The Spirit of God wins by truth, surrender, and daily alignment with God’s will. The flesh’s influence weakens as the Spirit grows stronger through denial and discernment. The loud demands of our flesh fade every time we acquiesce to the lead of the Holy Spirit. Our invitation that He guide us begets a wise answer. “Walk this way.” Each time we choose to obey the Spirit within, the flesh is hushed as we walk in confidence, clarity, and greater joy. James 4:2 applied. You lust after pleasures and yet you do not have joy. You slander and covet and cannot obtain superiority or justice. You fight and war and yet you do not have peace because you do not ask God. James emphasizes the importance of humbly asking God for what we need. We must ask to receive and rely on God.
Even when we feel compelled to indulge a desire, its authority fades with our obedience. The Spirit within grows stronger every time we ask, listen, trust and obey. This is why the ongoing spiritual battle cannot be won by the flesh. The flesh depends on urgency, impulse, and fear. The Holy Spirit operates in patience, truth, love, and peace. The desires of the flesh to control, to retaliate, to defend — burn with impatience, with a lust to be understood, and unrest until it panics in confusion. Our reliance on the Spirit of God within builds slowly and lasts. Living by the spirit means you stop trying to silence the flesh and start refusing to follow it. Practicing walking and listening to what the Spirit is saying, gains momentum over time. What once felt like a war begins to feel like peace. The truth is, walking in submission to the Holy Spirit’s guidance, we realize that we operate from victory, not impatience. We leave frustrations behind as we learn how to listen to He who is greater within. The flesh does not win the spiritual battle by its own strength. The Holy Spirit does not conquer by force, He wins our attention as we ponder Truth. Our, daily surrender walks us into perfect alignment with the living and active Word of God. Living by the Spirit is not a mystical escape from reality, it is the most grounded, disciplined, and chosen way to live. Walking in the Spirit requires transpatent honesty when excuses feel easier. It requires obedience where comfort feels safer, and it requires trust when the flesh screams for immediate relief. When we humbly submit and ask Holy Spirit to, “Speak for your servant is listening” the tension once felt departs. We want to please God, but our flesh resists even if we know His Way is best. Without faith we are unable to please God so as we deny the flesh our faith deepens in His promises.
We want peace, yet our soul feels divided. We want to walk in spiritual freedom, but old thought patterns still whisper “loosen up, take a break.” No matter how loud the flesh becomes, it cannot win when we deny the flesh to walk in the Spirit. We accept that the Spirit of God and our flesh are not equals. We believe that the Holy Spirit is always greater than the impulses of our flesh. When we choose to allow the Spirit to dominate every impulse, we grow in confidence and faith. If you believe the flesh is as powerful as the Spirit of God, every struggle feels like a possible defeat. Every temptation feels like proof that sin still rules you. When the Word of God overrules our old ways, He liberates us in all our steps. The flesh operates based on old patterns. It is a conditioned way of thinking, reacting, desiring, and protecting itself that was formed before the Spirit of God awakened in us. The flesh has old habits, memories, reflexes, and cravings, but it does NOT have authority. When we give all authority to the Spirit within us, we walk in glad obedience to God. The Apostle Paul did not describe the flesh as victorious, he described it as persistent. That distinction matters. Fleshy persistence is loud, convincing, and exhausting. The battle for control is daily. The repetitive, selfish demands of the flesh are silenced by a conscious choice to surrender. The tension is real because the flesh keeps trying. The Holy Spirit, on the other hand, never shouts or demands. He waits on our surrender to His way. Being in relationship with Holy Spirit we feel conviction, inner alignment. When the Holy Spirit speaks, He does not negotiate, He reveals, and His revelation always weakens deception. One of the most important things we must embrace is this: the flesh only has influence when it is believed. The moment we treat a fleshly impulse as truth, it gains momentum. The moment we ask Holy Spirit for clarity, and His direction, the impulse begins to lose strength.
This is why living by the Spirit of God is NOT about suppressing desire through force. It is about submitting with understanding that our flesh is not in control. The Holy Spirit does NOT say, “You must NOT feel emotions.” The Spirit says, “This feeling is NOT who you are.” The truth always is ever at work to change us. The flesh says, “You are hungry, therefore you must act.” The Spirit says, “You feel hunger, but you the truth satisfies! The flesh says, “You are afraid, so protect yourself.” The Spirit says, “You feel fear, but you are not in danger.” The flesh says, “You want this now.” The Spirit says, “You want relief, but God has a plan to enrich your soul through this.” The daily battle is not about our effort to change, it is about surrender and remaining “in Him” to be aligned with truth. Repeat, “I am a child of God, and His will is my will. His thoughts are above mine, His Way is best, so I submit. What God’s Word says, is my command.”
Whichever voice we listen to becomes the one we obey. This is why the flesh panics when we begin to walk in the Spirit. The flesh knows it cannot overpower, so it tries to confuse, to blur the line between temptation and self-denial. The flesh whispers, “You deserve a break today, stop the struggle, just indulge a little.” The temptations are designed to exhaust us. The Spirit of God never tempts us beyond what He can handle. But we must question, what voice we are listening to. The flesh demands based on a fleeting moment. The Spirit of God speaks from eternity. He reminds us that we were sealed before this battle began. Our flesh reacts to the present. The Holy Spirit anchors us in the finished work of God. When we see that His way is best, we agree to begin asking fir His ever present guidance. We stop fighting and start discerning voices. We stop asking, “Why am I like this?” and begin asking, “Which voice am I listening to?”
Jude 1:14-25 applied. Enoch prophesied: Look the Lord is coming with thousands of His holy ones to judge everyone, to convict all of their ungodly acts and words. The grumblers, complainers, the fault finders, and those who never surrendered their hearts to God. They follow their own evil desires; they boast about themselves and flatter others with words they long to believe for their own advantage. Remember what the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ foretold. They said in the LAST DAYS there will be SCOFFERS who will follow their own ungodly desires. These are the people who divide the church with false teaching. They follow their flesh, their own instincts and do NOT have the Holy Spirit. Build yourselves up in your most holy FAITH and PRAY in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. Be merciful to those who doubt; save others by snatching them from the fire; to others show mercy, mixed with fear—hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh. To HIM who is ABLE to keep you from stumbling and to PRESENT you before HIS glorious presence without fault and with great joy—to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore!
Scripture informs us that Enoch walked with God, not as a distant deity to visit occasionally, but as a close companion to share every day with. Enoch shared his ordinary thoughts with God as he worked, doubted, and grieved. Enoch continually turned his heart toward the Lord, speaking and listening as naturally as breathing. Enoch lived through 300 years of hardships. He relied on fellowship with God Almighty. Hebrews 11:5 “He did not experience death as others do.” Enoch was simply taken into heaven in one continuous step of communion. The faith of Enoch drew him near to God. He welcomed conversation in his daily routine. Genesis 4:17 “Cain made love to his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch.” So I pray Psalm 139 with total awe! “Search me O God, and know my heart. Test me to see if there is any offensive way in me.” Holy Spirit lead me in the way of everlasting today. There is no where I can go away from Him. I do not desire to flee from His presence, nor could I. If I fly through the heavens, He is there; if I lay down in grief, He is there. The darkest days are not dark to God. For in the dark, He is the light. For my Father created my inmost being, my unseen spirit. He knit me together in my mother’s womb. And by His Spirit, I comprehend vast mysteries within His Word. My Father ordained all the days of my life. Each detour I would take, each doubt was known and corrected by His faithfulness. Each of my days is written in His book, even before one of them came to be. How vast is the sum of God’s thoughts towards me. They far out number the grains of sand, and yet when I awake, Holy Spirit waits for my attention. Here I am Lord, use me today. AMEN
Living Abroad 