The Flesh and the Spirit in Conflict

The flesh and the Spirit of God have nothing in common. They are “contrary the one to the other,” that is, they lie over against each other, like two active foes, each eagerly watching the opportunity to crush the other. The flesh is corruption; it can not inherit the kingdom of God, because corruption doth not inherit incorruption. 1 Corinthians 15:50. The flesh can not be converted; it must be destroyed. The carnal (fleshly) mind “is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh can not please God.” Romans 8:7, 8. Here is the secret of the backsliding of the Galatians, and of the trouble which so many find in living the Christian life. The Galatians began in the Spirit, but thought to attain to perfection by the flesh (chapter 3:3), a thing as impossible as to reach the stars by delving in the earth. So many people desire to do right, but, not having definitely and fully yielded to the Spirit, they can not do the things that they would. The Spirit strives with them, and has partial control, or is at times quite fully yielded to, and they have a rich experience; then the Spirit is grieved, the flesh asserts itself, and they seem like other persons. They are swayed at times by the mind of the Spirit, and at times by the mind of the flesh (Romans 8:6), and so, being double-minded, they are unstable in all their ways (James 1:8). It is a most unsatisfactory position in which to be.GTI 223.1