“BUT the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the passions and the lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vainglory, provoking one another, envying one another” (Gal. 5:22-26),
We have seen somewhat of the essential evil and deceitfulness of the works of the flesh. But, thank the Lord; there is a better picture.
The Spirit of God, which, in his fullness, is freely given to every believer, lusts against the flesh, so that in him who is led by the Spirit of God the flesh cannot do the things that it would. In such the Spirit of God rules, and causes to appear in the life “the fruit of the Spirit,” instead of “the works of the flesh.”
And though it be true “that they which do such things” as we described in the list of the works of the flesh, “shall not inherit the kingdom of God,” yet in the gift of the Holy Spirit, through the grace of Christ, God has made full provision by which every soul, in spite of all the passions, lusts, desires, and inclinations of the flesh, can “inherit the kingdom of God.”
In Christ the battle has been fought, on every point, and the victory has been made complete. He was made flesh itself—the same flesh and blood as those whom he came to redeem. He was made in all points like these; he was “in all points tempted like as we are.” If in any “point” he had not been “like as we are,” then, on that point he could not possibly have been tempted “like as we are.”
He was “touched with the feeling of our infirmities,” because he “was in all points tempted like as we are.” When, he was tempted, he felt the desires and the inclinations of the flesh, precisely as we feel them when we are tempted. “Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lusts [his own desires and inclinations of the flesh] and enticed” (James 1:14). All this Jesus could experience without sin; because to be tempted is not sin. It is only “when lust hath conceived,” when the desire is cherished, when the inclination is sanctioned, —only then it is that “it brings forth sin.” And Jesus never even in a thought cherished a desire, or sanctioned an inclination, of the flesh. Thus, in such flesh as ours, he was tempted in all points as we are, and yet without a taint of sin.