that whoever is a sinner is separated from God (Isaiah 59:1–2). A sinner does not have any relationship or affinity with God in any way. When Adam and Eve sinned God chased them out of the Garden of Eden immediately (Genesis 3:22–24). Therefore, everyone who sins against God is immediately evacuated from God’s presence and banished away into the darkness of suffering, oblivion and turmoil. Also: anyone who commits sin cannot carry the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit is the DNA and nature of God. In other words, the nature of God is holiness. The devil can counterfeit good works, or speaking in unknown tongues, or what have you, but not holiness. So to be sinful is to be unholy before God and, thus, unacceptable.
The Way Out
Since man fell from grace in the Garden, God has sought for a way to totally and effortlessly redeem man back to Himself. In the Old Testament, He kept and guided His people by giving them leaders who ruled over them and brought them closer to Him. He used prophets, priests, kings and judges. He even used the enemy of His people, the pagan nations, to torture His people, all in the bid to bring them back to Himself. But all these did not stop the Israelites from turning away from God time after time, till the point God declared: “I have seen these people, and, behold, it is a stiffnecked people!” (Exodus 32:9, KJV). But thanks be to God, for when the fullness of time came, He completed His work of redemption by sending His Son to die on the Cross at Calvary (Ephesians 1:10). The death of Christ brought to all humankind total deliverance from sin and flesh. How?
1. The Blood
The Bible makes us understand that the blood that Jesus shed on the Cross is our deliverance package from sin ( Ephesians 1:7). This might sound a bit awkward, but you’ve got to know and accept that the only thing that can ever wash away any and every sin is the blood of Jesus. Good works, self-righteousness, or sacrifices cannot take away your sins. Forgetting and neglecting your sins by getting yourself drunk can never erase your sins and mistakes, or the fact that you committed them. The way out is the blood of Jesus. For there is a cleansing power in the blood of Jesus that human understanding cannot comprehend. In the Old Testament, the Psalmist cried to God: “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean!” (Psalms 51:7, KJV). That cleansing power lies in the blood of Jesus, and in His blood alone.
Do not be deceived, the blood of Jesus does not cleanse anyone by being physically poured on the body. We receive deliverance from sin only by faith in the blood of Jesus (Romans 3:25). This means that you’ve only got to believe that the blood can wash away all the stains and guilt of sin. Admit that in prayer by confessing your sins and asking that the blood of Jesus will wash them away. And it shall be so.
2. The Cross
When you hear the name “Mr Flesh”, or “Old Man”, or “Self”, this is pointing to the presence of an unseen being that is present in our mortal bodies (Romans 6:6; Colossians 3:9). This man is sin (noun, singular); he is different from our sinful actions that we call sins (noun, plural).
The man of sin is the being that stirs our bodies to commit sin. Just as a director determines the actions and comportments of actors in a play, so also is the way the man of sin leads, directs and influences the character of a sinner. He directs the sinner to commit both inward sins (e.g. pride, hatred, bitterness, lust) and outward sins (e.g. fornication, stealing, murder). He makes a man to be so full of himself. He manifests not only in inward and outward sins but as well as in behaviours, in the way we eat, speak, dress and carry ourselves.
This man of sin is so stubborn and has to be eliminated. Sadly, in our generation, people try to suppress him through piety, yoga, meditation, creed and New Year resolutions. The truth of the Scripture is that the only way this man of sin can be destroyed is by crucifixion. He must be crucified. And Christ had done that when He died on the Cross nearly 2,000 years ago (Romans 6:6). So the man of sin has been crucified, yet he still lives and exists in the lives of those who have not accepted the finished work of Christ on the cross (Romans 6:7).
Just as we receive deliverance from sin by faith in the blood of Jesus, so also we receive deliverance from the flesh by knowing and accepting that Christ took the Old Man of Sin with Him to the Cross. There this Old Man was crucified and we received victory, but this victory can only be experienced if we choose to believe and accept this truth. Genuine deliverance from the works of the flesh begins from believing that the man of sin no longer exists in us, that he has no hold whatsoever over us, that we are dead to sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus.
God has settled all necessary requirements for us to live a life pleasing unto Him. The sooner you believe this truth, the sooner you will begin to work victoriously over sin and the flesh. This article is an excerpt transcription from a message preached AT HIS FEET by Joseph Ola Okunola, you can download the full message here.
