In disciplining ourselves to practice godliness which is a prerequisite for eternal life, God has not left us helpless. Jesus promised to send us the Holy Spirit who would help us (John 15:26). The good news is that that Holy Spirit now resides in us to help us live godly lives.
By the mouth of the prophet Ezekiel, God made it clear that a day was coming when we would be cleansed of our sins and then receive the Spirit to help us keep His commandments. It is written: “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols . . . I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them” (Ezekiel 36:25, 27). The day we received Jesus as our Saviour was when we were cleansed from all filthiness (sin). At that moment, God put in us His Spirit so that we would receive divine help in keeping His commandments.
As you can see, this is the right teaching of the Bible, and it refutes the wrong and prevalent doctrine that Christians are not to concern themselves with keeping God’s commandments. The Spirit of God that now dwells in us is there for that very reason – to help us keep the statutes and judgments of God. We are not alone in our fight against sin. On the contrary, by the Holy Spirit, we are internally and divinely empowered by God to triumph against sin. Hence the words of Paul in Romans 6:12-14: “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”
Please carefully note that when in Romans 6:14 Paul said that, “You are not under law but under grace,” he did not mean that when we accepted Jesus as our Saviour we were then freed from keeping God’s laws. In the context of the entire passage of Romans 6:12-14, and as it is written in Ezekiel 36:25-27, this is what Paul meant: Since the Spirit is in us to help or ‘grace’ us against sinning, (and we therefore are not sinning), then we are not under the law (or principle) that when we practice sin we shall die spiritually and end up in hell. In other words, if we cooperate with the Spirit or Helper within us, we will not be practitioners of sin, and therefore the law (or principle) of ‘sin and you will die’ will not apply to us. However, if we refuse the Spirit’s help (grace), and therefore practice sin, then the law (or principle) of ‘sin and you will die’ will apply to us, and we will indeed die or be separated from God and end up in hell. It is only those who cooperate with the help (grace) of the Spirit within them – and, so, bear the fruit of the Spirit – that will inherit eternal life. But those who ignore that grace or help – bearing evil fruit or works of the flesh – will end up outside the Kingdom of God, and will not inherit eternal life. This is why Paul issued us a stern warning in Galatians 5:18-21 saying: “But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Thanks be to God for the Holy Spirit inside us who graces us with the ability to practice godliness and thereby inherit eternal life.
Amen.