I cherish this passage of Scripture, because it reveals one of the great truths of living the Christian life, and that is simple that no one can do it. You read right dear friend, no one is able to live the Christian life. If you try, you will fail. It is common for baby believers to attempt to live the Christian life, but they still wallow in their sinful bad habits and struggle to no avail to live right. Many become discouraged and quit church, accepting failure.
But dear reader I have great news for you! We don't have to live the Christian life, because Jesus wants to live through us. The Bible calls this WALKING IN THE SPIRIT. That is, yielding to the indwelling Holy Spirit. This is the FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT (Galatians 5:22-25). At the moment of salvation (the new birth when we rely completely upon Jesus for what He did through Calvary's cross to pay our debt of sin), God gives us the free gift of His Holy Spirit to live inside our spirit, soul and body (1st Corinthians 3:16-17; 1st John 3:24).
May I say, no one has ever turned away from their sins!!! All you can do is clean up your life somewhat, quit some sinful bad habits and put on a good show for others, but you're still a dirty sinner and so am I (Romans 3:10-23). You can take a pig and give him a nice bath. Then you can put perfume on him and groom his hair very nicely. But the moment that you set that pig down on the ground on the farm, he's going to head for the nearest mudhole to wallow in it, because he is a pig.
Likewise, there is no such thing as a “good Christian.” At best, all we can achieve is to be a struggling redeemed sinner who is yielding to the indwelling Spirit of Christ to live the Christian life through us (Romans 8:9; Galatians 2:20). Throughout human civilization religion has been attempting to groom the pig in mankind, tidy us sinners up a bit to make us look and feel better, but we are still filthy sinners deserving of eternal damnation in Hell, fire and brimstone for our sins. Remember, a demon's favorite activity is to make religious people comfortable in their lost condition. Satan's greatest weapon is to con people into living the Christian life without ever being born again. That is what's wrong with 99% of churches and religion today.
The way that we walk in the indwelling Holy Spirit is to abide in the written Word of God (John 17:17), which I believe to be the inspired KING JAMES BIBLE in the English language. All modern English Bible revisions have been corrupted horribly by the Devil.
