Bible, Bros & Brew
Bible, Bros, & Brew is all about helping you navigate your relationship with God in practical, real-life ways. Hosts David and Phil dig into scripture—'chopping up the word'—and bring it to life with insights you can actually use every day. And while they’re at it, they share their favorite 'brews'—don’t worry, it’s not booze! Just a solid lineup of classic coffees and teas to keep the conversations flowing.
Bible, Bros & Brew
What Does it Mean to Walk In the Spirit?
You’ve probably heard the phrase "walking in the Spirit," but what does it really mean? Is it about appearing somber and pious, seeing angels and demons, or reaching a level of spirituality reserved for a select few? The good news is that walking in the Spirit is far more practical—and accessible—than you might think.
In this episode of Bible, Bros & Brew, David and Phil dive into scripture to uncover the true, biblical meaning of walking in the Spirit. Together, we explore what this essential command from God’s Word entails, identifying the attitudes and behaviors that are anything but Spirit-led. Tune in for timeless spiritual truths that will clarify this life-changing imperative and empower you to live a Spirit-led life.
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gotbrew@biblebros.net
Hey, welcome to this episode of Bible Bros and Brew. You know, over the last several episodes we've been talking about breaking the cycle of sin and we touched on something that we feel like we need to spend some time with over the next couple of weeks, and that is how do we walk in the Spirit. You know what? This is a simple subject, but it's got some depth to it that I think you're going to want to hear. This episode of Bible Bros and Brew. Of course I am David. With me tonight is my homeboy, my ace booboo, that's Phillip Rich. Down below me here is Ryan Holderman. Look, I got a point game, because over there in the corner is.
Speaker 1:John, Look at my fingers. They were doing all the work and I didn't know how to make it happen, but I did it.
Speaker 4:That's harder than it looks, man.
Speaker 2:Harder than it looks.
Speaker 1:We are back from a little bit of a break, but we are so glad to be with you guys. We've got something new to talk about tonight. Little bit of a break, but we are so glad to be with you guys. We've got something new to talk about tonight. But before we do that, I want to take a moment. Just this will be a little bit of a time stamp kind of thing, because it may not be the case when you hear this, but I do want to just take a moment and just remember we've got some crazy stuff happening over in Los Angeles right now, yeah, and we've got fires burning out of control and when I last looked, they had 0% control over the fires. So take opportunity, if you would, to pray for Los Angeles, pray for what's going on there, pray for the right conditions for the fire to be stamped out. You can feel whatever way that you may want to feel about California and all of that good stuff, but just remember those are people's lives and they're losing everything and what they deserve is our compassion, our sympathy and, if possible, whenever possible, our help and care, and they deserve our prayers. So pray for the folks over in Los Angeles today, if you would.
Speaker 1:All right, we're going to be talking about walking in the spirit, you know, and that's, you know, I don't.
Speaker 1:As I thought about it, you know, I couldn't really think about too many times where I've heard like a sermon or a study on walking in the spirit.
Speaker 1:But yet I know that it is something very critical for every believer to understand. And so tonight I'm glad that we're going to start digging into this topic for you. And one of the things I want to remind you is, as we're digging into these topics, if questions come up or you have some comments or something you want to share with us, please feel free to use the comment section on the app that you're watching or listening to, or you can reach out to us at gotbrew, at biblebrosnet, and we'd love to just hear from you, tackle any questions you have and go from there. So let's get into this topic, but even before we do that, let's take a moment and dig in to what's in our cup. The conversation goes so much better with a nice cup of coffee or a brew of your choice to help just ease you right on in there for good talk. So, philip, what are you drinking tonight?
Speaker 4:You know, david, to kick off the new year, I wanted to highlight something that I've been drinking quite a bit lately, just as a kind of a fun, cool drink, a literally cool drink, because it is actually meant to be like a frozen type of situation. It's called Blendtopia. I don't know if you've heard of this. It's a super type of situation. It's called Blendtopia. I don't know if you've heard of this. It's a superfood coffee latte, wow, and it has coffee, coconut lion's mane, which I forgot what that does, and then MCT oil, which I also forgot what that does.
Speaker 4:But it's some kind of a nutritional situation. But anyway, it comes in these little let me see it right there. Well, that side, like these little you know how you used to have those freezy pop kind of sticks, you know what I mean? Yep, well, it comes in that same kind of form and you just cut it open, you squeeze it into the blender, throw some milk in there, Throw some I don't know. You can do almond milk, you do chocolate milk, whatever blend that bad boy up and drink it, and it's actually really, really good.
Speaker 4:Man, I've had it more times than I probably should have in the past week somebody's brought up an issue already yeah, exactly dude, and it's weird because normally in cold weather like this, I wouldn't want to go for a cold drink. But uh, these are good man, they're actually awesome, so try them out sometime. Blendtopia.
Speaker 1:All right, that's a nice one over there, brian. How about you tonight?
Speaker 3:All right. Well, I'm still in the holiday spirit, as you can see, yes, in the stocking.
Speaker 1:Brian, I would just want to say that I think it's acceptable to continue on in the holiday spirit.
Speaker 4:Thank you, at least to the end of January.
Speaker 3:for sure, I do still have the Pete's Holiday Blend. We are finishing it up, and today I'm doing something a little different. We've got the French Roast or the French Press, excuse me, roast or the French press oh, the live pork. It's alive, doing it right to kick off the new year. Come on, dang.
Speaker 2:I got a new cup.
Speaker 3:I don't have my typical Bucky's.
Speaker 2:Where's the Bucky's? It's in the kitchen. It's actually right here. We're leaving that behind in 2024.
Speaker 3:No it's coming with me.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, yes, that's the first ever live pour on. Bible Bros and Brews and the French press. Congratulations.
Speaker 3:You've moved into the real coffee, realm now. How about for you, John?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, I'm a few decades behind. I used a K-cup today. Actually, my beautiful, glorious, amazing, awesome wife had poured, poured me. Let's see if we can. I don't know if you can see that, but this is a bailey's irish cream there you?
Speaker 2:go there, we go I don't think you can. I can't read that well, but it's a bailey's irish cream with some more irish creamer. Um, it is absolutely delicious. It is like I have a really bad sweet tooth a really great sweet tooth actually, and this is very. It's not too sweet, but it's just sweet enough and it's it's hidden. It's checking off all the boxes for me right now, so, and of course we have a nice little Michael mouse. There you go. Yes, yes, it's delicious.
Speaker 1:Nice, nice. Well, tonight, gentlemen, I would like to introduce a new coffee to the table. Yes, prepare your hearts and minds for tasting notes. First of all, this coffee is from Rwanda.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:It is a medium roast with tasting notes of dark toffee, molasses, rum, spices, rich cocoa, vanilla and spice Dang. So this is New England original Cooper's Cask Coffee rum barrel aged Dang.
Speaker 2:Bro, that is.
Speaker 1:And let me tell you first of all, this was a Christmas gift. Thank you, john. Thank you Sabrina.
Speaker 3:I got you.
Speaker 1:But also it tastes phenomenal. I'm just sitting here, but also it tastes phenomenal. I'm just sitting here. This has been probably the most. I intentionally did not try this between Christmas and now so I could test it for the Bible Bros.
Speaker 1:But, this is a lovely cup of coffee that I wish you all could partake in. Why don't you take a moment down in the chat, tell us what you're drinking as we talk tonight, give us an update on your coffee decisions and let us hear what you're doing there? All right, gents, let's get right into the topic for tonight. Walking in the spirit, I think that it's probably best that we just jump right into the scripture, because it lays out some foundational pieces that I think are critically important for us to talk about. So let's all go to Galatians, chapter 5, verse 16, and let's do a little bit of reading here and let's see what we've got here. And let's see what we've got. All right, philip, I'm going to start with. I'm going to run through 18 here for a minute and then we'll stop and chat. That sound good, yeah perfect.
Speaker 1:All right, galatians, chapter five. Let me make sure I've got it ready for myself. Here we go. It says this. I say then and we're reading from the King James translation and once again, you've heard us say before and I believe this with few exceptions that the best translation is the one that you'll read regularly.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah is the one that you'll read regularly, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So find a translation that really speaks to you. Philip and I are King James kids, but we also, you know, we do Berean Study Bibles, esv, nlt, you know, amplified. We play around with a lot of translations because it helps to clarify or help you get understanding about what it is you're reading and hearing. So in galatians, chapter 5, verse 16, in the king james, it says I say then, walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh for the now, but I will. Well, I'll save that for a minute, for the flesh lust against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh. Another way to say that is the flesh is at war against the Spirit and the Spirit is at war against the flesh. And these are contrary to one another, and these are contrary to one another, the one to the other, so that you cannot do the things you would. But if you be led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.
Speaker 1:One of the things if I could launch in a little bit, phil is one of the things that initially stands out is here we have some language again that's very familiar to us because of our conversation over the last few weeks about breaking the cycle of sin, and we saw throughout Romans 6, 7, and 8 how Paul was repeatedly using this phrase variations of walking in the spirit versus walking in the flesh and so this is not unfamiliar territory to us to begin looking at here, where we're asked to walk in the spirit and not according to the flesh. What are you thinking, phil?
Speaker 4:Yeah, absolutely man. With the Romans 8, that's the first one that comes to my mind about when it says there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ, who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit. In the King James it says that, and it's interesting because when he uses that word after, it's basically the same meaning as walking in the spirit.
Speaker 4:If you want to put it a different way. It's like patterned after the flesh versus patterned after the spirit. That kind of thing is what he was saying. It's like, you know, there's no condemnation to those who are in Christ, who walk patterned after the spirit and not after the flesh. You know, and I think too david, just something that popped in my head a few minutes ago. I think it is important that, right off the bat, we kind of demystify the whole idea of walking in the spirit yeah, I agree it's.
Speaker 4:It's one of those things where people, when they hear that phrase, walk in the spirit. It sounds so ethereal and mysterious or whatever, and it's like what exactly is it? And I think it's good to maybe even say a few things about what. It's not kind of right off the bat.
Speaker 4:It definitely doesn't mean conducting yourself in any kind of spooky way or any kind of way that makes you, you know, appear overly pious and whole, you know, and you got this tone to your voice that sounds like you're speaking in hushed, reverential tones all the time, and all those things like that.
Speaker 1:And calling it the spirit.
Speaker 4:And calling it the spirit and calling it the spirit. And I remember you know, david and I came from quite a big mega church and you would meet folks like that sometimes. You know who. I remember this one time I was. It was after service was over and we were kind of walking out but this dude was sitting there and I kind of knew this guy but didn't really know him that well. But anyway, I just thought, you know, say hey to him real quick. And he was just kind of staring off into the, into the distance and still sitting in his chair and I was like hey, how you doing, man?
Speaker 4:And he just kind of kept looking the same way and then he said glory like that, ha ha, glory Like that. And I remember thinking like don't let me interrupt you, man.
Speaker 2:There's obviously something glorious going on that I don't know about.
Speaker 4:So you know, so we had a lot of stuff like that happen, man, like where you know, people presented themselves in a way that seemed honestly just overly spiritual, too deep. You know you need scuba gear to get that deep Right, and so you know.
Speaker 1:I'm not trying to do that man, so just want to put it out there, david, yeah, walking in the spirit is, you know, you said let me tell you what it's not first, here's another thing that it's not, and it's it kind of correlates with what you're saying. Walking in the spirit isn't the presentation of an outward appearance that gives the impression that you are something more than what appears.
Speaker 4:Come on, dude.
Speaker 1:Yes, right Because I've seen people who are walking in the spirit, who are doing hard labor, but they're called to do that labor yes and I I want to read to you out of this, um, this book that I have, and it says those who walk in the Spirit will show forth daily, moment by moment, holiness. This is brought about by consciously choosing, by faith, to rely on the Holy Spirit to guide in thought, word and deed. Wow, wow.
Speaker 1:That's good and none of that. None of that gives the impression that it is what you present outwardly that communicates that you're somehow a pious and, as you said Philip, pious and holy and nearer to God than than thine own nearest cousin. You know, I think we, especially depending on where you've come from church and I'd say you probably see this more in the charismatic movement Right, you see it more amongst Pentecostals that they put on airs to give the impression that the Holy Spirit is present and there's an anointing there that may not really exist.
Speaker 4:It's true. Yeah, sorry, man, it's cracking me up, but we've kind of taken things a little too far and we've made them a little more sensational than they probably should be, because there is a difference between that which is supernatural and that which is sensational, and I think we get those confused. You can be operating in a supernatural way that's hardly even detectable, you know, because supernatural simply means that which is above the natural realm, that which is, you know, in the realm of the spirit, if you want to call it that. And I think that if we feel like we have to put some kind of outward display out there that shows or tries to force something that looks to look spiritual, you're already off the page a little bit, man, and we got to kind of reel that thing back in Because, truth be told, the only real prerequisite I know we're going to get into this in more detail, but the only real prerequisite for walking in the spirit is basically what David just said as far as conducting yourself in a way that lines up with the word, lines up with, you know, holiness, with those things that are the qualities of God.
Speaker 4:There is no such thing as walking in the spirit unless you have a foundation of God's word as your compass. That is the measure and the baseline for walking in the Spirit. Are you walking in a way that is compatible with God's Word and with His ways?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you used a word there, philip, and it's the word holiness, and maybe in a week or so we ought to dig into that word, because it often comes across as something about. When people hear that word holiness, they just kind of I don't know. It's like a mixture of tensing up and also getting very deep and spiritual and all these other things I don't believe. Okay, fix me me. All right, fix me go for it man well, I believe god is deep and wide.
Speaker 1:He's deeper than the ocean. He's wider than the widest wide place you know. He's wider than the galaxy in the universe. God is that deep and wide. I also don't believe that god is that deep and wide. In other words, he's not going to present a word to us, like holiness, and make it so unattainable. Thank, you.
Speaker 1:He's so out there, and so beyond our ability to reach it and to attain it for ourselves, that we just fall apart. So we'll need to talk about that. But holiness isn't a bad word, nor is it a super deep word that you can't attain in your life.
Speaker 4:Absolutely, man. And when I think about what 1 Peter 1 says. It says be ye holy, for I am holy. It's one of the I guess you call it instructions or admonitions from the word for us as New Testament believers, and it's like if it was this super unreachable, hardly attainable except by a very select few type of thing, then why would God put it as a general instruction? You know, in one of the letters, and it's not even in just that letter alone, it's all over the New Testament, that whole idea of walking in holiness as a part of walking in the spirit.
Speaker 4:So there has to be something more practical.
Speaker 4:There is what we're trying to say and I think that if the more we get into this, we'll see that these things of the spirit, these things of walking in the spirit, are actually more practical than we sometimes like to admit, because I think in some kind of way sometimes we want it to be more.
Speaker 4:You know, that way it feels more awesome or more you know, like we're really dialed into spiritual things or whatever. But I'm just coming to find out, man, I mean David and I, we've been, we've been, you know, doing our best to walk the walk for the past 20 some years now realize he's a lot more practical and simple and down to earth if you want to call it that than we even give him credit for in how he deals with us. We know he is the infinite, all-knowing, almighty, ever-present God. He doesn't have anything to prove along those lines. But when it comes to dealing with us, I think he likes to do things in a very practical way most of the time, because otherwise it's almost like in Psalm 103, it says he knows our frame and he remembers that we are dust. He knows who he's dealing with, so he's not going to put things out there that are going to be so hard to achieve that only 0.001% of all Christians could ever attain to it.
Speaker 1:That's my humble opinion about this a little bit about the holiness piece. It reminded me that 1 Peter scripture that you mentioned. It reminded me of this 1 John 4.17. I just had to go find it to make sure I got it right. It says this is how love is made complete among us, so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment. It says well, this is the NIV. It says in this world we are like Jesus. But what I really like, I'm going to read the King James. It says as he is, so are we in this world. So if Jesus is holy and we have died with Christ and have been born again with him again and raised from the dead with him, then we are like he is. So holiness is something that's within us, it's capable, it's reachable, it's executable in our lives and we don't have to. We probably don't have to struggle nearly as much as we think we do to even to attain to it.
Speaker 4:That's good man. Actually, in Ephesians 4, it says that the new man that he has made us to be, that new man, is created in righteousness and holiness.
Speaker 1:It's there it's part of the.
Speaker 4:It's baked into the cake. This new creation that we've become through, there it is. You know, this new creation that we've become through, there it is. Yeah, thanks, ryan. I think it's down like verse 17-ish somewhere around there, because Paul was saying you know, there it is.
Speaker 4:If you don't mind me reading this real quick, it says so I tell you this and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer walk, as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They're darkened in their understanding and alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardness of their hearts. It says they've lost all sense of shame. They have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity, with a craving for more. That doesn't sound like walking in the spirit to me. It's the very opposite. Right, he said.
Speaker 4:But this is not the way you came to know Christ.
Speaker 4:Surely you heard of him and were taught in him, keeping with the truth that is, in Jesus, to put off your former way of life, your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires. That's walking, the opposite of walking in the spirit. And in verse 23, it says to be renewed in the spirit of your minds and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. So there's something about this new creation that God has made us 2 Corinthians 5.17,. If any man is in Christ, he's a new creation. There's something about that newly recreated spirit that already has those ingredients of righteousness and holiness, already has those characteristics built into it, and all we have to do is begin to to, to express that outwardly through lining our lives up with the word of god and doing our best to walk in god's ways. And that is when you begin to I guess you want to put it that way that's when you begin to walk in the spirit is is through those things correct.
Speaker 1:That's so good, philip. I want to jump back into the Scripture here, because we get a Paul as we go through here in verse 19, and we'll spend some time going back through some of the verses and talking through in a little more detail. In a couple of places Paul clearly identifies the difference between what the works of the flesh are and what the works of the Spirit are. In other words, he's made it possible for you to identify whether you're walking in the flesh or whether you're walking in the Spirit. And he goes in verse 19 and says Now the works of the flesh are manifest or made known. Which are these?
Speaker 1:Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, wickedness sorry, idolatry witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revelings and such like, of which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Brian, let's do something real quick. Let's just bounce over to the New Living Translation, because I don't want to assume that that list. Now I will tell you this If we'll look at verse 19 in the New Living, that list is worth studying, mm-hmm.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 1:Because, to dig into the Greek of some of those words, there's a real understanding to be gained.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, from digging through those words. The other thing I want to make clear for you is that this is not an exhaustive list. That's right that's right.
Speaker 1:So that any don't want you to believe that outside of these couple of things, that if you don't walk in these 13, 14, 15 things, that everything else is okay. Paul's intent was not to write an exhaustive list but to point out some very specific things, and I would suspect that they were specific things that would matter to the Galatians because there were issues with them in the Galatian church.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow Because then if you look over at Timothy you'll see I think it's 2, timothy 3, he goes through a list of things. There are things that he lists out in Ephesians, chapter 4. So you can look at different portions of the word and you can see him listing out behaviors that are walking in the flesh.
Speaker 4:And see, that's a cool thing, David. It's a big clue. It's like if you want to find out what walking in the Spirit is, check this list out here. Anything that's on that list is the opposite of walking in the spirit, Correct? So you can't call yourself walking in the spirit and you're out there fornicating.
Speaker 1:Now here's what I will tell you, though Paul's list of things where we're walking in the spirit are consistent throughout the word there you go, that's other places that he speaks. He may not, um, he may not speak to all of them, but he will point to elements of walking in the spirit and different of the letters, so that you know what he's talking about that's good I'm going to reread philip 19 through 21 in the New Living Translation just to help some clarity happen.
Speaker 1:It says when you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear Sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling facility, quarreling, jealousy, outburst of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God. That's a promise on the end.
Speaker 4:Dude, can I say something real quick?
Speaker 1:David Say it real long too, if you want to.
Speaker 4:This thing just popped in my head and, Ryan, if you don't mind, could you put that scripture back up on there? I don't know something about the way it's put here is so cool.
Speaker 1:In verse 19,.
Speaker 4:It says when you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear.
Speaker 1:Very clear.
Speaker 4:This is fascinating to me. It's like there is the sinful nature produces these types of desires, Right is the sinful nature produces these types of desires right. And if you give away to those desires because everybody's capable of this, whether you're saved or unsaved, you're capable of walking in the flesh, You're capable of the works of the flesh. It's not like when you got born again that all of a sudden every wrong or sinful desire just disappeared out of your heart and mind. It does not work like that. Now you are a recreated spirit. Once you're born again, your spirit's brand new. Your spirit is now made in the image of God. It is connected to God in a way that it wasn't before, but that doesn't mean that your mind changed at all. It wasn't before, but that doesn't mean that your mind changed at all.
Speaker 4:And that's the part where the work needs to be done because, those old habits of thinking, those old ways of doing and being that you may have had or that you were used to seeing around you. Whatever the case is, they have a tendency to still creep in and pop up, and sometimes at the most inconvenient times, and it's like, if you follow those desires, that, like I said, it wasn't that they went away when you got born again. They're still going to be there. Sometimes it's just a matter of knowing what to do when they come. He's telling you, if you follow those desires, if you give away to them, he's telling you, if you follow those desires, if you give away to them, it's going to produce what's on that list? The adultery, the fornication, the uncleanness. There's so many different ways it could go wrong.
Speaker 4:You know, and so following those types of things, those sinful, selfish, self-gratifying desires that all of us are tempted with every now and then, if you're doing that and yielding to those things, you can automatically know that you're walking in the flesh and not in the spirit, because you're going to be walking in one or the other. There is no in between. That's true. It's going to be one or the other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know what else is cool, philip, you know. Again, I want to encourage people. If you haven't heard it in your off time, I want you to go listen to Breaking the Cycle of Sin, because one of the things that this talks about here and that we talked about during that series was that one thing leads to another. It's never, it's not always, that you're rocking, you know. Oh, I'm running through these 14 sins right now. I'm walking in that now. That's usually one or two and that leads to another and that leads to.
Speaker 1:You know you're walking in this and then all of a sudden, you find yourself at a wild party and then that wild party leads to some other stuff on.
Speaker 1:You're walking in this and then all of a sudden, you find yourself at a wild party, and then that wild party leads to some other stuff On top of that. You've got some things going on that are out of control. So you're operating in lasciviousness and these things can pile up, and if you allow the flesh to do so, not only will it take over your life, but it tries to take over your life, to ruin your life, and so we're talking about here that walking in the Spirit versus walking in the flesh is also talking about a quality of life issue, and Paul lays these things out before us by the Holy Spirit for us to choose, because it is a quality of life issue. Which one will you choose? Quality of life led by the flesh, quality of life led by the Spirit? So let's now take a look at what Paul says. It means.
Speaker 1:Or what is it to walk in the Spirit Verse 22, it means, or what is it to walk in the Spirit? Verse 22, it says but the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. There is no law against these things. I'm going to let you first crack at it. Philip, go ahead.
Speaker 4:Man. See this. To me it shows you the stark contrast between walking in the flesh versus walking in the spirit. And if we back it up actually, ron, if you don't mind putting it back up on the board back up in verse 16, it says, you know, walk in the spirit. I'll just read from the New Living Translation I say let the Holy Spirit guide your lives, then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. Now here's the deal, verse 17,. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the spirit wants. And the spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other. So you're not free to carry out your good intentions. To me, when you look at that list of the fruit of the spirit down there in verse was it 22? Who doesn't want that right? Who doesn't want to live a life where they're full of love and joy and peace? I mean man come on dude, so true, so true.
Speaker 4:It's like if you hear something all the time's, this thing of I just want to be happy, you know that comes from everybody. You know I don't know any person who doesn't hasn't said that one time or another, like I just want to have peace, I just want to be happy. You know that kind of thing. And he's saying the fruit of the holy spirit's activity in your life will produce that. It produces the joy, the love, the peace, theleness, all that good stuff. And so you think, well, I mean, obviously I'd want to rather live that way.
Speaker 4:But what's getting in the way he told you in verses 16 and 17, those desires of the flesh, those desires of the unrenewed self that still hang around in your mind. That's what is the road, and I won't say the roadblock, but that's what can be the hindrance to you. Letting the spirit of God express himself through you like that. You got to start recognizing when those desires come, or those thoughts come, or temptations come that are actually contrary to what the Holy spirit wants for you. If you get good at recognizing those things, you can finally start putting up the blockade when they come.
Speaker 4:You can start saying, like you start doing what Jesus did in the wilderness when he, when Satan came to him with the temptations and he said no, no, no, wait a minute, it is written, it is written. Him with the temptations and he said no, no, no, wait a minute, it is written, it is written. And so it's recognizing when those things try to come to lead you down the trail that's going to be destructive. And I love what you said, david, earlier, man, that it's a quality of life issue that we're talking about. Dude, god understands us better than we understand ourselves. He knows that our sinful desires have only one outcome, and that is destruction. In one way or the other, it's going to be detrimental to your life, even though it's presented as something that's going to benefit you. What you realize is yeah, you may feel good doing that thing, you may feel like it's something that'll be fulfilling for the moment, or whatever, but it always comes with a price. It always comes with a cost, man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, this has got me thinking about relationships, philip.
Speaker 1:I know that's the wildest thing. But I see the picture in my head. It's the woman or it's the guy who says I just want a good relationship, I want somebody to love me, I want to be at peace, I want us to live a happy life together. But then you go about trying to find and build relationship the same way. You always have Right. You go in and you try to give yourself up. You give yourself up sexually, you lie about things, you're not honest with one another because you're playing these relationship games of who's going to get to do this, who's going to get to do that?
Speaker 1:And then you leave, disappointed in that relationship game. And then you say again I just want peace.
Speaker 3:And then you say again.
Speaker 1:I just want peace, and it's the wildest thing and it's what we do to ourselves, not just in relationships but in life itself. We constantly say I want peace, I want peace, and that's something that people talk about all the time. They want peace, and sometimes I'm like I don't think you would be happy with peace if you had it because there's not enough drama going on in your life.
Speaker 1:I see drama is the work of the spirit. Yes, you know you've given yourself over to drama and you always got to know what's going on with the Jenkins. And then you're always telling somebody this happened to them, and so you're a gossip and you're trying to figure out why you got no peace. And we try to go about acquiring these things through fleshly efforts when they are things that can only be acquired through spiritual efforts that manifest themselves in the flesh when I'm walking in love. Eventually that love walk that I'm walking out is going to be manifest in my life. You'll see it, there'll be something I always say it like this man, there's just something about that person, something about the way they're carrying themselves.
Speaker 1:You can tell so many times when the Spirit of God is sitting upon a person and I'm telling you that's a work of the Spirit, which means that we've got to learn how to cultivate these fruit, and they are fruit of the Spirit, which means they have to be planted, they have to be watered, they have to be cultivated, nourished and grown so that people can eat from those fruit in your life.
Speaker 4:Wow, wow. And you know something, david, I was thinking about. This is a simple thought, but it actually is very powerful. Fruit is the product of seed?
Speaker 1:Yes, and when you have the seed of the product of seed yes.
Speaker 4:And when you have the seed of the word of God, just like Jesus talked about in Mark four, it's like it's the seed planted in your heart on a, on a regular basis, along with, like you said, David, cultivation of that seed. Eventually it's going to produce the fruit of the spirit. It's like, oh yeah, that's how this thing works, and so if I'm in a place in my life and I've been there, I'll go ahead and tell everybody I'm not ashamed of it.
Speaker 4:I probably should be but I've had times in my life where I went producing no fruit man or my fruit seemed rotten. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I want to confess to the fruitlessness. I too have had such seasons.
Speaker 4:I'm telling you there have been seasons of fruitlessness, man, but I always, would you know, once I learned this kind of thing, this principle, I would go back and go well, dude, check your planting, check your seed.
Speaker 4:How much of God's word have you been putting in, how much have you been depositing in your heart and in your mind, and how much crap have you been keeping out as well? Because that was one of the parts of the parable of the sower that Jesus was emphasizing that third level or that third type of soil where you had some level of fruit being grown, but then, all of a sudden, the thorns and the thistles started coming in and choking it. Sometimes we have all the distractions of the world, the deceitfulness of riches, the lust of other things, entering in Mark 4, it chokes the word, and the word becomes unfruitful. At that point he's telling us, he's showing us exactly how this system works, man. It is a system of planting the seed, of the word, cultivating that seed, and then it will, of its own accord, he said. He said that it'll bring forth fruit of itself.
Speaker 1:And it's like dang.
Speaker 4:all I got to do is just plant and cultivate, and I should be able to see something different in my life. And it's true.
Speaker 1:It works and, like any good farmer, you don't even have to worry about it, because farmers don't. Farmers don't plant seed and then go about worrying about it every day, right seed and then go about worrying about it every day.
Speaker 1:Right, you know looking at it, walking up and down the field, you know staring at the seed to see if it's going to come up or not. They have a faith, an assurance that what they planted is going to bear fruit and it's going to bring forth. I mean, it's just, it's a real thing. Philip, we're right at a good stopping point right here. I think that if we look back over this conversation, we recognize that there are two ways to walk according to the flesh or according to the spirit. Yeah, we see what is the flesh, we see what is the spirit, and then we're left with the option to choose one or the other, because if left to your own options, you would choose the flesh right.
Speaker 1:Right now that you've got Christ dwelling in you. Now it's almost like a video game, philip, you know, you don't know that there's a secret door but all of a sudden you get born again and Then all of a sudden the secret door opens and there's love, joy, peace and all these other things. That is there that you now have the ability to attain these new attributes for your character.
Speaker 4:That's good man.
Speaker 1:And so now we're left to make a decision which one are we going to walk in? And now the question, I think, philip, becomes how do we walk in?
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 4:And so.
Speaker 1:I just it's a good start.
Speaker 4:Well, you have some more digging to do, man, definitely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think I know where we need to dig next. I'm not going to say it till later. Yeah, this is good, philip. What are your couple of your final takeaways, as we kind of wrap this particular session up?
Speaker 4:Well, first of all, man, I think this is probably a more vital topic than we maybe even give credit for.
Speaker 4:Give it credit for whatever. I think that it's one of those things that maybe, as a believer, as a Christian, maybe you felt that this has been missing out of your life. You know, and I understand that feeling, because it's one thing to be to call yourself a Christian, to be a regular churchgoer, but if you have really come to experience God and who he is, there's something in you that's probably going. I want more who he is. There's something in you that's probably going. I want more. I want to walk with God at a deeper level, or at a more consistent level even.
Speaker 4:And if you've been feeling that kind of way, what you're really probably seeking for is to see more of God expressing himself through you, and that, I think, is what you know. The ultimate goal of walking in the spirit is being conformed to the image of his son. If we want to, you know, throw the Romans 8 back out there. That's what it boils down to. When you're in that kind of a place, you're walking even as he walked, and that's a cool thing when that begins to happen.
Speaker 4:And so I would just say, you know, take time to look over Galatians 5. Take time to really think on those things that have been, you know, laid out in that whole chapter. I encourage you to read it over in several different translations and just get a good feel for what Paul's talking about there and what the Holy Spirit's talking about with walking in the spirit versus the flesh.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know what, phillip, I was thinking of something while you were just talking, and you were talking about this concept of church attendance. I want to tell you, god wants so much more than just your church attendance.
Speaker 1:Yes yes, church attendance is a good way to introduce and walk out community in your life. And even when you have a good church, you have good word that's given to you. That helps you to focus your meditation during the week on considering God's word, the things that have been said. But I want to remind you that God wants a relationship with you specifically. He doesn't want a relationship with you through the church, he wants a relationship with you directly. So if you've come to put your church attendance at the forefront and say, because I'm attending church, I have a relationship with God, I'm here to tell you that it's like no, I attend church because I have a relationship with God.
Speaker 1:I do some of the things that I do because of my relationship with God, but most important to me is having a relationship one-on-one with God that I nurture. Relationship one-on-one with God that I nurture every single day of the week on my own, without anybody else having to tell me that I need to do that because I'm growing in Him.
Speaker 1:And then I use things like this podcast and the church service and other things that help to push my faith forward. But I'm nourishing myself because I want the relationship with God, I want to know him more and, as a result of doing that, you're going to find you're going to be walking in the spirit in a much simpler and easy way, because you desire the relationship with God where you'll build and cultivate. Yes, so let's give, let's pray for everybody really quickly before we go, and let's let's just pray over this kind of word settling in, and then we'll close out.
Speaker 4:Sounds good. Father, we thank you for what came forth tonight. We thank you for all of the wisdom that you give us through the Holy Spirit. In our everyday lives, father, there's so many different ways that you help us. Some are very just, practical, some are things that are life changing. We're just grateful for everything that you do for us and every way that you lead us, father, and we pray right now over every person that'll hear this podcast.
Speaker 4:We ask you, father, to speak to their hearts and begin to draw them, father, to the things that you would have for each person. You know the situations they're dealing with. You know the types of struggles they're having. You know the things that'll help them set their feet on solid ground. Lord, we pray that you'll give them that wisdom that you'll show them by revelation. Show them what it means to walk in the spirit, open the eyes of their understanding, so they can have a deeper and clearer understanding of those things, lord. I pray that for all of us, lord, that we would come to know these things with even deeper insight. You said in your word in Colossians, one that we could be filled with the knowledge of your will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding. I pray that for every person listening, that they are filled with the knowledge of your will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, and we just give you praise for these things, father, and that we'll see fruit from these things you're depositing in us every day.
Speaker 4:We give you praise for it, Father, in Jesus' name Amen.
Speaker 1:Amen. Well, we are so glad that you guys have joined us for this episode. We hope that you got a little bit of inspiration, as well as encouragement, from it. We hope that you've heard some things that are stirring something in you to cause you to want to move forward this year. One of the things I think we need to talk about and constantly remind you of is a personal relationship with Jesus, and that's what you really really need. That will help to push your faith walk out exponentially beyond anything you could have hoped or thought.
Speaker 1:We want to ask you to take an opportunity to connect with us on social media. You can find us on Twitter, you can find us on Instagram, you can find us on Facebook and, if there's some I don't know if there's some other social media out there. I'm not old, but I'm not that young either, so, but we're out there, we're in social media. We share with you things like the brew of the week, share with you some of the coffees that we drink, and we send out some snippets and some other things to help to encourage and inspire and remind you throughout the week on social media.
Speaker 1:So make sure that you like or friend us on social media, that you also, if you're on YouTube or Rumble, that you subscribe to our channel as well as like the episodes that you're watching, and, hey, we want to encourage you, use these episodes as bible study. You can look at the time stamp on these and if an episode is 45 minutes, you know that maybe if you did 10 minutes a day, you know, or seven minutes a day of each episode, not only will you get it, but you'll find that we've talked about a lot of scripture throughout and you can pull things out and use those things to help you to grow in your walk in the Lord. We just encourage you to keep going forward Until next time. I'm David, he's Philip. On behalf of Ryan and John, we bid you a hearty adieu and bid you cups up.
