What Does It Mean to Live ‘in the Flesh’?

00:00:00.000 | Well, over 90 times the Apostle Paul speaks of the flesh.

00:00:08.080 | So what does this key word mean for him?

00:00:10.400 | It's a shrewd and important question for any Bible reader to get clarity on.

00:00:13.960 | The question comes from a listener named Cheryl.

00:00:15.920 | "Pastor John, hello and thank you for this podcast.

00:00:18.680 | I listen to episodes every week at the gym.

00:00:21.720 | I'm trying to come up with a clear definition of what Paul means by flesh or sarks in the

00:00:27.480 | Greek.

00:00:28.480 | Sometimes Paul seems to be talking about the external physical body (2 Corinthians 75,

00:00:33.800 | 1 Timothy 3.16).

00:00:35.760 | At other times he seems to be talking about some internal nature causing sinful actions

00:00:39.560 | and thoughts (Romans 8, 5-8, Galatians 5.17).

00:00:44.080 | I'm confused.

00:00:46.200 | What does Paul mean by flesh, and do you have a clean definition to encompass it all?"

00:00:51.520 | Well, we'll see.

00:00:54.800 | This really is, really is a crucial question, utterly crucial for understanding, especially

00:01:03.000 | the Apostle Paul, who uses this concept so often.

00:01:07.920 | So let's tackle it.

00:01:08.920 | We have just a few minutes and you can write books on this.

00:01:14.160 | So let me limit us to something I saw recently in getting ready for a look at the book on

00:01:20.960 | Philippians.

00:01:23.320 | Two passages in Philippians are going to shed amazing light on this.

00:01:27.720 | They did for me anyway.

00:01:28.720 | Let's start with chapter 1.

00:01:30.760 | 121, "For to me to live is Christ, to die is gain.

00:01:34.200 | If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me.

00:01:39.560 | Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell.

00:01:41.560 | I am hard pressed between the two.

00:01:43.400 | My desire is to depart," that is, to die, "to depart, leave behind the body, and be

00:01:50.320 | with Christ, for that is far better.

00:01:52.600 | But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account."

00:01:58.440 | Now I think all of us would agree that what flesh means in Philippians 1, 22 and 24 is

00:02:07.600 | simple, earthly, bodily life.

00:02:12.840 | Nothing negative implied about it here, except that we can't be with Jesus in the same intimate

00:02:20.360 | way if we're here as if we're in heaven.

00:02:23.440 | So over against departing and leaving the body and going to heaven, you have Paul saying,

00:02:28.320 | "I'm going to remain in the flesh."

00:02:32.060 | So that just simply means, "I'm going to still be in my body."

00:02:35.760 | So flesh refers to the body as we ordinarily experience it in this world.

00:02:43.240 | Now there are a lot of places in Paul where he uses it like that, and we shouldn't jump

00:02:47.560 | to unduly negative spiritual connotations every time we see that word.

00:02:52.360 | However, let's go to chapter 3 now, because what we watch happen in chapter 3 is just

00:02:59.560 | amazing, I think.

00:03:01.760 | Paul transforms the meaning of a fairly neutral term for physical body or some body part,

00:03:12.920 | he transforms that word into something negative and spiritually bankrupt.

00:03:20.840 | Let's watch him do it, because we can actually see how he does it, which defines for us this

00:03:26.720 | negative side.

00:03:27.720 | Here's what he says at the beginning of Philippians 3, "Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord.

00:03:35.500 | To write the same things to you is no trouble for me, it is safe for you.

00:03:39.720 | Look out for the dogs, look out for the evil workers, look out for those who mutilate the

00:03:45.440 | flesh."

00:03:46.440 | Now, right here we can see that Paul is using the term in an ordinary physical way to refer

00:03:56.520 | to skin or some part of the body.

00:03:59.200 | In fact, the next phrase is going to show us that he's talking about mutilating the

00:04:05.700 | flesh in circumcision, viewed in a certain way.

00:04:11.120 | That's why he's using the word mutilate.

00:04:12.920 | He's viewing this cutting of the flesh in a certain way.

00:04:19.940 | The initial straightforward meaning of flesh is simply skin or some body part, and here's

00:04:27.400 | how he continues, "Watch out for those who mutilate the flesh, for we, we Christians,

00:04:33.240 | are the circumcision."

00:04:35.080 | In other words, what I just referred to, Paul says, what I just referred to as mutilating

00:04:40.780 | the flesh is not true circumcision.

00:04:44.360 | We are the true circumcision.

00:04:47.620 | We Christians are the true children of Abraham, the true heirs of the promise, the true followers

00:04:52.080 | of the Messiah.

00:04:53.860 | And then, to distinguish precisely what it is that turned circumcision from a holy sign

00:05:02.440 | of the covenant into an act of mutilation, he says this, "We are the true circumcision

00:05:10.340 | who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the

00:05:21.760 | flesh."

00:05:23.760 | So here's what I think Paul's doing.

00:05:25.560 | He is saying that worshiping or living by the Holy Spirit and worshiping or living for

00:05:33.040 | the glory of Jesus Christ is what makes Christians the true circumcision.

00:05:40.240 | And in the absence of those two things, dependence on the Spirit and glorying in Christ, in the

00:05:47.720 | absence of those two things, holy acts like circumcision are turned into mere mutilation.

00:05:59.080 | That is, mere flesh in a new spiritually negative meaning.

00:06:06.240 | So flesh is moving from being a mere reference to the body to being a reference to the kind

00:06:14.880 | of thing one does, any kind of thing one does, when the Holy Spirit and Jesus are not central.

00:06:23.640 | Now let's test this, because if you just keep reading, you'll see how he's thinking now.

00:06:28.540 | Verse 4, "Though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh," which he can refer

00:06:33.640 | to, he says, "I don't put any confidence in the flesh, but I could if I wanted to."

00:06:37.440 | What are you talking about, Paul?

00:06:38.440 | Here's what he says, "If anyone thinks that he has reason for confidence in the flesh,

00:06:42.200 | I have more."

00:06:43.680 | And now he mentions things like this, four things.

00:06:47.800 | Circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, in other words, I was circumcised

00:06:53.680 | at the perfect moment, in obedience, I'm of the greatest people on the planet, I'm of

00:06:58.640 | the tribe of Benjamin, which had the first king and is a great tribe, I'm a Hebrew of

00:07:04.920 | Hebrews.

00:07:06.280 | Now all of that is physical human pedigree.

00:07:10.360 | This is the physical ethnic identity and pedigree of Paul, and he calls it flesh, mere flesh,

00:07:20.520 | which he will not boast in, though he once did and though he could, because he's going

00:07:26.400 | to say in just a moment, "It is rubbish.

00:07:29.440 | It's all rubbish."

00:07:30.440 | If, if, if, if, there's no dependence on the Holy Spirit and no glorying in Christ Jesus

00:07:38.840 | over it all.

00:07:40.200 | And then, to make it even clearer how broad this term flesh, this new negative meaning

00:07:46.200 | of flesh can be, he adds these three things to his physical identity and ethnicity.

00:07:52.720 | One, as to the law, I was a Pharisee.

00:07:56.320 | This guy is maxed out in focus on God's Word.

00:08:02.200 | Number two, as to zeal, I persecuted the church.

00:08:05.940 | He's not only focusing on the highest standard, he's doing it with the greatest zeal.

00:08:10.800 | Third, as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

00:08:13.520 | In other words, he was successful.

00:08:15.360 | He did it.

00:08:16.360 | Now, those three characteristics, which he calls flesh, are not physical.

00:08:22.400 | None of them.

00:08:23.400 | Law-keeping, zeal, success in morality, whatever gain, this is the next verse, "Whatever gain

00:08:32.620 | I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ."

00:08:37.400 | So here's my, here's the upshot.

00:08:41.280 | Flesh, in Paul's vocabulary now, has become something that includes zeal, an emotional

00:08:49.600 | virtue, law-keeping, blamelessness, a moral virtue, only they're not virtues.

00:08:57.920 | Because they are missing dependence on the Spirit and glorying in Christ Jesus.

00:09:07.720 | So I think what we are watching, and this is just so thrilling to me to see, to actually

00:09:13.200 | watch Paul's mind work, what we are watching in Philippians 3, 1-7, is the process by which

00:09:20.840 | a positive term, flesh, referring to skin, part of the body, becomes a negative term

00:09:27.760 | for Paul, referring to both bodily reality, like physical descent from Abraham, and moral

00:09:34.400 | reality, like law-keeping, and emotional reality, like zeal, all of it called flesh, and all

00:09:41.400 | of it rejected as rubbish, if we don't have any reliance on the Holy Spirit in those things,

00:09:50.600 | if we don't have any glorying in Christ in those things.

00:09:54.320 | In that case, he says, "I'm going to put zero confidence in the flesh understood that way.

00:10:00.640 | Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss."

00:10:04.080 | And we should ask, okay, now, when and why are those things worthless?

00:10:09.760 | Because they're good!

00:10:10.760 | I mean, it's not bad to love the law of God.

00:10:14.360 | It's not bad to be zealous.

00:10:16.000 | It's not bad to be blameless.

00:10:18.400 | For goodness sakes, Paul, do you really want to call that trash?

00:10:23.360 | We have to ask this question, because there's nothing wrong in and of themselves.

00:10:30.160 | What turns it into flesh?

00:10:34.240 | And I think the answer would go like this, and this is my definition, so this is my last

00:10:41.120 | answer to the question.

00:10:43.400 | Flesh is any human action or achievement without dependence upon the Holy Spirit and without

00:10:53.160 | glorying, exalting in, trusting, treasuring, valuing Jesus Christ.

00:11:01.160 | It might be as gross as rape and child abuse, or as moral as trying to keep the Ten Commandments.

00:11:09.240 | Self-reliant commandment-keeping and child abuse would both be flesh, because they're

00:11:15.400 | not flowing from dependence on the Holy Spirit, and they're not glorying in Christ Jesus.

00:11:22.720 | Yeah, that's a really good little introduction into one of the most important vocabulary

00:11:27.040 | words in the entire New Testament.

00:11:28.720 | Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you to everyone who listens regularly.

00:11:32.920 | If you're new to this podcast, we have about 1,400 episodes now to date in our archives.

00:11:39.200 | You can find that archive, you can read transcripts of those episodes, or even ask a question

00:11:43.240 | of your own.

00:11:44.600 | Do all of that at our online home at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.

00:11:50.720 | Well I am your host, Tony Reinke.

00:11:52.120 | We will see you back here on Friday.

00:11:54.240 | Bye.

00:11:54.740 | [END]

00:11:56.740 | DesiringGod.org

00:11:58.740 | Page 1 of 9

00:12:00.740 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

What Does It Mean to Live ‘in the Flesh’?

Chapters