I HAVE SEEN THE ENEMY

“We have met the enemy and he is us” --- Pogo Cartoon

It was a beautiful sunny afternoon day while travelling in the East area of London while I did a self examination of myself. I pondered and wondered why my flesh still sometimes responds to the things of this world. I mean to the desires and lust of this world. It became so apparent and obvious that my flesh is so vulnerable to the things of this world. As this concern grew within me, I have since then engaged myself in a continuous search, study and meditation to know and understand the reasons behind my propensities.

What do you think then, that we can continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! I suddenly began to find out that many of us have hidden in pretence under the umbrella of grace as a license to continue in our sins.

My friend, there’s a need to understand that Grace is God’s unmerited favour to those that deserves His wrath. This shows that we are not even qualified for such grace but by the power of His love, gave His Son for us.

We would need to identify the reason(s) we still continue in these sins although Ephesians 2:8 says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God”. This simply means we were redeemed through faith (our acceptance of the victory we have in Jesus Christ) from the power of sin and the devil by grace in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ offering Himself as a sacrifice for our sins to defeat the power of sin. It goes on to say, all these didn’t happen by our own power, will, self-determination or strength but simply a gift to us from God. This gives us the assurance that sin no longer has dominion over us. The next question that rattles out of your mouth is then, “Why do I still sin if I have been redeemed from the power of sin?” Your second thought might be – “Since Jesus Christ died for me to defeat the power of sin, He will always prevent me from sin if/when He wants to!” To examine these two views properly, have a look at my scenario which I believe will help your understanding of grace and your own role in your salvation.

The relationship between God’s grace and man is like that of the world system and a strong tower. Before we gave our lives to Jesus Christ to become born-again, we were all under the direct influence of sin, sold to the bondage of sin and all continued in sin through the Adamic nature. We followed the dictates of our fleshy (sinful) desires, thoughts, actions and sinful habits. Sin became so deeply seated inside of us due to various things we were exposed to through the media, our culture, western civilization, fashion etc. As a result of all these factors, following the principles of the world, the devil was now able to hold us captive from pleasing God.

The next episode was that God deemed it fit to release us form the power of bondage and gave us the spirit of adoption to become sons of God through the death of Jesus Christ. Suddenly, our residence changed from that of the world and we became citizens of heaven instantly. Consequently, our residence was moved from the world system to the strong tower. Praise God!

From the moment we started living in His strong tower as sons, the Bible records that “There is therefore now no condemnation to, those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit” --- Romans 8:1. However, there’s still need to relate with the world system – because we still live here physically while on earth, go to work, school, do business and lots more. The challenge now is that we as sons must walk according to the Spirit while here in the world to maintain the grace we have in Christ Jesus. So, for those sons who chose not to remain or always walk in the Spirit will most likely continue in sin according to the desires of their flesh while mingling with the world.

We can now rightly conclude that grace is for all that have faith in Jesus Christ but not for all that continued according to the flesh. Your flesh is your number one enemy and that is you! As long as you respond according to the flesh and not the Spirit, you abuse the grace and if right measures are not taken, you probably end up in the bondage of sin again. Every individual must acknowledge their sins and constantly deal with them accordingly with the help of the Holy Spirit and not according to the flesh or self-strength.