Romans 8:5-9 (KJVA) For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

Last week we saw that every person on the face of this earth is either condemned before God, or uncondemned before God.

As humans, we like to put things in categories. People are red, yellow, black, or white. That’s human tradition, and human error. God tells us that …

Acts 17:26 (AP) God has made all nations of people FROM ONE COMMON SOURCE, OF ONE BLOOD. God determines our appointed times on the earth as well as our boundaries.

It is God Who put people in different places and times – but we are all physically from ONE SOURCE and, if you look “under the hood”, we all have ONE BLOOD. We all bleed RED. As God looks at humanity, He cherishes all that He has created. He sent Jesus Christ to this earth to save whosoever believes on Him. His Disciples are commanded to:

Mark 16:15 (AP) … go into ALL THEWORLD, and PREACH THE GOSPEL to EVERY CREATURE

God does not care what color you are, what your economic situation is, what your nationality or cultural background is. Jesus came “to take AWAY THE SIN OF THE WORLD” (John 1:29). The Bible says “God SO LOVED THE WORLD that He gave His only Son, that EVERYONE who believes in him will not perish, but have ETERNAL LIFE” (John 3:16).

Two categories, Uncondemned or Condemned. These categories are described in other ways in Scripture based on their relationship to God in Christ. People are either:

Saved or Lost
Children of God or Children of Adam
Righteous or Wicked
Saint or Sinner
In Christ or In the World
Children of the Father or Children of the Devil

and today we are introduced to another Biblical description:

In The Spirit or In The Flesh

How You Live Your Life Matters

What has poisoned the Church in America today is the “Jesus Movement” concept that you can be saved by professing Christ, and yet still live your life the way YOU want to without regard to God. Some preachers have erroneously taught a two-tier form of Christianity:

Tier One: You are saved by faith in Christ
Tier Two: You choose (or don’t choose) to follow Jesus

This nonsense is NOT in the Scripture, but was something that Satan and the world tried to infiltrate into Christianity from the very beginning. We are told in:

Jude 4 (NASB) … certain people have crept {into the Church} unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this CONDEMNATION, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into indecent behavior and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.

UNGODLY or CONDEMNED people will tell you that you can be saved, and still do those things which God has forbidden. That you can be saved, and yet produce evil fruit. This is contrary to the teaching of our Lord Jesus, Who said:

Matthew 12:33-35 (ESV) Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad, for the tree is known by its fruit. 34 You brood of vipers! How can you speak good, when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. 35 The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil.

Again, we see TWO CATEGORIES of people. Jesus speaks of

The GOOD Tree or The EVIL Tree

Both trees produce fruit. The good tree produces good fruit. The evil tree produces evil fruit. WHY? Because the heart of that tree is either GOOD or EVIL. Jesus said “Make the Tree GOOD and its fruit GOOD, or make the Tree BAD and its fruit BAD” (vs 33). Jesus said in His “Sermon on the Mount”:

Matthew 7:17-18 (KJV) … every GOOD TREE bringeth forth GOOD FRUIT; but a CORRUPT TREE bringeth forth EVIL FRUIT 18 A GOOD TREE cannot bring forth CORRUPT FRUIT; neither doth a CORRUPT TREE bring forth GOOD FRUIT …

There are two categories of people – GOOD and CORRUPT. The GOOD Tree produces good fruit, the EVIL Tree produces evil fruit. Now follow me on this.

Illustrate: There is a tree called a Manchineel Tree. The fruit off of this tree looks like an apple. In fact, as it grows along the coastal beaches of the West Indies and Central America, it is often called the “Beach Apple”. If you take one bite of the Beach Apple, you’ll find it is pleasantly sweet. But in a few moments your mouth will fill like it is full of pepper, your throat will burn and feel like its tearing up. Swelling in your throat will keep you in agony, and it may take a day before you can swallow solid food again. If you eat the whole fruit, it will kill you.

Sap from the tree will blister and burn your skin, and wood burned will produce smoke that can blind you. If you seek shelter under its branches when raining, you can be blistered by the run off.

The Guinness Book of World Records (2011) crowned this tree the “most dangerous tree in the world”. No matter how hard a Manchineel tries, it’s fruit will always be corrupt, and deadly. Now compare this to an Apple Tree. An Apple Tree, regardless of the type, produces good, beneficial fruit. An Apple Tree cannot produce Manchineel fruit. The Apple Tree produces apples. It will always strive to produce edible Apples.

How do you get a Manchineel Tree to produce edible Apples? You have to change the Tree. It has to have a complete re-creation from Manchineel to Apple. No matter how hard a Manchineel Tree tries, it’s works, it’s fruit, will ALWAYS BE CORRUPT. It cannot work itself hard enough to become an Apple Tree. It naturally produces the “Little Apple of Death”.

Just like the Manchineel Tree, we are all born into this world physically alive but spiritually dead. We are physically born into a condemned state. How do we get from condemned/ evil to uncondemned/ good? It is only through surrender to the Lord Jesus Christ. It is not through a two tiered, blasphemous and unBiblical idea that you can be saved and cling to the darkness. Jesus Christ saves His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21).

When you give yourselves to Jesus, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to your soul (John 15:26). The Holy Spirit causes you to be “born again” (John 3:5, 6, 8). The Holy Spirit removes the scales of sin on your eyes, and turns your heart from stone to a heart that loves God, Jesus is the Mediator of the New Covenant (Hebrews 12:24). His Blood shed on Calvary makes your salvation possible. Because of Jesus, the Holy Spirit comes and, as prophesied:

Jeremiah 31:33 (KJV) … I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

God changes the Tree from Manchineel to APPLE. God the Holy Spirit moves you from CONDEMNED to UNCONDEMNED. God’s Action at the point of salvation changes you:

From Lost to Saved
From Children of Adam to Children of God
From Wicked to Righteous
From Sinner to Saint
You are In Christ not of the world
You are Children of our Heavenly Father
not Children of the Devil

The Tree Is Changed By God, So The Fruit Changes

Romans 8:5 (KJVA) For they that are after the flesh do MIND {phroneo [pronounced fron-eh’-o]} the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.

I cannot judge a person’s HEART, but I can judge the visible FRUIT. Those who are corrupt, who have refused to REPENT and TURN FULLY TO JESUS are corrupt trees. They are flesh based. Their minds are focused on pleasing their flesh. They may say “I’m a Christian”, or “I’m a [insert denomination of Church here]”, or “I love Jesus”, or “I’m going to Heaven when I die” … but the question is, “What fruit are you producing?” Those that are “AFTER THE FLESH” are primarily focused on the FLESH, on what THEY WANT as opposed to what God wants.

Word Study: The word translated “MIND” is the Greek phroneo [pronounced fron-eh’-o] means “to exercise the mind, to entertain, have a sentiment or opinion toward, to be (mentally) disposed (more or less earnestly in a certain direction); intensively, to interest oneself in (with concern or obedience) or to set the affection on”. The unconverted Tree is focused on what the Tree wants. That person focuses on the flesh, on pleasure, on the things of this world, on satisfying self above all else. When I was growing up my mother or father would say, “Now mind me, David”. What she meant by that was to pay attention and obey their direction.

The lost “MIND” the flesh, because Satan is their father, and the world their stage. The saved “MIND” the Holy Spirit, the directive of God. Yes, there are times when the saved step off base of the will and Word of God, but in such cases we find the discipline of God. The Bible says:

Hebrews 12:6-8 (NASB) For whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He punishes every son whom He accepts.” 7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.

The Tree that is God’s is supposed to produce GOOD FRUIT. What if it doesn’t?

John 15:1-5 (NKJV) I am the true vine, and My Father is the vine dresser. 2 Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit. 3 You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. 4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. 5 “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.

If you belong to God, if you are His Child by faith in Christ, you MUST bear fruit. Jesus said “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away”. God can cut the Tree down. He can take you off of this earth. You are not guaranteed tomorrow, Beloved. He wants you FRUITFUL. When our Lord Jesus saw a fig tree and went to eat of it (Mark 11:12-14), and THERE WAS NO FRUIT, Jesus said “Let no one eat fruit from you ever again”. When the disciples passed by that tree the next day, “it was DRIED UP FROM THE ROOTS” (Mark 11:20).

God will take you away, dear Christian, if you willfully refuse to bear fruit. Jesus went on to say: “every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit”. The pruning of God is the trials of life by which God grows you. Abiding in Jesus you “bear much fruit”. That’s what God wants of His Children. We bear MUCH FRUIT.

God’s Love Wants Us To Bear Good Fruit

Romans 8:6 (KJV) For to be CARNALLY MINDED [is] death; but to be spiritually minded [is] life and peace.

Word Study: The words translated “CARNALLY MINDED” is the Greek sarx which means “focused on the flesh, driven by the world”. Those who produce corrupt fruit are playing with DEATH. We have read before in Romans 6:23, “The WAGES OF SIN IS DEATH”. God is life and light, and in Him is no darkness. Anything that draws us away from life and light drags us into death and darkness. Those who are saved by faith in Christ know that:

John 4:24 (KJV) God [is] a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship [Him] in Spirit and in Truth.

We cannot worship God and worship the flesh at the same time. The Christian is called to worship God, to worship Him in Spirit and in truth. He fills us with His power. He enables us by His Spirit. He feeds us by His Word. The flesh cannot feed, but is can demand and consume. They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh. The fleshly person, dead in his trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1), walks according to the directions of the world and of its lord Satan (Ephesians 2:2). The good Tree walks in the Spirit of God, according to the Word of God, the Bible. We are told in another place:

Galatians 5:16-18 (NKJV) I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. 17 For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

God calls His people to be like He is, not like the world is. We are called to productive, Biblical thinking and FRUIT BEARING. God wants us to bear LIGHT and LIFE. He wants us to bear MUCH FRUIT to His glory.

A Lost Person – Like A Corrupt Tree – Cannot Bear Good Fruit

Romans 8:7-8 Because the carnal mind [is] enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. (8) So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

God gave us the Mosaic Law as a “schoolmaster to bring us to Christ” (Galatians 3:24-25). Measuring our lives by the Law of God, we saw how far we fell from God’s will. Being convicted of our sinful state by the Law, we came to God will empty hands and repentant hearts. Realizing we deserve damnation, we surrendered our hearts to Jesus.

And the Holy Spirit changed the Tree.

The Spirit of God not only changed the Tree, but He indwelt the Tree, the life that now belongs to Christ. We read:

Romans 8:9-10 (KJV) But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. (10) And if Christ [be] in you, the body [is] dead because of sin; but the Spirit [is] life because of righteousness.

Our text in verse 9 literally states: “You are not in the flesh, but you are in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God keeps on making Himself at home in you”.

The normal Christian life is to live a life that is comfortable with the Holy Spirit.

God calls those who are His Children to rest in Him, to trust Him even when our senses (our FLESH) tells us otherwise. Heaven is about trusting God, about living by faith. We are told:

Romans 8:11 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.

If you are “born again”, then you are born again by the power of the Holy Spirit. If you are “born again”, then the “Spirit indwells you”. If the Spirit of God indwells you, then that same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead will “quicken your mortal bodies”. God is not talking about Heaven here. He is talking about your “MORTAL BODIES”. God will enable you while YOU ARE ON THIS EARTH to BRING FORTH FRUIT to GLORIFY GOD.

The devil wants to keep you in the FLESH, following your earthly wants and desires. But God the Holy Spirit wants to take your broken lives and use them for the GLORY OF GOD.

Therefore …

Romans 8:12-13 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. 13 For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

Where is your focus? If you live “BY THE FLESH YOU SHALL DIE”. If you are a lost person pretending to be saved, you will one day leave this life and find yourself imprisoned in a lake of fire FOREVER. Let me put it this way: If you NEVER think about God, NEVER pray, NEVER read the Word of God unless you are in Church, you may be headed to hell. Hell is a place of death. Hell is where the lost soul, the dead without Christ, go. That’s a bad scene!

But if you are a Christian, you will shorten your life ON THIS EARTH by living in the flesh. Think about Israel in the Old Testament. They were given the Promised Land. Had they followed God, and entered the Land when God told them to do so, they would have received the reward. But instead they murmured, they complained, they resisted God rather than glorifying God – and wandered in the wilderness for 40 years until all the offenders were DEAD. We have this promise of God, “if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die”. This applies to the believing individual. This applies to the CHURCH. The Christian is a person who is under obligation to God. We are not obligated to the flesh. We are not obligated to the old Sin Nature. We are not obligated to Satan, nor are we obligated to peer pressure or the lost world. We are obligated to follow the God Who saved us. Continued separation from God for the believer leads to physical death. We see this in the lives of the Corinthian Church. They continued to ignore the Way of the Master while following the way of flesh. They followed after selfishness rather than following after the Spirit of Christ. The Apostle told them:

1 Corinthians 11:30 For this cause many [are] weak and sickly among you, and many sleep{in physical death}.

Christian, the fruit of your life should be glorifying God. Again we are told:

Romans 8:13 … if ye through the Spirit do MORTIFY {put to death} the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

The Holman Christian Standard renders this verse “But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live”. We who are Christians are partners in life with the Holy Spirit. We do not have the power to purge our sins, no more than we had the power to save ourselves. The Spirit of God Who indwells us does have the power to purge our sins. As we live the surrendered Christian life, the Holy Spirit controls more and more of our lives.

As we practice the Christian disciplines – Prayer, reading & meditating on the Holy Scripture, and unity in fellowship with other believers (the gathering of the Church) – the Holy Spirit will gain ground in our lives.

Piece by piece parts of the old life die, being mortified or put to death by the Spirit. The Christian is a person in flux, in change. This change, this growth continues until the day we stand with our Jesus in glory, cleansed of sin forever. May that day come soon to all of us.

To Whom do you belong? What fruit are you bearing, and does it glorify God? It matters. It matters. May God the Holy Spirit draw you to Christ’s side today. Amen.