One thing that will make anyone not understand the dimensions of the journey the Lord God is taking him or her on is not because he hasn't got university degrees, PhDs, or millions in his account, or that he can't read well nor write, it is because his life has been subjected to the leading of his or her flesh. The flesh is the enemy in us fighting our spiritual vision. Even when God was to shout in our ears, the flesh is so dull of hearing that it can't hear nor perceive, and when the spirit is pressing in to know what the will of God is for him, the flesh overwhelms the spirit with all its contradictions and distractions.

The Lord is saying to us this day the same thing He said to Cain, but the appetite of his flesh, yearnings, desires, and bitterness wouldn't allow him to heed Divine institutions:

"If you had done the right thing, you would be smiling. But you did the wrong thing, and now sin [the desires of your members, the wants and yearning of your flesh: eyes, nose, mouth, stomach, reproduction organ, legs...] is waiting to attack you like a lion. Sin [the desires of your flesh/body] wants to destroy you, but don't let it!" (Genesis 4:7, CEV.)

Jesus in His teaching gave us the ABC of the flesh according to John chapter 6 verse 63b, He said, "THE FLESH PROFITS NOTHING." I don't want you to think that the Lord Jesus left a gap for us to figure it out, or try to evaluate if truly the flesh could profit us anything at all if our lives are ruled and spent by it.

It is clear and vivid, the flesh profits nothing, no matter anything that the flesh can accumulate unto itself in a moment, it only takes a little time to fade away, and its glory like a grass ? that is burnt in a fire, and nothing is remembered about it again.

But there is a profit to gain from life or in a lifetime only when we buy the way of life that is in Christ Jesus. In the same place that Jesus said, "The flesh profits nothing,” is the same place He pointed out to us what can profit us or we can profit from maximally. Look at it,

"It is the Spirit Who gives life [He is the Life-giver]; the flesh conveys no benefit whatever [there is no profit in it]. The words (truths) that I have been speaking to you are spirit and life."

(John 6:63, AMPC.)

How does the Spirit give life to as many that come to the Father in Christ Jesus, or how can we gain the life of the Spirit, the life of God by the Spirit?

The Spirit gives us Life by producing His work or fruit in us, we are alive in the Spirit when the Spirit is the one in charge of what we do, say, where we go and don't go, what we believe and don't believe. When our desires and obedience are powered by the Spirit, we are made alive in Union with the Father, Son, and the Spirit (Holy Spirit).

We don't operate the two lives together at the same time, we can't live in the flesh (doing our desires, living as it pleases us) and at the same time living and walking in the Spirit at the same time, no, it does not work like that same way no car can head towards two destinations, one way to the lift and another way to the right, in the same moment. I am not talking of two destinations on the same route.

In like manner, you can't be controlled by the flesh and the Holy Spirit at the same time. It is our choice to make if our effectiveness must be evident to all and profitable to God and our generation. It is only them that allow the Holy Spirit to be the Lord, controller of their lives on the earth that are sons of God on the earth.

This truth looks hard but it is all that the truth is. The fishes in the oceans live like fish, the goats don't live like chickens, nor do the monkeys live like cats. Every creature lives in the manner of its nature, according to ancestral lifestyle, behaviour or mannerism.

The Bible says, "if a man is in Christ is a new creation" (2 Cor. 5:17). Meaning he or she was created as a new being. There was a life he was living before, the nature he was born with. Like every human being on the face of the earth, this nature is shared commonly among all just like every goat globally behaves almost alike; a goat is a goat wherever you take it to, or wherever you find it.

The behaviour, manner of life, or ways of the nature of life that we were born naturally with is what the Bible referred to as the flesh life, the old life. Its ways and doings and its yearning are not in Union with the new life that we have received in Christ Jesus. The new life we have received in Christ Jesus as recorded in John chapter 3 verse 6 is what is referred to as the life of the Spirit — children that are born unto God by the Spirit.

“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”

The manner of the life of the flesh is not the same as the life of the Spirit. The moment a man or woman is born again, there is a need for him to learn the manner of the life of the Spirit. Because the two lifestyles are not the same. A man or woman that is in Christ is expected to behave like Christ. For this to be possible, he must learn the life of Jesus. The manner of the life of Jesus is not something to be wished for, it does not fall on anyone like ripe pawpaw. It is a lifestyle; it entails all that Jesus began to teach and to do from the day He was born till He resurrected and ascended to the Father.

The hardest thing to ever do is to live the new basis on the old. Nothing looks more frustrating to a fish than forcing it out of the water to begin to live on the land like a snake. Similarly, when a spiritual child for any reason begins to live based on the old template, the manner of the flesh, he will struggle through phases of life, and he will suffer so many wounds and unamendable losses, damage that the tears of the flesh can’t solve the cause of it. we can’t make progress in the new running the new life like the old life. It is contrary and unfruitful. This could be the reason many in the body of Christ are stuck in one position for years.

You and I have the responsibility to live according to our new order, nature, if we are no more of the flesh, to live basis on the details of the flesh or thinking, appetite and reasoning of the flesh is disastrous to our well-being; to God and our generation. We will become a burden to ourselves and our generation, and people will think we are bewitched, whereas, we are the one that abandoned our nature to live and operate in other life that is contrary to us. Should we choose to do otherwise, we must bear in mind that God will never compromise the standard of His Word for any choice we make outside His will for us. we have the responsibility to obey God wholistically.

Jesus knew that you and I cannot do this on our own that is why the Holy Spirit was sent to us, the church, to reveal the person of Christ to us, see what the Bible says:

And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever— the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore, I said that He ^[c]will take of Mine and declare it to you. (John 14:16-18; 16:13-15.)

It is the responsibility of the Holy Spirit in our daily lives, to teach and mature us in the likeness of Jesus. We can't import the old life into the new relationship that we have entered with the Father in the Son. The old life is passed away, the Bible says, "Everything has become New". The newness is not a song to sing, it is a life to be lived. It is not a desire to burn with, it is a life to be lived, the choice of Jesus is a rejection of the life of the flesh in all its wisdom and possession. Everything that the new life in Christ will ever attain is made possible and sorted in Christ alone. Christ becomes the ultimate possession of all that abide (trust and believe) in Him, and the qualification for any height that we can ever get to in life; in business, politics, education, ministry, entertainment, and lots more.

What has your choice been, is it the flesh that powers your daily activities, or the Holy Spirit? This isn't a matter of what you wish it is, but what is actually in charge of your life and activities. Think about this one thing, make your decision for eternal profit. Dust is our flesh and all its desires and to the dust shall all its glorious return in subject to rust, and like a breeze that is passing away. What we don’t have to waste is time, the Lord awaits us to rise and lead our generation to victory.

 

#PEACE

Thanks for the gift of your time, I am John Ojoagbene!

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