Walking by the Spirit, Part 2

Galatians 5:19-21

We're continuing our series tonight in the book of Galatians and I draw your attention to Chapter 5 for our study, and this is part two in the look at walking by the Spirit.  Galatians Chapter 5 and we'll be looking at verses 16-25 in the subject of walking by the Spirit.  Now the passage that we are looking at Galatians 5 is the primary passage in the scripture on the subject of walking by the Spirit, which is, of course, a very, very basic concept to the Christian life.  And as we come to Galatians 5 and as we are introduced to the idea of walking by the Spirit, that is not to say that we are introduced to the concept of walking.  For the idea of walking in the Christian life is frequently discussed in the New Testament.

I notice when Ralph shared his testimony he made reference to his walk as a Christian and we talk about the walk of the Christian.  Because this is a very familiar term in the New Testament.  Now the word walk or walking is used in reference to the practical daily life of the believer.  If you wanted to use a contemporary synonym for walk, you could call it lifestyle.  The believer's lifestyle.  The believer's walk, his daily pattern.  Now as I started to think about this and getting into the whole subject, I got stuck on the word walk at the very beginning of verse 16.  And I decided well, I'm going to trace that word all around the New Testament and see if I can come up with a sort of a mini theology on walking.  A guide of walking theology, what does it mean when it talks about the Christian walk?  And I found some very interesting things that are very, very basic and very important.

First of all, and we'll cover several items, but first of all this is all introduction and we may never get passed it so don't worry.  But anyway, first of all, in the concept of walk there are some general commands in the Bible in the New Testament.  And I say general insofar as they simply exhort us to walk.  In 1 Thessalonians, for example, verse 12 of Chapter 2, the Bible says, "That ye should walk worthy of God who hath called you unto His kingdom and glory."

Now as a general statement that you are to walk worthy of God who has called you.  In Colossians 1:10, it says, "That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing."  And again, you have this general idea of walking worthy.  In Ephesians, and you may be more familiar with this, Chapter 4, verse 1.  "I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation to which you're called."  Three times generally the Holy Spirit tells us to walk worthy of our calling.  And what that simply means is let your practice match your position.  If you are a new creature in Christ, if you are uniquely set apart unto God, if you are holy, if you are all things become new, then you ought to act like it.  So walk worthy, that is walk in accord with who you are.  If a man is a king, we expect him to act like a king.  If a man is a dignitary, we expect him to act like a dignitary.  That's the same idea.

Because of who you are this is how you are to behave, walk worthy.  So there are general commands that the daily pattern of the believer, his lifestyle is to be at least the equivalent or as close to it as is humanly possible in the strength of the Spirit to his position as is possible.  Now secondly, in addition to some general commands, there are some very specific commands about our walk.  And this gets into the idea of specifically what we do.  Now as long as you're in Ephesians 4, let's stay there for a minute.  Look at verse 2.

Now he says "walk worthy."  Well, what does that mean?  Well, let me give you a little walking theology.  If you've got a pencil you can jot these things down.  Here's a little theology of the Christians walk.  First of all, walk in humility.  Walk in humility.  Our lifestyle is to be characterized by humility, verse 2.  "With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering forbearing one another in love."  That means you don't get angry at other people.  You tolerate them lovingly.  "Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace."  Now there's only one thing that makes for unity and that's love, and there's only one that makes for love and that's humility.  And we've seen that time and time again.

So a worthy walk then is to walk in humility.  To walk in humility.  Secondly, walk pure, walk pure. Not only walk in humility, but the New Testament exhorts the believer to walk pure or to have a pure lifestyle.  Romans 13:13 says "Let us walk honestly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy."  He's talking about purity.  Walk in the purity.  Walk pure. 

Thirdly, the Christian's walk is to walk content, to walk content.  Now this is most interesting, but to illustrate this to you and this is only an illustration of walking content, and we could illustrate that a lot of ways and whatsoever state you are to be content.  But the idea of walking is interesting, because it's used in 1 Corinthians 7:17.  Now any of you that have gone through any marital trouble or recently been married or any kind of marital counseling, you probably wound your around to 1 Corinthians 7.  Because 1 Corinthians 7 is all about marriage and the believer and the marriage between two believers and a marriage between a believer and an unbeliever and unmarried women and a lot of things are talked about there.

But a most interesting statement is made in verse 17 of 1 Corinthians 7 says this.  "But as God as distributed to every man, as the Lord has called everyone so let him walk."  And in that passage it has direct relation to marital status.  And what it's saying is this, so you get saved and you've got an unsaved spouse.  That is no grounds to dissolve the marriage.  But you are to be content to walk in the very way which God has called you or the very way that God has dealt with you.  If you are married to an unbeliever, you become saved, you continue to be married to an unbeliever.  You don't violate the marriage on a spiritual basis or a so-called spiritual basis, which would be unspiritual.

And so as an illustration he is saying be content even in that union, for God has dealt that to you.  God knows that when He redeems you, you have an unsaved partner.  So you are to be content in one sense with your marital status and that illustrates to me the idea of walking content.  And another point, we are to walk in faith.  We are to walk in faith.  2 Corinthians 5:7 says, "For we walk by," what, "faith and not," what, "by sight."  So the believer is not to judge the things that are happening by what he sees happening, but he is to judge all things in terms of his faith in God.  He sees all things from the heavenly side.

He interprets everything celestially.  He sees God at work.  Has the circumstances.  So we are to walk in faith.  Another thing about our walk, we are to walk in good works.  We are to walk in good works.  I just read you Colossians 1:10 which says we are to walk fruitfully unto all good works well pleasing in His sight.  But Ephesians 2:10 perhaps gives us another look at it.  "For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God has before ordained that you should," what, "walk in them."  So the lifestyle of a Christian is good works.

The lifestyle of a Christian then is humility, purity, contentedness, faith, and good works. Let me give you another interesting one.  Turn in your Bibles to Ephesians 4, if you're not still there, verse 17.  And we'll jump in at this point.  In Ephesians 4:17 we find that the Christian is to walk, now listen to this one, "to walk differently."  We are to walk differently.  Look at verse 17.  "This I say therefore and testify in the Lord that you henceforth walk not as heathen walk."  The word other doesn't appear in the best manuscripts.  And Gentiles ethnic can be translated pagans or heathens or Gentiles or Greeks or any of those terms.  "But you are to walk not as heathen walk in the vanity of their minds."

So you're to walk differently.  You are not be like the system.  You're not to be like the world.  It's a different walk.  And he goes on to contrast it.  You look at the old walk and the new walk contrasted in the passage.  Let me just give you an idea of what I mean.  At the end of verse 17 it says that the old walk was in the vanity of their minds, self-centered, vanity, pride in their own thoughts.  The old walk self-centered.  Look at verse 20.  The new walk "You have not so learned Christ."  Christ never taught you self-centeredness.  It's a Christ-centered walk. 

The old walk is self-centered, the new walk is Christ-centered.  Secondly, the old walk is ignorant, verse 18.  Having the understanding darkened.  Be alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart.  The old walk is ignorant.  The new walk is in knowledge.  Look at verse 21, "If so be that you have heard Him and been taught by Him as the truth is in Jesus."  Here's knowledge.  We have heard, we have been taught the truth.  So the old walk is ignorant, the new walk is knowledge.

Thirdly, the old walk is shameless, verse 19.  "Who being past feeling," no longer sensitive conscience, "have given themselves over unto lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness."  They chase after uncleanness, they're greedy for it.  Shameless.  The new walk is with a sensitivity to sin.  Verse 22, "You put off concerning the former manner of life," the former lifestyle.  "The old man corrupt according to the deceitful lusts."

It's different, it's not shameless.  It's sensitive to sin.  Then fourthly the old walk is a reprobate mind.  It's the kind of mind that is completely given over to evil at the end of verse 19.  To work all uncleanness with greediness.  It's just gone.  There's no bounds anymore.  There's no limits on it.  Whereas in verse 23, it's a new mind.  "Renewed in the Spirit of your mind."  So the old walk and the new walk are diametrically opposed.  We walk differently. 

Let me give you another concept in our mini theology on walking.  We are to walk separated.  We are to walk separated.  And to illustrate that I draw your attention to 2 Thessalonians 3, verse 6 and here we're not talking about apart from the world. We're talking about apart from other Christians.  Did you know that there are times when you separate yourself from other Christians?  Yes, 2 Thessalonians 3:6, "We command you brethren," this isn't an option.  "We command you brethren in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you withdraw yourselves from every brother that walks disorderly and not after the tradition which you received of us.  For you yourselves know how you ought to follow us.  For we behave not ourselves disorderly among you."

In verse 11, he says, "And we hear that there are some who walk among you disorderly working not at all, but are busy bodies."  That's one good illustration of disorderly being a busy body.  You're to walk separated from Christians living in sin.  It's a separated walk.  Let me give you another one.  You're to walk in love.  Are you still in Ephesians?  Look at Ephesians 5:2.  You're to walk in love, the lifestyle of love.  Verse 2 of Ephesians 5 puts it very clear.  "And walk in love as Christ also hath loved us and given Himself for us an offering an sacrifice to God."  Now you say what kind of love?  The kind of love that sacrifices itself.  That's the kind of love.  You're to walk in terms of self sacrifice, not physical love.

That's verse 3.  "Not fornication and uncleanness and all that.  That's what the world thinks love is.  You're to love as Christ loved in the sacrifice of yourself.  Same Chapter, look at this.  You're to walk in light, verse 8.  "For you were once darkness, but now are you light in the Lord.  Walk as children of light."  So we're to walk in light as well as in love.  He's not done.  Look at verse 15.  You're to walk in wisdom.  "See then that you walk circumspectly."  The word means exactly or carefully or accurately, meticulously.

You are to walk carefully, meticulously following the Christian principles, not as fools, but as wise redeeming the time because the days are evil.  And that same injunction is repeated in Colossians 4:5.  So you're to walk in love, in light and in wisdom.  Let me give you one more.  You're to walk in truth.  And here you get to the depth of the study of the word of God and this is in the little Epistle of 3 John.  And listen, this is such a beautiful little statement here and I can certainly read the heart of John as he wrote and sympathized with his feelings.  In 3 John, that's just a couple of pages before Revelation, verse 3.  "For I rejoiced greatly when the brethren came and testified of the truth that is in thee even as thou walkest in the truth."  He rejoiced because they walked in the truth and he expresses it in verse 4.  "I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth."

I'll tell you if you're a teacher or a discipler of others you can understand that can't you?  The greatest joy that you have is to find out that your children in the faith are walking in the truth.  The greatest disappointment is to find out they're not.  So we're to walk in truth.  Well, there you have just a general and then a more specific statement on the Christian walk or the Christian lifestyle.

Now, to give some...and you say well, that's...you know that's good and those are presets and those principles and they're there and I read them and I see them and maybe I wrote them down, but if you're like I am, it's nice to have a handle on some of these things.  It's nice to say well, that's good, but I need something more concrete.  Something more physical that I can grab onto and pattern myself after.  And so if that's what you and that's what I need and the Holy Spirit must have known you can come with me to Philippians Chapter 3 and you can look at verse 16.

And Philippians 3:16 it says, "Nevertheless as to that which we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule.  Let us mind the same thing."  Now he's saying we ought to walk consistent with what we've learned.  Now we've learned these basic truths.  Everything I just told you I've taught you before in detail, that's why we didn't go into it.  Now you need to be walking in that pattern.  Now in case you need help, verse 17.  "Brethren be followers together of me and mark them who walk even as you have us for an example."

Now here Paul says you can pattern your walk after my walk.  And you can also see those who walk in an ungodly fashion whose end is destruction, verse 19.  So Paul says there are concrete patterns for you.  He's one.  There are spiritual men.  There are men of God that you can look to in terms of a pattern of godliness.  So walk and walk after godly patterns.  You say well that's good.  Then I'm supposed to sort of be like Paul.  That's easy. 

What's the next point?  Well, if you think that's tough get this one.  This is the epitome and I want you to look at it.  1 John 2:6, 1 John 2:6 summarizes everything about the Christian walk.  Now if this doesn't get to you nothing will.  Verse 6 of 1 John 2, "He that saith he abideth in Him," now stop right there.  Now anybody who's a Christian claims to abide in Christ, right?  So all of us would say that.  I abide in Christ.  Great.  "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk even as," what, "He walked."  Now you thought Paul was tough.  Who's the standard?  What is God's great desire for the Christian?  That his lifestyle be the equivalent of that of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself on earth.  And if you say you abide in Him, then you should walk as He walked.

In other words, your lifestyle should match the lifestyle of Jesus Christ.  You say oh that's just wonderful.  Now all I have to do is be exactly like Jesus.  That's right.  That's right.  But can I give you an encouraging word?  One that encourages me?  I think you'll get a new dimension of understanding.  2 Corinthians 6:16, now you say but it's impossible to be like Christ.  I can't walk like He walked.  You're right.  First thing to do is to recognize it.

Look at 2 Corinthians 6:16, "And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols."  Now listen to this, "For ye are the temple of the living God.  As God hath said," watch this one, "I will dwell in them and," what, "walk in them."  Is that fantastic?  Of course you can't walk like that.  So God dwells in you and walks in you.  And all you need to do is go along.  That's why it says and you come right back to Galatians 5 walk by means of the Spirit.  In the Greek, that's the instrumental case.  Walk by means of the Spirit, not like Enoch.  It says in the Bible that Enoch walked with God.  That's nice.  That's not what we're to do.  He...we're not walking with God.  There's a song like that.  "I'll walk with God."  That's...you can't do that.  You can't go the places He goes.  And if you did, you couldn't get back.

You can't walk with God, but God in the new covenant walks in you.  So that wherever you are, He's there.  And He is living through you the Christ likeness that He desires.  That's a fantastic thing.  You say boy does that take the monkey off my back.  I mean, after you gave all those general commands to walk worthy and all those specific lists and then you told me to be like Paul and then to be like Jesus and now you say God will walk in me.  That's the key to the whole New Testament.  So we come full circle.  We land right back.

Turn in your Bibles to Galatians 5 and the injunction of Galatians 5 is this simple.  It says "walk by the Spirit of God."  In other words, just stay in step with God who's moving in you.  Simple concept.  The Spirit of Almighty God is in us.  He's alive and He's walking and we can fulfill all the worthy walk by walking by His power, by walking by His leading.  And so in Galatians 5 when the Bible says walk by the Spirit, maybe it means something more to you than it did before we studied just that little introduction.

Everything, watch this now, everything then becomes ultimately possible to the Christian in the worthy walk, because it is the Spirit of God that is in us taking every step.  And all we need to do is just go along in His energy.  Go along in His power and He'll conform us to Christ.  Now you can sit in the corner legalistically and grunt and groan and grit your teeth and try to be like Christ and it'll never happen.  And that's what Paul's been trying to say through Galatians isn't it?  That you cannot effect in your life the righteousness that God demands through legalism.  Through law works. 

The law can't save, the law can't sustain and the law can't sanctify you.  The Spirit of God saves you.  The Spirit of God secures you by the sealing.  And the Spirit of God sanctifies you.  It is not your works.  You were saved by grace, Romans 5:1 says and you continue to stand in grace.  It's all a divine work.  You didn't gain your salvation externally by works.  You can't keep it externally by works.  You can't live by external law works as the Judaisers tried to teach.  You don't need any of that because you have the indwelling God.  You don't need outward rituals when you have the indwelling God walking in you. 

Now the immediate context as we draw our attention then to Galatians 5, the immediate context is Paul's reaction to the Judaisers.  And in this immediate context, do you remember what we said?  Paul came along and he said the Christian doesn't need to live under a legal system.  It doesn't need to believe that what he does, what he does outwardly in terms of his deeds really causes the blessing of God.  You know, it's one of the things that you see so often in this is the area of what is called tithing in the Old Testament. If a guy gives his ten percent, he feels he has bought God's blessing.

That's ridiculous.  As I've told you before, we're not under the law.  So if you're struggling around the law, why don't you give either nine percent or eleven percent, but not ten, because that's legalism.  Don't think that because you gave ten percent, God is up there saying well, mark off Joel there he did his thing.  No, some of us ought to give 50%, some of us perhaps less.  That isn't the point.  The point is that we're to respond to the Spirit of God directing us inside to give, not by our bank accounts.  But that's one area where people very often are very legalistic. 

We do not gain God's favor.  We do not grow spiritually by keeping an external code, but by responding to the direction of the Holy Spirit.  Now what happened here was Paul came along and he said you don't need any external laws any more and the Jews...the Judaisers just said wait a minute, if you remove the law, you have removed the only sin restraint.  They felt that the law was the dam that held sin from busting loose.  That the people who had the law and who knew the penalty for the law would keep themselves back from sin, because they wouldn't want to pay the penalty.  And so when Paul came along and preached liberty, you're free in Christ, you know, you have this great liberty, you don't need the law any more.  The Judaisers kind of grabbed their heads and said now wait a minute, if you do that and you remove the law, there's no restraint for sin.

And that's when Paul came along and said no, the restraint's gone internal.  The Holy Spirit is the restrainer.  And He's the one that restrains.  He's the one that purifies.  He's the one that becomes our conscience.  He's the one that restricts us.  He's the one that makes the God life reproduced in us.  The external becomes immaterial, inconsequential, unnecessary.  And believe me, the Holy Spirit will do a lot better job of restraining than the law ever did.  The law only scared people into submission.  Now let's look at verse 16. 

"This I say then walk by the Spirit."  Cross out in if you have it there and put by.  There's not a preposition in the Greek, it's just an instrumental case.  "Walk by means of the Spirit."  Walk by His power.  It's not you in Him, it's what?  It's Him in you.  It's Him in you.  So "walk by the Spirit and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh."  Now that's his answer to the Judaisers.  You don't need to worry about sin.  If the believer just walks in the Spirit, he doesn't need the external law because the Spirit will restrain sin.  So walking by the Spirit is basic to Christian living. God dwells in you.  His Spirit dwells in you, and as He said, "I will dwell in them and walk in them so God walks in you."  And all you need to do is rest in Him, stay in step.  It's His power and it's His direction.  And it's only a question of submitting to that.

Now, as we look at the discussion in these verses 16-25, we see four parts to our attention we would really be able to pull these four parts together to probably get the main message of the passage.  The command, the conflict, the contrast, and the conquest, and we looked at the first two last time.  I'll review them briefly.  First of all, the command.  The command is clear in verse 16.  "Walk by the Spirit and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh." Walking implies as I said lifestyle, daily progress and it also implies effort on our part.  The term by the Spirit implies power and direction on God's part.

And as we said last time, we're involved.  It is the Spirit walking in us, but it is for us to walk as well or we would not need a command.  Now let me give you a handle on this.  You say well, walk by the Spirit, John, what do you mean?  I mean, the Spirit is so intangible, you know.  And I agree a lot of people have made a personification of the Spirit or attempted to in a dove and that's kind of become the identity that a lot of people have or sort of a floating blob that looks like an abstract dove.  But basically the Spirit of God is a detached reality in the sense that He has no personal form.  And since He has no personal form and had no earthly life, for us to say we're walking by the Spirit is somewhat abstract.  And I think the Holy Spirit accommodates our thinking by making a very clear comparison repeatedly in the New Testament.

And let me give you an illustration.  Turn to Ephesians 5:18, "And be no drunk with wine in which is excess, but be filled with the Spirit."  All right?  Be being kept filled in the literal Greek.  It's a continuous thing.  Be being kept filled in the Spirit.  Now that's the same as walking by the Spirit.  In other words, you're yielding the control of your life to the Spirit of God who permeates you and carries you along.  The idea of filled is a word that is used in other places to speak of sailing.  Where the wind fills the sail and it billows out and carries the ship.  So be moved along by the Spirit.  Be carried along by the Spirit.  Open your sail, that's submission.  Let the Spirit carry you His direction under His power.  That's the same as walking by the Spirit, same concept, different terms.

But to help you get a concrete handle on that, notice this.  In verse 19 it gives the results of being Spirit filled.  It says, "Speaks to yourselves..." "Speak to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord."  One thing about a spiritual person is he happy, joy, sings, if he hasn't...can't carry a tune he sings to himself.  Another thing about a Spirit filled person in verse 20, he gives thanks.  You can always tell thankful people are Spirit filled people.  21, a Spirit filled person submits, then he goes into detail.   Spirit filled "wives submit to their husbands."  Spirit filled "husbands," verse 25, "love their wives."  And you have Spirit filled children in Chapter 6, verse 1.  They obey their parents, Spirit filled parents don't hassle their children, verse 4. 

Apparently some of you can identify with that.  And servants who are Spirit filled are obedient and masters who are Spirit filled are fair, verse 9.  So you have all these results of Spirit filled life.  Now watch this, go to Colossians 3:16, and you'll see something very interesting.  If you've read Colossians and Ephesians, you know that they're almost identical, but listen to this.  Verse 16, start in the middle of it.  Colossians 3:16, "speak to yours