There are some things you just have to do. You don’t necessarily do them because you want to, but because you know you should, or you somehow feel obligated. Websters defines obligation using words like duty, responsibility, and demands of conscience or custom. Maybe you made a promise, or you were committed by someone else, and you have to make good. I was thinking about one obligation the Bible says believers don’t have.
We are not obligated to the flesh to live according to the flesh (Romans 8:12b HCSB).
This verse highlights an interesting, and liberating, truth.
I defined the flesh in Heaven-Bound but Going Nowhere as “anything you believe, think, say, feel, or do apart from God.” The flesh is a mindset, a way of thought and behavior to which we were habituated before coming to Jesus. But when we accepted His atonement for our sins on the cross and gave our lives to Him, we each became a new creation, and that old way of thinking no longer defines us. 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NLT) says, The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
This means that as believers, we have a new identity in Christ. The Bible says we’ve been delivered from the domain of darkness, and transferred to the kingdom of God’s beloved Son (Colossians 1:13). Now a domain is a place where complete ownership or rule is exercised. When we were in the kingdom of darkness, it ruled us. But when we embrace our citizenship in Jesus’s kingdom, we no longer identify with attitudes and actions that fail to acknowledge God, His Word, and His work in our lives. We recognize we’ve been gifted by God’s grace with a new nature, a pleasing, godly disposition that reflects Jesus.
You might be reading this and saying, “But I still mess up! A lot!” That may be true, and God’s grace covers it (Romans 8:1). But that fantastic verse at the top of the page can help you. It’s telling you that though you may experience ungodly thoughts and impulses, you are under no obligation whatsoever to them. You can just say no to those things—remembering you are in Christ and choosing to not even think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh. You’ve no obligation to those negative impulses. Whom the Son sets free is free indeed!
What does this look like in practice? Well, we get tempted all the time to say and do stuff we shouldn’t, but the Bible says we’re empowered to sidestep those traps (1 Corinthians 10:13). Truth sets us free when we know and apply it (John 8:32). You can ignore thoughts you realize have no authority or power over you.
Say you once had a domineering, demanding boss that used to terrorize everyone in your office. But you left that job years ago. If you saw that old boss in the grocery store and he or she started barking orders at you, would you drop what you were doing and comply? Of course not! They have no business telling you what to do because you don’t work for them anymore. It’s just like that with the flesh. Whether it’s feelings of impatience, anger, selfishness, fear and unbelief, complaining, greed, pride, it doesn’t matter. You are in a different kingdom now, no longer under the dark domain—and you are free from all its demands!
