"It's Not The Flesh"

"Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell: for wickedness is in their dwellings, and among them." (Psalms 55:15) Alrighty then, that sounds kind of permanent; it's not like they did not have it coming to them, but it sure sounds a little drastic. However, if you stop for a moment and think about this, it is not unlike God to show some sort of drastic measures here and there, just to remind us that He is really serious about us thinking that He does not know what we are up to. There are three instances that come to mind: Nadab and Abihu (Leviticus 10:1-2), Achan (Joshua 7), and Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5;1-11); all of which involved doing something that they thought no one would know about, and also at critical times of Spiritual leading. I think the Spiritual leading part is more important that the part about thinking God is not watching, not because God does not care so much if we pretend that He cannot see us, but because in times of God leading His people into something new, the moving of His Spirit must not be hindered. All three of these examples involved times of God moving His people into something new, something that involved His people surrendering to His will. In the case of Nadab and Abihu, God had just established the tabernacle that would represent His mercy upon His people; in the case of Achan, God had just demonstrated what He can do, despite how ridiculous things might appear, as He dropped the walls of Jericho; and in the case of Ananias and Sapphira, God's Spirit had moved upon the church to share all of their belongings. All three were instances of surrender; surrendering of our sins, surrendering of our understanding, and surrendering of our possessions; and all were times of Spiritual transformation among God's people; times where they must give over to God's way of doing things, regardless of how we feel it does not matter, or how we don't see how it will work, or how much it might seem that it will cost; when it comes to the Spirit verses the flesh, only the Spirit is what counts, the flesh just gets in the way of what God is doing. Talk about betrayal...
"Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more. For ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: that every one should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour; not in the lust of concupiscence, even as the Gentiles which know not God: that no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any manner: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified. For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness. He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given unto us His Holy Spirit." (1 Thessalonians 4:1-8)