Daily Devotional for Thursday, October 27 

Walking After the Flesh

She pulled him out of the puddle yet again and this time she was not letting go. Little Joe was a bundle of energy, always on the go with only one speed. Usually that speed was toward the dirt, mud, grease or whatever might ruin an outfit. 

People are like that toward God. We remain unheeding of His warning, drawn to the temptations offered by our carnal nature. The temptation is there for even the godly who have had their sins paid for. “Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Mathew 26:41). The ungodly, marked by their disregard of Jesus Christ, will pay the punishment for their actions which offends the just God. “Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matthew 7:22, 23). 

If pure religion is in part to keep unspotted from the world, “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world” (James 1:27), then these individuals are false teachers because they walk after the flesh. Often marked with a contempt for authority, they live their lives as animals, corrupt at their core even as they confidently mingle with the children of God. God will deal with them. They are cursed children, outside the family of God and in need of a Savior. 

REFLECTION: Have you been acting like a child of God or an animal? 

David Thompson