Dear Friends,
Greetings to all in the victorious Name of our Lord Jesus, who has caused us to overwhelmingly conquer in all things.
Isn’t it comforting to know that Jesus has given us the victory over sin, made us a new creature, and sent His very own Spirit to live inside of us. Wow!!! That is just amazing!! How awesome!! What a privilege!!
As a child of God, the bible tells us in Romans 8:14 “For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” Isn’t that great. As a child of God we can be led by the Spirit of the living God.
The word led, comes from the Greek word age, the root word ago, to lead along, bring, or to carry. From this we get the English word agony. The suffix “ny” from the Greek word ne, meaning not. To be in agony is to be “not led.”
When we are in agony, we are not being led by the Spirit of God. We may be driven by the flesh, pushed around by our thoughts, but not being led by the Spirit. The leadership of the Spirit of God comes from within. Not within our thoughts, but within our spirit. The driving of the devil always comes from without, outside of our spirit. He can cause us to be driven as we give our self to wrong thoughts, or wrong feelings, even wrong perceptions. His direction always comes from outside of our spirit where the Holy Spirit dwells.
In order to be led, ago, by the Spirit, we must be not led, ago-ne, by the flesh. We could say, if we are not led by the Spirit, we are in ago-ne, caused by the flesh. So, if we are being led, ago, by the Spirit, it will be ago-ne to the flesh. The leadership of the Holy Spirit is not comfortable, nor pleasant to the flesh.
Romans 8:7 “because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so.” The flesh is hostile toward God. The word hostile, is the Greek word echthra. It means to be an enemy, to hate. The King James translation calls in enmity. This word is a definite article. Therefore we can translate it as, “ The flesh is THE enmity, THE hostility, and THE enemy of God.” This enemy is not able to subject itself to God, it doesn’t even want to. It is rebellious, defiant, insubordinate, disobedient, resistant, and insolent, just to name a few things.
Being driven by the flesh cannot bring a favorable outcome in our lives.
God put His Holy Spirit inside of us. His desire is that we be led by Him. His leadership will always bring a favorable outcome, one of blessing and not curses, full of hope not discouragement, victory not captivity, faith and not fear. Therefore, we do not look for things to be comfortable and pleasant, but we are agonizing our flesh in making it obey the leadership of our Lord, who is Lord of all flesh.
Jesus truly has given us the victory and made us to overwhelmingly conquer, and He certainly wants us to follow Him into that place for our lives. Let’s refuse the flesh the opportunity to agonize us any longer, and let’s make a decision to ago, be led, by the Spirit of the loving God. Praise His Name forever!!!!
Pastor Bob
