Jesus was fully God and fully man. Despite His perfectness, His holiness, and blamelessness, He was not in sin. Despite Him having the weakness of the flesh, He remained holy. He still faced the same temptations we went through. He still went through wilderness seasons, moments of persecution, attacks, and people seeking to trap Him. He had the attacks of the enemy and the flesh, but the difference with Jesus was that He won every battle against His flesh.
Our flesh can have battles with us. It can make us want to envy; when we ignore that voice of envy and choose selflessness, we have a victory in Christ, but our Christian life is filled with times we fall short. We aren’t perfect and won’t be; we can fall, we can make a mistake, and we can disobey. We are no Jesus where we are perfect, but despite our weakness and imperfection, we have Jesus Christ, who won every battle, overcame every temptation, and always triumphed. He now lives in us. He defeated the battles we could never fully win so we could walk in this victory. So we could have His life. It’s not us who live but Christ who lives in us (Galatians 2:20).
It means that like Christ, we have victory over our flesh, and we don’t need to be under the oppression of the enemy. We don’t need sin to conquer us. We can have authority and victory in Christ. Jesus was tempted just like us, and He knows we will, too.
We are promised never to be tempted beyond what we can handle (1 Corinthians 10:13). So when we fall into temptation, it’s not that the temptation was so powerful or it was beyond what we could handle, but in fact, we are promised to have a way of escape. The one who leads us to that escape is the Holy Spirit, who strengthens and gives us the grace to resist the devil and flee from temptation (James 4:7, 1 Corinthians 10:13). He guides us to look away, to not speak, and convicts us when something is going too far. We need to lean on Him.
For those having trouble with your flesh. You desire or do good but you find yourself doing evil. You want to be patient but you can’t help but deal with a short temper. You want to be filled with love but jealousy keeps coming up. You want to be selfless but struggle with selfishness. You want to be helpful but find yourself doing the opposite. You want to walk in purity but find it difficult to control your thoughts.
Don’t fight your battles alone forgetting you have the Holy Spirit. When you confess your sins, repent, and accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour you no longer are chained but are delivered. You have the Holy Spirit living in you that the Bible describes as our Helper (John 14:26) don’t try to be like Christ without Christ but lean on His Spirit. To bear the fruit of the Spirit you need to abide with The Spirit and there you’ll bear much fruit (John 15:4) but the key is to remember you have to abide. You have to decide to go to God, spend time with Him and abide in Him. You have to surrender yourself and cry out for God’s help. You need to remember you can’t walk this walk alone and live according to His will by yourself.
Whenever you feel your spirit is willing but your flesh is weak, call on Christ to strengthen you, help you and support you. Often when we fall into sin we try to run from God or help ourselves but rather we need to abide to become more like Christ and cling to His help, knowing we can’t do anything without Him. Whenever you feel your flesh is winning that’s when I challenge you to pray “Holy Spirit come and take over. I invite you. I need your strength to resist. I need your patience for I have none. I need your love. I need your peace” and continue this cry out to God over and over. Continually repeat what you need from Him. Trust His there and will help you.
And by the power of the one who had victory over every battle of His flesh even to the time where our Saviour surrender His will for God’s will (Luke 22:42), we can trust He will help us overcome.
-etty