In
Galatians 5:16–17, Paul explains how the flesh fights against the Spirit and the Spirit fights against the flesh. This dichotomous tension does not suggest that we have split natures inside us warring against each other; rather,
sarx refers to the whole person marked by the rebellion—the “corruptibility and mortality”—of this present evil age.
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This reflects the redemptive-historical reality between the old self, characterized by the flesh, and the new self, characterized by the Holy Spirit. This tension between flesh and Spirit is evidence of the overlap between the present evil age and the coming age. The flesh represents this wicked era and our position under the dominion of sin and death. The Spirit represents the coming age and our freedom from the power of sin and the law.
8 In this overlap, aspects of both ages are present together.
The reality is that “the present evil age” (
Galatians 1:4) has not passed away and the implications of sin and the “old man” linger. As redeemed believers, though we are being renewed and transformed day by day, we live nonetheless with the vestiges of our old self and with our distorted post-Fall image. Therefore, we must be vigilant in the midst of temptations. As Denny Burk and Heath Lambert put it so well, unlike Jesus, who had no sinful nature, we have a “landing pad” for those temptations that can quickly turn into sinful desire.
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Doing Battle with the Flesh
A spiritual battle is raging “between God’s Spirit and the impulse to sin.”
10 This impulse no longer enslaves the believer, but it can still have an influence. We therefore face a daily fight. In
Romans 8:13, Paul pleads with us: “If you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”
Christ’s salvific work certainly has inaugurated a new era, but this new era is also not fully consummated—the
already but not yet. We have been set free, but we must continue to persevere in the battle until that glorious and final day arrives. What does this mean for those who have a predisposition for—but daily mortify—same-sex sexual and romantic temptations?
We should recognize that predisposition is not equivalent to predetermination. In
Romans 6:6–7, Paul writes that the individual by virtue of union with Christ is emancipated from the bondage of sin and fallen human nature: “We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin.”
This freedom from sin’s reign does not imply freedom from all sinning or a complete absence of temptations, but it is a decisive break with sin and a qualitative change in which our mind is less dark and our will is less rebellious. This new life is the sovereign work of God.
The Holy Spirit is the divine cause of our rebirth (
John 3:5–6), and this freedom from sin is an act of God’s grace: “Sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace” (
Rom 6:14). As John Piper explains, “Grace is not simply leniency when we have sinned. Grace is the enabling gift of God not to sin. Grace is power, not just pardon.”
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