Many are being taught that they are fully righteous and fully holy because they believe in Jesus. It is said that there is no darkness in them, no sin, nothing that offends the Lord, just rejoice in Jesus. I believed this and taught it. But it is only half true. It is true that we are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. We have been justified freely by His grace and God has imputed Christ’s righteousness to us in order that we may stand before Him acepted in the beloved. We have right standing with God only through faith in Jesus. Not through sacraments, nor through good works, nor baptism, nor praying to saints, but ONLY through faith in the Son of God and what He accomplished for us on the cross.
Yet this right standing that we have in Christ is only the beginning point of a walk of holiness with the Lord. It is likened to entering the Promised land like Israel did under the leadership of Joshua. There were many enemies in the land that they had to subdue and conquer. The Promised land for us under the New Covenant is at first our body and soul.
When we are born anew through belief in Jesus He enters our spirit joining Himself there, and together we begin to possess our soul. Our spirit, soul and body must be totally brought under the dominion of Christ. It is not enough to simply believe that now you have Jesus you are completely complete, completely holy and completely righteous. All you have is imputed righteousness. To be sure, it is not any righteousness that you have, but that of Jesus Himself. But we are to overcome even as He overcame and sat down at His Father’s right hand. Now He is waiting for us to put all enemies under His feet. The enemy is in our promised land and we are called to drive them out.
Jesus did not do anything of Himself, through His own power or godliness, but by the power and grace of the Father. That is how He overcame, and is how we are to overcome. Simply saying you are fully righteous does nothing to the enemies that dwell in your flesh and have hooks and attachments to your soul. These enemies must be evicted from all parts of your soul and spirit and body. It was the Apostle of Grace himself, Paul of Tarsus who said,
“…let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.”
It used to trouble me no end when reading this verse. How can there be any need to cleanse our spirit!? If the Holy Spirit dwells in my spirit, then how is there any stain or filthiness upon my spirit? I was going full steam ahead with the teachings of complete righteousness through faith in Jesus and this verse kept jarring me. “Cleanse our flesh and spirit!? Filthiness in my flesh and spirit?! No, surely not Lord…surely Paul(You) is speaking about unbelievers here?”
To understand this it is good to look at Israel’s example. As I mentioned above, Israel went into Canaan through the gateway city of Jericho. God had promised to give them the land, but they had to obey Him exactly. In order to possess the Promised land they had to overcome and kill all the enemies in the land. It is plain to see that Joshua did nothing without consulting God for the plan. When they obeyed they had success, when they disobeyed there was failure. It is no different for us.
We must get to know God’s voice through sitting in His presence as Joshua had done for years as Mose’s assistant. Only through being able to receive the Lord’s instructions to us personally will we be able to conquer the enemies that are in our land. If we do not conquer them , they will have dominion over us in that area of our lives. God wants every part of us free from the dominion of Satan. This does NOT simply happen the moment we are born again.
For sure and certain God does take away some of our enemies or at least binds them when we first come to Him. But we find as we go on in God that there are strongholds in us that resist the Lord. Some strongholds are due to our own sins that we have indulged in before coming to Christ and after coming to Him. Some strongholds are in us from birth through trauma we may have suffered either directly as in a difficult birth or indirectly through any trauma our mother suffered. Some strongholds are there from our ancestors sins, vows and iniquities. So here we are in a land needing to be conquered yet we are not alone in this mission, we are walking with the King of Glory-Jesus Christ the Son of God who overcame Satan already.
Joshua and the people of Israel destroyed 31 cities with their 31 kings and armies and all the people.
Jos 10:40 So Joshua conquered all the land: the mountain country and the South and the lowland and the wilderness slopes, and all their kings; he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the LORD God of Israel had commanded.
Jos 10:42 All these kings and their land Joshua took at one time, because the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel.
Joshua walked with God. We are to partner with Jesus as well. Our mission is the same. Conquer all the enemies in the land and leave nothing alive that belongs to the enemy. If you read the 10th chapter of Joshua you get an idea of the determination and ruthlessness that Joshua was given as He walked with the Lord. We must set our minds like flint to subdue the enemy as well.
That land had been inhabited for centuries by idolaters who sacrificed their babies to Satan by burning them alive in the hands of their idols. Their abominable sins had filled up the measure of the cup of judgment and God, Who is slow to anger sent Israel into their land to mete out His justice upon them. You may think it is cruel to kill all these people, but everyone of them was devoted to Satan by the sins of their parents for generations. Sin will not go unpunished. The wages of sin is death, so they were all put to death for their transgressions. At the resurrection they shall all be raised up to stand before the Lord Jesus and receive their rewards according to what they have done. All of this is for our learning upon whom the end of the ages have come. We must obey the Lord and cleanse the land(flesh and soul and spirit) completely of every trace of the enemy.
Canaan had been filled with sinners for centuries and where there is sin there are also demon spirits. Ruling spirits dwelt over the land and spirits had defiled the land as well. Where every altar to every false god had been erected and used to sacrifice to that demon, the land at that location had become defiled. Demon spirits had legal right to be there in that town where the altar was. Their sins had given those demons access to the land and the town and its king. The people under the king were also tainted and prisoners to that ruling spirit that they sacrificed to. God’s solution was to kill them all, thus setting them free from the tyranny of those demons. Their soul now rests in the grave awaiting the resurrection.
God put those sinners to death and brought in a people of faith under a leader in whom was an excellent spirit. It is this way for us. We were put to death on the cross, buried with Christ through baptism into His death and raised by faith in the working of God to walk in newness of life in the spirit. The old man was rendered inoperable by the putting to death of Christ. So what is left of the enemy if the Old man of sin is put to death? Paul said that our spirit and flesh can be defiled or soiled in some way. “Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” 2Cor 7:1
molusmos from molunō probabaly from melas
a stain, to soil, black, defilement,1) to pollute, stain, contaminate, defile
1a) used in NT of those who have not kept themselves pure from the defilements of sin, who have soiled themselves by fornication and adultery. (Strong and Thayer Dict)
The defilement that comes through sinning gives the enemy legal right to a part of us. We become soiled and stained on our spririt and in our flesh. We must cleanse these areas through prayer, repentance, confession and then walking in the opposite spirit to the way we had done.
Just as Israel were commanded to destroy the inhabitants of the land, they were also told to destroy all of their idols and altars and temples. These things had defiled the land. For us this cleansing is essential. The altars Israel destroyed were to certain false gods. Where we have certain sins cherished in our lives these are the altars that must be destroyed through renunciation, repentance, confession and faith in the blood of Jesus.
You may have been a Christian a long time and still struggle with sins of the flesh. There is a stronghold in your flesh that needs to be repented of and broken completely. It can be done. Do not settle with coexisting with the enemy in your land. He must be gotten rid of. Paul said by cleansing our spirit and flesh we are PERFECTING OR COMPLETING HOLINESS.
Yes we are made holy by the holiness of Jesus. But after that we are EXPECTED TO COMPLETE THAT HOLINESS. Ignoring the sins of the flesh and proclaiming we are righteous and holy by faith in Jesus would be like Israel saying they are fully obedient and righteous whilst living in Canaan with all the original inhabitants still alive and worshipping demons as before. It would be a case of self deception to say such a thing. Victory is not just a theory. Victory is not pretending to have the victory. VIctory is when our enemy is slain at our feet and we now live free from it’s pull and control. When we live in the opposite attitude and behaviour as what we did before then that is victory.
If we were prone to lust for sex, victory would be to walk in respect for others as being co-hiers of Christ. Lust for anything is idolatry, whether it is somone’s body or a motor car. We need to sincerely ask the Father to forgive us for idolising whatever it has been and cut off the soul ties to every lover we have had.
To thoroughly cleanse our spirit of defilement and demonic control in our flesh we need the help of the Holy Spirit to shine His light in us. He can remind us of every instance where we sinned in that area. It is not just those lovers you may have had, but also any person you lusted over in any pornography, whether an image, video or live webcams, if you masturbated while lusting visually then you have opened the door for demons to attach to your body. You are enslaved by them, do not doubt this!!
The eyes, the hands, the genitals and the mind are all enslaved and need to be set free from demonic attachment. You have linked to the person with a soul tie through your sin. You are also now linked with all of their previous “lovers”. All that great pool of lust and perversion is now attached to your flesh and defiles you. You must repent and turn to God for deliverance!
Perfecting holiness means that we completely root out all the sins and demonic attachments that have been there from the past. Jesus is returning for a pure bride. The Holy Spirit is with us to do this very thing, so let us yield our spirits to Him in the worshipful fear of God and by the power of Christ Jesus to break off all these things.