Thoughts on Galatians 5:19-23

"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, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 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."

“Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.” These are the works of the flesh. These are things that all of us at one time or another are guilty of. Apart from God saving us these are the deepest desires of our hearts. Now lets compare the works of the flesh with the fruit or works of the Spirit: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control”. These are the deepest desires of the regenerated heart. These are the deepest desires of a Spirit filled Christian.

Do not misunderstand me, I’m not saying that as Christians we won’t desire to take part in any of the works of the flesh, we will. There is a battle going on inside of every Christian between the desires of the Spirit and the desires of the flesh. We just read this in verse 17: “For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.” Paul, the great apostle and author of thirteen books of the New Testament, struggled mightily with these opposing desires. In his letter to the Romans he writes: “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” He goes on: “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”

In speaking of the works of the flesh Paul writes in verse 21: “those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” The question then becomes “How do I know if I’m going to heaven? If I still desire sin and the works of the flesh and do them am I really a Christian?” To answer those questions we need to look at a couple of things.

First, what is your attitude toward sin or the works of the flesh when you do them? Let’s look back carefully at Romans 7 to what Paul said about his struggles with sin. He says : “For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate” and: “…but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.” Paul calls the works of the flesh evil and says he hates them and does not want to do them. This is the attitude of a person with a regenerated heart. A Christian will hate his sin. He will still enter into temptation at times because as we know “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” The response to our sin will give us a good indicator as to whether or not we are indeed Christian. If we, like Paul, hate our sin and recognize it as evil, we do so only by the power of the Holy Spirit living inside of us.

Secondly, we need to look closely about what Paul says about going to heaven: “those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” Notice he does not say “those who have done such things.” The verb in this text is a present participle and refers to those who make a practice of doing such things, as a pattern of life. Their outward conduct indicates their inward spiritual status: that they are not born of God, do not have the Holy Spirit within, and are not God's true children. Again, this is not to say that we will never do or have never done these things. Rather, as Christians with new hearts we should see an outward indicator of our inward status. Many times it is a slow process. The point is that there should be evidence of change in our lives once God, by His grace, gives us a regenerated heart with new desires and new goals. If there is no evidence of such change, ask yourself if you are truly a Christian. If you find that you are not, repent, and ask God to give you a new heart that would desire to glorify Him.