Spirit vs. Flesh

INTRODUCTION

Good morning, and welcome again to First Christian Church. We are so happy that you are here with us this morning, worshipping our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It is a great day to be in the house of the Lord, and I am so happy to be able to worship alongside you today.

As we continue our study of 1 Corinthians, we will be in chapter 3 today. If you could go ahead and turn there with me this morning.

When I was in high school, I got to experience something that was truly life-changing. It would be a clear, definitive marker of my life. From that point forward, everything was different. I was a sophomore in high school, and one night, the football team was invited to do something amazing. We went to our local Japanese hibachi place. It was the first time that I had sat down around that griddle and watched as a highly skilled hibachi chef did the onion volcano and threw shrimp at people to catch with their mouths open. My life would never be the same. One distinct thing I remember that night is someone ordered steak. The cook asked how they would like it cooked, and they said well done. There was a look of terror and shock on the face of the chef and I believe he replied with something like, “ok charcoal.”

The thing was, our little high school selves were not ready for a beautiful medium-rare steak. We were still babies. Our parents had to drop us off. We didn’t know the wonders that a beautifully cooked steak could bring about. Now, if you are a well-done person, no shame here. But the point here is, we wouldn’t give a newborn a well-done or a medium-rare steak. They could not consume it properly. It would harm them. But for a mature adult, we start to enjoy and even look forward to that beautiful steak fresh from the grill.

In today’s passage, Paul is going to talk about spiritual maturity, and we will see why we spiritually move from milk to steak.

Pray

This morning, we are going to start in 1 Corinthians 3 and look at the age-old battle of spirit versus flesh. Let’s read what Paul writes in chapter 3:

But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. 2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, 3 for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? 4 For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not being merely human?

1 Corinthians 3:1-4

As Paul has continued this letter to the church at Corinth, he moves from the division that rose around the different teachers and now is looking at the spiritual maturity of this church. He has not completely abandoned the fact that they are divided, and causing disunity because he points out that the division is coming from the flesh. In verse 4, he says that people claiming to follow him or Apollos are being “merely human.”

The phrase “merely human” is not Paul approving of the behavior. He is not saying that it is ok to have division because they are just human. We have probably heard people use this phrase to explain someone’s behavior, and when I think about it, it is usually used to explain a behavior we don’t enjoy. Paul is pointing them to the fact that the division is being caused by the human nature that they are allowing to have control of their lives.

Throughout 1 Corinthians, Paul is going to call the church to come out of the “human thinking” that is plaguing them and creating the issues that they are seeing. The biggest issue that verses 1-4 hit on is the flesh vs. the spirit. It could be said that Paul is telling the church, just because you are saved does not mean that you are spiritually mature. You are still capable of living like “people of the flesh.” But just because you are capable of doing it does not mean that you should.

Paul calls them ‘infants in Christ.’ He tells them and calls them brothers, and the understanding is that he is talking to all members of the church, that he could not even address them as spiritual people. He did not feel like he could refer to them as people who had an understanding of living by the Spirit; rather, they were still infants in Jesus. Newborns of the faith. It seems like the frustration comes from Paul telling them that he fed them with milk while he was there, and now, even as some time has passed, they have not matured past the need for the milk.

What is the reason that they are not ready for solid food? Paul says because they are still of the flesh. They are still allowing the flesh to have control and are still acting as people who are under the control of their flesh. What does Paul mean by this, though? What is it to be ‘of the flesh’? Let’s take a moment here to just create some understanding of what Paul is speaking about. When we read the letters that Paul has written to the early church, he often speaks about the flesh and the spirit. He will show that this battle is really how an old allegiance to a sinful nature still wants to poke its ugly head up to the surface. So, when we think of the flesh, we think of the sinful nature that still wants to control us.

Our flesh was originally perfect. But, once sin came into the world, our flesh now is mortal and will break down and decay. We know this just by living any number of years. Our bodies get hurt, break down, decay, and eventually die. It is also how Paul will speak about our sin nature. The flesh is most visibly affected by sin, and Paul connects the two.

Our spirit is the essence of who we are and lives on beyond when our physical bodies die. It is changed by the work of the Holy Spirit. When we talk about living in the spirit, we are speaking about leaning on the Holy Spirit, growing closer to Jesus, growing in our maturity in Christ, and living with the changed spirit leading us, not allowing the flesh to control us.

Now, this helps us see that the war that Paul is talking about is the battle between this new spirit in us and the old sinful, fleshly desires. It makes verse 1 of chapter 3 carry a little more weight. Paul is saying he had hoped that he could speak to them as spiritual people, people growing in their relationship with Jesus, people that are maturing, but he finds them to be people of the flesh. His frustration comes out as he sees that they have not matured in their faith.

The Spirit and the flesh have different appetites, and this is what creates the conflict.

Warren W. Wiersbe

This battle between our new renewed spirit and our old sinful flesh brings up a good question, though. A couple of weeks ago, we talked about grace. We said that it was the unmerited and undeserved love of God. God loves and forgives us, even though we do not deserve it. If this gift of grace is given out, and our sin is the reason it is given, should we still allow sin to rule us? If sin helps show off the grace of God, wouldn’t we want that grace to be sin this way? Good news, Paul deals with this in Romans 6:

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?

Romans 6:1-2

The answer is no! We should not allow sin to reign in us just so grace can be seen. We have died to this sin, and now it should no longer be where we live. When we come to faith in Jesus Christ, our spirit is renewed, and we are made alive in Jesus. we now walk in a newness of life.

We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

Romans 6:4

We do not live in sin still in order to point people to Jesus. Now, we must live by the spirit to overcome the desires of the flesh. Paul tells the church that there is jealousy and strife among them because they are allowing the flesh to rule. They are not living by the spirit and overcoming the desires of the flesh.

My life didn’t begin to be complicated until I became a Christian, because only then did I have to go to war every day between that which is of the flesh and that which is of the Spirit.

R. C. Sproul

How do we live in the spirit, though? Paul equates the desire to live in the spirit with their spiritual maturity. That maturity comes through how we eat. Now, that does not mean that I am asking you to go home tonight and take your bible and roast it in the oven at 350 for 20 minutes. We are not physically consuming the Bible, but we are consuming the Word of God in what we read, listen to and consume in our daily life.

Paul says that the spiritual newborns required milk. Just like a newborn only requires their mothers milk, so does the newborn believer. What is the milk? It is the Gospel, the good news, of Jesus Christ. It is the initial interaction most of us had with who Jesus is. That He died for our sins, and that he is the only path to God. He is the only hope for our salvation. The milk of our spiritual walk is this good news of Jesus. As spiritual newborns, we need this milk, it is foundational to our growth.

While we need milk, we all know that you eventually grow from milk to more solid foods. As we grow and mature, we no longer can grow from just milk. If you are a parent, you know you start to introduce food to the child as they can handle it, and as it is needed. Listen though, milk is still consumed, but it is not the bulk of my diet anymore. I love a good glass of milk with a cookie or a bowl of cereal, but my diet is not a bottle of milk every couple of hours. My body would not survive on milk alone.

Spiritually, I still need the milk. It is still used in the diet. I still love the Gospel. I still want to hear the Gospel every chance that I can. I want to hear and be reminded of the story of what Jesus did for me. The Gospel is still needed, but I can now grow and handle more mature things. My faith grows from understanding that Jesus died for me, believing in Him, and I start to grow more and more like Jesus. Why? Because at the moment I gave my heart and life to Jesus, I was only minutes away from being ruled by sin. I had not grown in my relationship with Jesus to be just like him immediately.

Some of us may remember the days after we came to know Jesus. We still fought with our sin nature. And that fight may have still been real strong. We had been renewed and changed, and people noticed we were different, but we recognized we were far from perfect. As I grow in my relationship with Jesus, I grow in my maturity with Him.

Paul says that they were still drinking milk and not ready for more solid food. I pray that this will not be said of us. What inhibits us from growing, though? How do I make sure that I do not stay stuck drinking milk for the rest of my life? In this passage, Paul says they are not ready because they are still of the flesh. They have been saved and changed, but they are still letting the flesh control them. Being in the flesh will inhibit our readiness for the meat of God's word.

When we follow Jesus and are maturing in our walk with Him, when we allow the spirit to lead and are relying on the Holy Spirit, we start to have a mind like Jesus. Look at how Paul explains it at the end of 1 Corinthians chapter 2:

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. 16 “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.

1 Corinthians 2:14–16.

The person that is ruled by the flesh does not accept the things of God, they seem like folly, foolishness, to them. When the flesh is in control, we are not able to understand and spiritually discern.

But the spiritual person, being led by the spirit, does not have to subject themselves to the judgment of the world. They recognized that God is the ultimate Judge of them. God is infinitely wiser than we are, and in his love and mercy, he has given us His wisdom through his word. God has shown his love and wisdom to us through the sacrifice of the Messiah.

On top of this, we have the mind of Christ. When we follow Jesus, when He becomes our Lord and our Savior, we are told that the Holy Spirit now dwells in us. God sends the Holy Spirit to take residence in us, and to renew our mind. We now can have the mind of Christ, allowing us to follow the will of God, to seek him. This is also how we can find the strength to defeat the desires of the flesh and live by the spirit. We mature and crave this new food, more spiritual food, as we grow and are strengthened in Christ.

What are things we can do to move from milk to meat? The most basic thing is that we learn and grow. We start to grow by consuming the word of God. We spend time learning and growing. We get involved in Sunday school classes, bible studies, and ministries that help us to not only learn but do. We consume things that glorify God. We grow by allowing those who are older than us to pour into us. We pour into others through serving and discipling others.

Today, what are you consuming? Would you say you are a spiritual newborn requiring milk? Or are you ready for more spiritual food? What are you allowing to lead you? The flesh or the spirit? What are steps you can take today to grow closer to God? Do you need to spend time in His word or in prayer? No one is perfect, yet. We all have things we could do better, and steps we could take today to grow in our relationship with Jesus.

This morning someone here may need to make their first step to follow Jesus as savior. Make today the day you admit you are a sinner, believe that the death of Jesus was all sufficient to pay the debt of your sin, and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord.