Walking by the Spirit or Flesh? continued

In the last blog, I asked a couple of questions for us to begin thinking about how we walk, whether in the flesh of by the Spirit. The question I posed, "Can we say the Spirit is leading us?" More specifically, I have to ask myself, "Is this from the Holy Spirit or is this my own desire". I was once told about an idea that someone had and asked what I thought of it, it was something that I was opposed to but had not really thought about it, nor had I prayed about it or researched it at all so my answer was, something to the affect, "my initial response is that I am opposed to it but if it something the Lord is asking you to do, who am I to stand in your way". The response I received was less than reassuring to me, "I don't know if it is something that Lord told me to do, it is just something that popped into my head." That response did not settle well with me because the individual had not discussed it with the Lord, had not measured whether it was a fleshly desire or a God given direction. So, today, let's look at what warrants something being God directed through the Holy Spirit or led versus a fleshly desire. This morning, in my time with the Lord, I asked the Him to tell me more about His Holy Spirit. When I looked at the verse of the day in my Bible app, it was Galatians 5:6: 16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Galatians%205%3A16&version=ESV That was a God given verse for me today, an answer to my prayer. I didn’t stop with that verse though because I wanted to see what it looks like to be led by the Spirit and not by my flesh. One of the most challenging times in my life was when I thought I was following the will of the Father, He worked everything out for me but in the end, it didn’t end the way I thought it was supposed to end and I became frustrated. As I look back on that time, I was looking at how it would benefit me not at how I can exemplify the Lord in the skills that He had given me. I was walking in the flesh, He was leading me in the Spirit, but my fleshly fulfillment is not what He had in store for me, He had a much better plan. So, how do we know when it is a fleshly desire or a desire led by the Holy Spirit? If we continue reading in Galatians 5, we will find our answer. Galatians 5:19-21 9 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy,[a] drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do[b] such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Galatians%205%3A19-21&version=ESV Contrast those verses with the Fruit of the Spirit, Galatians 5: 22-23 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Galatians%205%3A22-23&version=ESV When I read those I decided to write them down one column flesh and one column Spirit. You can easily categorize them in complete contrast to each other. Example: The first Fruit of the Spirit is love. We could go into a deep long study just on love. There are many types of love but God’s word make it clear what type of love it is talking about in the fruit of the Spirit I Corinthians 13:6-7 4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;[a] 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=I%20Corinthians%2013%3A4-7&version=ESV) Just looking at those verses we see that love encompasses the fruit of the Spirit from patience, to kindness, to self-control. Love is not described in a way that allows us to be sexually immoral or impure yet many times the flesh tells us that we need to show our love in ways that are sexually immoral and impure. Showing the Love of God to others, means that we are patient with them, we are kind to them, we are not jealous of them, we don’t have fits of anger towards them, we don’t have rivalries, or cause dissension and we are not envious of them. Those are all works of the flesh. I would like to encourage you to go through the works of the flesh and the Fruit of the Spirit and measure something that you are struggling with. I wish I would have done that years ago as I wrestled with whether it was my will or the Father’s will. In recent days, when I have done this, I have realized fleshly desires and the Fruit of the Spirit. When I struggle with an issue, become angry with a situation, I have to look back and see where I am coming in with a fleshly desire rather than seeking Him with all my heart. I would love to hear your stories where you have seen God work in your life and how that was made evident through the Fruit of the Sprit versus the desires of the flesh. Seeking Him with all my heart, Sheila ,