Apostle Paul

Walk the Walk and Talk The Talk

As I navigate through my Christian journey. I realize that it is not enough for me to only talk about my faith in God, and the goodness of Jesus Christ. But my actions and behaviour  should be  loaded with Christ like characteristics. I should thrive to be a worthy representative of Jesus Christ. And make sure that the life I live as a Christian, is in sync with the words I speak…Therefore, I should walk the walk and talk the talk.

To do otherwise would mean I have become sounding brass and clanging cymbal. I must practice what I preach, so I can be an example to others.

The Kingdom of God, was the central theme of  Jesus’ ministry but Love was the prominent message. Therefore, as a follower of Jesus Christ, I am required to display love. In Mark 12 :31 Jesus commanded His disciples to love their neighbor as themselves.

The apostle Paul, writing to the church in Corinth states: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal.  And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.
Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;  does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil;  does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth;  bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away” (1 Corinthians 13:1-8).

So as I and others continue our journey in faith, we should :”Be . . . followers of God, as dear children; And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour” (Ephesians 5:1,2). We should thrive to: ” . . .Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving our own selves” (James 1:22).

Walk in the Spirit and not in the Flesh

Stained glass at St John the Baptist's Anglica...

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As a believer in Jesus Christ, I find it necessary to remind myself daily that it is important that I walk in the Spirit, and not in the flesh. The flesh adopts the old sinful Adamic nature, but the Spirit adopts the nature, and characteristics of Jesus Christ.  2 Corinthians 5:17 states: “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new.”

Walking in the Spirit may sound like a fairy tale or a fantasy, but it is an important characteristic every believer needs to adopt and practice in his or her daily life. The Christian life cannot be manifested through the workings of the flesh. The old Adamic nature– the flesh, failed in the Garden of Eden— rendering itself unreliable.

But there is hope in Jesus. The God I serve designed the perfect escape route—which was activated the moment I had confessed my sins and accepted Jesus Christ as Lord Savior. “And you hath He quickened, (made alive) who were dead in trespasses and sin” (Ephesians 2:1). “But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.”

So, I am a believer who is made

alive by the Spirit of God. Therefore, I should allow the Spirit to take over my life and direct my footsteps.

Still, walking in the spirit is not an easy task. It does not matter whether I am a Christian for one week or fifty years. The Apostle Paul, himself, a stalwart and role model of the early church struggled with the flesh. In 1 Corinthians 9:27, he said: “But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway” (1 Corinthians 9:27).

In a letter to the church in Galatia, Paul admonishes its members to walk in the Spirit: “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). He was responding to disturbing news he had received that the disciples in Galatia had returned to their old Adamic ways. In Galatians 1:6 , he writes: “I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel.” Paul knew from experience that the Christian life is impossible without  the Holy Spirit‘s guidance.

Like the Apostle Paul, I am aware that the ways of the flesh are sinful.  And I cannot rely on my knowledge of the Word of God to live the Christian life. I need the Spirit of God to indwell me and be with me every day.  Without the Spirit of God I am apt to fall back to my old ways. Hence the reason I remind myself daily that I should walk in the Spirit, and not in the flesh. I protest by your boasting which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily (1 Corinthians 15:31):

Born Again–the Salvation Experience

The Tree of Knowledge, painting by Lucas Crana...

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Salvation begins with an experience of new birth apart from natural birth into the world. According to the Bible, all humanity has descended from Adam and Eve who were created sinless and perfect by God from the dust of the earth (Genesis 1 :26, 27 ; 2:7). Though brought into existence for fellowship with God, they were given the agency of free will to make personal choices in the newly created world.

At some point this faculty was tested by Satan in a temptation to eat fruit from the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evil–a temptation that was failed and which changed the nature of humanity forever (Genesis 3:1-20). Because of this failure, the nature of sin was inbred to the offspring of the first family throughout the succeeding generations. This resulted in an innate tendency to rebel against the will of God (Romans 5:12).

In his first letter to the Corinthian Church, the Apostle Paul mentions that the solution to this sin problem, and its penalty is through the remedy of Christ’s sin offering at Calvary and His subsequent resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:21, 22). It is through the death ,burial and resurrection of Christ that fallen humanity rediscovers and experiences the life lost by disobedience of our ancestors in the garden of Eden–a spiritual rebirth.

This born again experience cannot be achieved through an intellectual process, as was clearly explained by Jesus to Nicodemus (John 3:1-18), but through another kind based upon belief in Jesus Christ as the Son of God and faith in His crucifixion and resurrection as being enough for redemption and confession of personal sin. This Salvation of the soul begins with a decided repentance from sin but is consummated by works of the spirit in the life of the individual–justification and regeneration. being born again depends not only upon faith of the person seeking salvation, but also upon the works of grace in the heart by the Holy Ghost.