Your Own Worst Enemy

It was D.L. Moody who said, “No one gives D.L. Moody more trouble than D.L. Moody.” Let’s face it; we are our own worst enemy. A man heard a sermon on praying for your enemies, so he went home, got on his knees, and prayed for himself. There may be more truth than fiction in this story.

As long as we are in this flesh we will have to haul this “old man” with us everywhere we go. A common saying among the deeper life advocates is that we need to get out of Romans chapter seven and into Romans chapter eight. But if you’ll check your Bible, you’ll find the same man that’s groaning in chapter seven is still groaning in chapter eight.

You don’t try to change the “old man,” Jesus says, you’re to “Deny him.” In the movie, A Beautiful Mind, the main character, who was a schizophrenic, after being healed made a great statement, “I still see things, I just don’t acknowledge them.” We should never deny the existence of the old nature, but the recognition of it. Don’t let the old you convince you he is the new you!

After reading such scriptures as: the flesh is weak; flesh is unchangeable; flesh profits nothing; no good thing in the flesh; flesh cannot please God; flesh is filthy; flesh reaps corruption; and flesh wars against all that is holy and good, no wonder we’re told, “Put no confidence in the flesh.”

You can’t reason with it, you can’t satisfy it, and you can’t change it any more than a leper can change his spots or an Ethiopian his skin. Don’t coddle what God has condemned! We need to deal with our “old man” the way Samuel did Agag (a type of the flesh). We’re told, “Agag came unto him delicately. And Agag said, Surely the bitterness of death is passed. And Samuel hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord.”

Every morning of a believer’s life should begin with taking your “old man” by the nape of the neck, and drag him, kicking and screaming, to the Cross. And make sure you’re deaf to all his subtle promises and vows to do better, if you’ll only spare him. Remember, what Saul spared slew him in the end.

After Augustine’s conversion a woman of ill repute he had known previously called to him on the street, “Augustine, it is I.” To which he replied, “Yes, I know, but it is not I.”