Part 1 – Understanding Our Make-up

This Article is part of a multi-part Study Series called Two Natures Within the Christian Believer.

To understand the believer’s relationship with Christ from the moment one is “regenerated” (Titus 3:5, i.e., ‘born again’) we need to see who we ‘were before faith in Christ and who we now really “are” … being in union with Christ as our new life and identity.

First, every human born is intended by God to become His living, freely willing, containers… through whom He can ultimately express His righteous life while we are on earth. God uniquely made man able to ‘receive’ the resurrected “Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” (Rom 8:2) into our “spirt of man.”

Our “spirit of man” is the ‘spirit-container’ for Christ’s resurrected “Spirit of life.” Our “spirit of man” is perfectly suited to enable humans to receiveand then express ... Christ’s life. We who have believed to receive Christ as Savior are now are eternally united with Him, being literally “one spirit” with Him.

“The burden of the word of the LORD for Israel, saith the LORD, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth The Spirit of Man within him.” (Zechariah 12:1 (KJV)

“I Daniel was grieved in my spirit [ruach] In the Midst of My Body, …” (Daniel 7:15 (KJV)

“And so it is written, The first man Adam [of Genesis] was made a living soul; the last Adam [Jesus Christ] was made [Became] a Quickening [Life-Giving] Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 15:45 (KJV)

“Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of The Divine Nature…” (2 Peter 1:4 (KJV)

“But he that is Joined Unto The Lord Is [has become]One Spirit.’” (1 Corinthians 6:17 (KJV)

Thus, we as believers are equipped to fulfill God’s purpose for us by Christ’s LIFE & NATURE within us.

“What? know ye not that your [human] body is the temple of the Holy Ghost [Spirit] which is IN YOU which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? 20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body [by where you go and what you do], and in your spirit, which are God's.” (1 Cor. 6:19-20)

“… the mystery [Gk. musterion, the ‘secret’ plan of God] which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints: 27 To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this Mystery [God’s formerly secret plan] among the Gentiles; which is CHRIST IN YOU, the hope of [eternal] glory:” (Colossians 1:26-27 (KJV)

Every believer is to forever be a Living Container of the very Life of Godin the person of Christ… now in us as the resurrected “Spirit of life in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:2a, cf. 1Cor 15:45). The most important part of our being is our “spirit of man” … where Christ abides forever.

“… Ye are the temple of God” (1Cor. 3:16).

“So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 But ye [believers] are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell In You. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 10 And if Christ be In You, the body is dead [with Christ, Rom. 6:3) because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of [Christ’s] righteousness.” (Romans 8:8-10 (KJV)

Yet, there is a problem. Every believer should soon recognize that there are two natures within them. I’m sure we all experience and sometimes fall to sinful impulses. A ‘nature’ is an innate “spirit force that directs, controls, and maintains.” (Webster’s Dictionary). The Two Natures in believers are;

1) Satan’s ‘Sin-spirit’ is located in the flesh” of the physical body of all humans (Rom. 8:3)

2) Christ’s “Spirit of life” is the … One “Spirit of God.” (cf. Eph. 4:4)

We are of God… know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error [Grk. plane, deceit]. (1Jn. 4:6)

[Yet] the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other… (Galatians 5:17)

It is undeniable we humans were all “conceived in iniquity [sin].” (Psa. 51:5). We are all born into this world with Satan’s Sin-spirit, that spirit that doth work in the children of disobedienceby nature children of wrath (Eph. 2:2, 3). This Sin-spirit nature has operated in us and through us in the form of all our sinning, from gossip to the most heinous sins.

When Adam and Eve chose to sin in believing the Serpents words and disobeying God and lying to God in the Garden, the Serpent’s Sin-spirit came into them and has passed to all the lineage of Adam. Adam’s choice still affects all us humans today, as all of us have Satan’s Sin-nature in our “body of the sins of the flesh.” (Col. 2:11) Consider Paul’s words;

“Wherefore, as by one man [Adam] sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:” (Romans 5:12)
“For what the law [of Moses] could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned [judged] SIN IN THE FLESH [at the Cross]:” (Romans 8:3 (KJV)    

“Now then it is no more I that do it [sins], but SIN THAT DWELLETH IN ME.…  20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but SIN THAT DWELLETH IN ME. (Rom. 7:17, 20)

But we as regenerated believers live in the new paradigm of the NO CONDEMNATION” reality of Romans 8:1. There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus… .”

Satan uses his evil thoughts shot into the believer’s minds as “firey darts” (Eph. 6:16) in order to condemn us and thereby rob us of the peace and rest we joy of our new life in Christ. We should not permit Satan’s lying thoughts draw us away from the truth of God and His loving provision for us in Christ. We must deal with these thoughts by knowing “the word of truth,” then to stand upon the truth of the word of God whereby we are dead to Sin and are now able to “walk in newness of life.”

“Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into [not into water, but into] his death? 4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:3-4)

We must know who we are as grace-believers and live with God’s truth as our overarching mindset. We must know the truth of Scripture “righty divided and stand upon it. E.g., We know that there is no sin in being tempted, for the Lord Jesus Himself was tempted of the Devil … “yet without sin[ning].”

“… but [Jesus] was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” (Hebrews 4:15b (KJV)