Dealing With Life's Frustrations
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I want to begin today’s lesson with a question, which is, “How many of us deal with frustration and anger? And what is it that frustrates us?” Could it be a sibling who is pressing our buttons? A friend who turned their back on you? A person at school who loves to start drama? Or maybe it’s when you’ve got so much already on you and when some adds another thing on your list of expectations you’re tempted to explode from the stress! Do any of you ever deal with that? **Try to get a few examples if they’ll answer**
Well, as we look in Galatians 5 today, we reflect on our last verse from last week which is Galatians 5:15
15 But if you bite and devour one another, beware lest you be consumed by one another!
The imagery that Paul is using here hints that he’s thinking of the beasts in the amphitheaters that they would release to fight one another to the death. Apparently, the destructive teaching of legalism had not empowered them to love one another and now the Church in Galatia is full of division and hatred and Paul is full of concern over whether or not the Church will survive this! The term that he uses for “consumed” is “analohete” or annihilate which was often used when describing something destroyed by fire. Now, we know the Church there in Galatia survived this turmoil, but how? Did they all team up to be great legalists together? Did they decide to ignore one another issues and be more tolerate? Well, as we look at our passage for today I believe we’ll find the answer not only to the anger, division, and frustration in Galatia but the answer to the frustration we face in our day to day lives.
When problems find their way into our lives, causing us to be frustrated, we must:
Actively Decide to Follow the Spirit Step by Step (16)
Actively Decide to Follow the Spirit Step by Step (16)
16 I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.
As we look at v16, Paul, in regards to his previous statements, is speaking as though to say, to handle all of the division, chaos, and disunity, I command you to walk in the Spirit! This is the solution. No other force, no other rule can make you love your neighbor as yourself. This love, this unity comes only from the Spirit of God!
Paul uses several verbs from v16-25 such as, “walk, be led, live by, keep in step with the Spirit.” “Each of these verbs, Timothy George writes, suggests a relationship of dynamic interaction, direction, and purpose.” And the verb “walk” here in v16 gives us the indication that this is a present activity that is being done. We should walk in the Spirit, going where He goes, listening to His voice and following His guidance.
Paul is giving us the command that comes with a promise attached. “If you walk in the Spirit, you will not, in anyway, give into your sinful desires.” And you and I certainly want to do that, but what does it mean to walk in the Spirit? Well, lets answer a few questions:
Who has the Spirit?
Well, it’s Christians of course. In Galatians 3:3, 4:6, and 4:29 Paul makes it clear to the believers in Galatia that the Christian life begins with the Spirit and here in our passage today we see that not only does our Christian life begin with the Spirit, but the only way we continue in our Christian walk is by the power of the Spirit and this takes us to our main question which is:
How do we walk in the Spirit who sanctifies us?
Let’s look at Christ, our example.
17 Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. 18 As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. 19 And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.
Christ, as we see in this passage, is our perfect example of sanctification. Perfect sanctification as “perfect love for God and neighbor and perfect obedience to the Word of God. And this is what we see in the life of Christ. Jesus says in John 14:31
31 But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave Me commandment, so I do. Arise, let us go from here.
By what power did Christ do this? How did He have perfect love and obedience?
Philippians 2:5-7 (ESV) “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
What does it mean that He emptied Himself? Well, it doesn’t mean that He became a lesser being, or that He was 100% God and 100% man on Earth. What it means is that Christ, being fully God and fully man, laid aside His divine privileges taking on the form of a servant and He lived totally reliant upon the Holy Spirit and wholly submitted to the will of the Father.
This is seen in Luke 4. Look there with me as we note the mentions of the Spirit and Christ’s utilization of the Word.
What does this mean for us?
What is so beautiful about this is that when we were saved, Ephesians 1:13 says...
13 In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
6 He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked.
This means that all who are saved possess the same Spirit that empowered Christ’s perfect, sinless life of absolute obedience and love. This Holy Spirit that raised the Lord from the grave is the same One who Christ has sent to live in us and this is the same Spirit that, when we walk in Him, we absolutely will not gratify the desires of the flesh. (NOT SINLESS PERFECTIONISM).
How many of you have tried to eat clean food but then you catch yourself snacking and you just throw the day away and continue to eat junk food? We can’t do that on a diet, we’ve got to take it one meal at a time. This same principle stands here. Paul is calling on us to determine that we are going to walk with the Spirit one step at a time, one problem at a time, one minute at a time. We are encouraged to live wholly dependent of Him and His power just as our Lord did.
Be Aware Of The War That Is At Hand (17)
Be Aware Of The War That Is At Hand (17)
Lazarus made alive but was still needing to be freed from his grave clothes. This may serve as an illustration for us today who have been redeemed by Christ. Though we are not freed from our struggles with sin as quickly as Lazarus must’ve been freed from his grave clothes, we still may understand that the smell of death hangs on us, and will hang around us until we are glorified at that final day, and up until then, we are being sanctified progressively.
Paul understood the pain of our fight with sin as he wrote in Romans 7:24
24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?
During ancient times, when men were convicted of murder, their punishment would often be that they would tie the body of the victim onto the back of the murderer, allowing the corpse to decay and while that decaying process occured the infection and decay from the victim would eventually cause the killer himself to die. Paul, speaking of how morbid and horrible his sin nature is, uses that here as he cries out, “Who will deliver me from this body of death?” but he quickly replies saying Romans 7:25
25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.
But this is both a present progressive and future deliverance. In Romans 6-7 we get a fuller picture and understand that though we aren’t totally free from sin, we are free from the dominance of sin in our lives.
And so, as we return to Galatians 5:17 we see that there is a war between the Spirit and the flesh. And what Paul is putting together in v16-17 is that those who are walking in the Spirit are not neutral in this war, but they are committed to fight alongside the Spirit against our sinful desires.
17 For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.
The statement, “So that you do not do the things you wish.” Is a widely debated passage. Some believe it means that our fleshly desires are so powerful that we merely long to do spiritual things, but we can’t. Others have said that through the Spirit’s work, we have left the weak attempts of self-righteousness and have rested in the righteousness of Christ. And others believe that Paul is showing his confidence in the Spirit here. That we who are walking in communion and submission to the same Spirit that empowered our Lord, will, through His power, not be forced to fall to the desires of our sinful nature.
And I tend to agree with both of the last two. I believe Paul is teaching that through the work of the Spirit we don’t have to rest in anything but Christ alone and also, we aren’t controlled by our sin but we have power over it!
So, seeing that there is a war actively raging constantly, we must be prepared for it, knowing that when you go to school and deal with that person or situation that really frustrates you, you don’t have to give into that sin but you can rest in the power of the Spirit of God.
Continue to Rest in the Spirit’s Work in Your Life (18)
Continue to Rest in the Spirit’s Work in Your Life (18)
What Paul is teaching here is not that the moral law of God has no commanding power, but that it has no condemning power over us. Believers are now energized to fulfill the true purpose of the law because we have been freed from the condemnation of the Law by the work of the Spirit. Paul explains this in Romans 8:3-4
3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
Hansen Walter said this, “If the Spirit is leading you to forgive your sister who wronged you instead of being resentful toward her, you are under the control of the Spirit rather than under the restriction of the command “You shall not kill.” When your conduct is guided and empowered by the Spirit, your conduct will fulfill the law, so you will not be under the condemnation ...of the law.”
Conclusion
Conclusion
When we live a life that is defined by active obedience to the Spirit in warfare against sin we will experience a life of freedom.
Application:
When you are frustrated, do not trust your emotions in the moment but look to Christ as He lived a life totally relying on the Spirit.
When you feel discouraged in your fight against sin, rejoice that there is forgiveness in Christ, remember the promise given here, remind yourself to take this walk one step at a time, and rest in the fact that the Spirit is working in your life.