Put to death ... your earthly nature

Colossians 3:5 put to death whatever belongs to your earthly nature....

The rest of the passage lists some of the "earthly nature" that the people from the church in Colosse were dealing with: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Of course the earthly nature is our sinful nature. We can blame it on Adam and Eve but we are no better. If they hadn't fallen, we would have.

The "earthly nature" mentioned by Paul is not exactly the earthly nature I need to put to death. I do have an "earthly nature". Pride. Disobedience. Laziness. Distrust. Gluttony. I am not always righteous, upright, and God-centered as I should be. Actually, I may not even be God-centered most of the time. A God-centered nature would crowd out the earthly natures in me. I wouldn't feel lost, broken, dissatisfied if I were able to focus more on what God wants and less on what I think I want.

A person could tell immediately how I differ from the image of Christ presented in the Bible. Those differences ) can be attributed to my earthly nature. I need strive every day to put to death the parts of me that conflict with the image of Jesus Christ and who God wants me to be. God provides the tools, namely the Holy Spirit, to help with that transformation. The Holy Spirit has his work cut out for him on some of my issues!

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