Freedom — In the Spirit – Wednesday
TODAY’S VERSE
Galatians 5:19-21
Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (ESV)
A few summers ago, I decided I was finally going to take control of a section of my yard that had gotten out of hand. What started as a few scattered weeds had quietly turned into a thick, tangled mess. At first glance, it didn’t even look that bad. There was still some green, some life, but underneath, the weeds had wrapped themselves around everything. They choked out anything good that tried to grow.
I grabbed what I thought I needed: a pair of gloves and a little hand shovel. I started pulling at the surface, but almost immediately realized that the problem wasn’t on the surface. Those roots ran deep. Every time I pulled one weed, another seemed to surface, and what I thought would take an hour turned into an entire afternoon of digging, sweating, and going to war with the ground.
Sin rarely announces itself as a problem to battle. When we let it, sin can creep in quietly and grow steadily until we realize the roots are deeper than we thought, and take real work to combat.
Paul calls sin the “works of the flesh,” and he lays them out plainly; not just the obvious sins that we expect to see listed, like sexual immorality, drunkenness. But also the ones we often excuse because of their familiarity: jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, divisions. It’s dangerous to get comfortable with sin.
When we tolerate sins that don’t embarrass us publicly, we eventually stop fighting them. Sin doesn’t need to be visible to be destructive. Left alone, it spreads and chokes out what’s good. Complacency toward sin numbs your heart to God, and that’s where people start calling it personality instead of pride. Stress instead of anger. Discernment instead of judgment. But the Gospel refuses to let us stay there.
Jesus didn’t die so you could manage sin; He died so you could be free from sin’s power and be reconciled to Him. Jesus’s sacrifice was complete. His blood covers our brokenness, and we don’t have to keep working for salvation. Jesus paid our debt in full.
John Owen famously said, “Be killing sin, or it will be killing you.” Sin is what separates us from God, so as adopted children, we ought to keep fighting and seek to pull up any roots of sin in our lives. Not by our own strength, but with the help of the Holy Spirit.
When we submit our sin to our perfect Savior, His grace is more than enough. The weeds we struggle to fight on our own, He prunes with ease. Jesus paid it all.
APPLICATION
Take time today to identify one sin you’ve been minimizing or justifying. Write it down, confess it to God, then share it with a trusted believer and invite accountability.
PRAYER
Lord, I confess that I sometimes tolerate the things that put You on the cross. Show me where sin has taken root in my life. Give me the courage to bring it into the light and provide the strength, through Your Spirit, to put it to death. Thank You that Jesus has already paid for my sin and made a way for me to be free. Amen.