CONVICTION VS. CONDEMNATION


Let’s get one thing straight. If we walk in the flesh, if we walk in sin, we will live under condemnation. There is therefore no more condemnation for those in Christ that walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. If we walk after the flesh, we can do things that have a form of godliness but is powerless because in the heart we are after the flesh. You may do spiritual things, but your heart desires the flesh. The root of your flesh is your fleshy desires. For a man is not tempted unless he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. The enemy is allowed in when we allow flesh in. 

We need to kill our flesh but we really need to kill our will. Our will is what brings forth the fruit from our flesh. Many keep chopping off bad fruit from their tree but we need to bring the ax to the root and pull out the roots of our flesh. Our thoughts are connected to the desires of our heart, and when our heart is bad, our heart will start to condemn us. Yet God is greater than the heart. He can deliver us from what’s in our heart, and condemnation will come out with it. It is sin unto you when you know what’s right but you don’t do it. 

We need to know what’s right and wrong. We need to know what God hates and loves. We need to know what God wants us to do and doesn't want us to do. We need to know what God wants us to say and doesn't want us to say. The Bible says the Spirit of truth will lead us unto all truth. The Spirit of God has come to reprove the world of sin, judgment, and righteousness. He will convict us of what is right and what is wrong. He will keep on our minds the judgment that is to come that we may make ourselves ready. He will lead us unto paths of righteousness. 

The devil comes as an angel of light. He dresses his ministers as ministers of righteousness. He will come and try to get in the way of God’s people and try to lure them in with a false light. He is the artificial light that comes to show you his version of right and wrong. Jesus is the second Adam. He has birthed us back in that garden scenario where we are connected to God again eating from His son. He is the way, the truth, and the life. He feeds us fruit from the tree of life. When he comes unto us, He comes to lead us, guide us, and teach us. He said come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me. For I am meek and lowly in heart. He is meek, He is lowly, He is the Lamb. He comes after us to teach us, to correct us, rebuke us, and exhort us, with all long-suffering and patience. Sometimes God spanks us, chastises us, but never does He condemn us. You need to shake off the condemnation of being a prodigal son and come home to your daddy. Boldly knowing His heart that He is ready to receive you back with gladness!

The devil comes to steal, kill, and destroy. The devil knows the word. The devil will come with the letter to kill, steal, and destroy. The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. The devil will do as the Pharisees did with the adulteress woman. The law commands us to stone her. The law commands us to condemn her. But Jesus will make your accuser flee. “Woman, where are your accusers? Go and sin no more.” Where the law was, sin increased. The strength of sin is the law. Yet where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. The new wine will make the old bottles burst. 

The devil will take the sword of the letter and kill you with religion. He will tell you to do the old traditions of the law. He will tell you that you must observe the sabbaths to be saved. He will tell you that you can't eat pork or you must abstain from certain meats. The Kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. 

We cannot let the devil use the word to condemn us because he shows us it in the flesh. This is why we need to know the word in Spirit. This is why we must walk by the Spirit, by the conviction of the Spirit and not the devil's condemnation. We need to heed and hearken to the conviction of the Holy Spirit that brings the word in Spirit and in truth. God is Spirit. God convicts, the devil condemns. God will lead you, the devil will kill you. He will kill your walk and your connection to God. He gives you morality but not godliness. He gives you spirituality without the Spirit. He is a counterfeit to God and is a copycat to everything God does. 

The devil will twist the truth and try to feed you another gospel. Just like he did to Adam and Eve, he used knowledge to beguile them thinking they would arrive unto a higher form of godliness. He gave them the illusion of a higher place in God when he was actually pulling them away from God. We need to recognize when God is speaking and when satan is speaking. If you are after God and God alone, the devil will try to deceive you by acting like God. He will come as another christ. You need to tell the difference and know the voice of your father and the voice of a stranger. Strange voices bring strange fire. Preachers who live under condemnation will preach condemnation. They listen to the voice of a stranger and the stranger leads them by condemnation to condemn. They stand on street corners and tell sinners they are sinning but don’t lead them by the Spirit that convicts and leads to repentance. The stranger will not convict you to lead you to repentance. He will give you worldly sorrow that you would not repent but that you would be sorry and do the same thing over and over. Or that he leads you to call yourself just a sinner saved by grace instead of a sinner turned a saint.

When God convicts you, He delivers you as long as you submit. When we don’t submit to His conviction, we turn our conviction into condemnation. We need to submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee. Condemnation is no longer allowed when we submit to Christ. The accuser of the brethren will come and falsely accuse us of things that we are not guilty of or things that we already repented of. We overcome him by the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony. He will come and accuse us and condemn us. We must drink His blood and eat His flesh. We must go boldly to the throne of grace to run this race. We need to run to the cross, repent, and drink and receive His forgiveness. 

God is not going to drink the blood for you. You have to drink the blood by faith and receive His forgiveness for you, and He shall cleanse you from all unrighteousness and the devil shall flee. We have the word of our testimony. So when the devil tries to tell us we’re not doing the right thing or we’re not walking with God, when the devil tries to tell us we’re not who we say that we are or that we’re not saved, we look back on all that God has done and has been doing in our lives, and we say, “satan, you’re a liar.” I have seen His power, His glory, and I still see it today. Encountering the power of God on a daily basis keeps the devil away. Then you will say, “Here’s the fruit, satan!” Here’s the fruit: doubt and unbelief!

We must know when God convicts us. The Pharisees constantly came in agreement with the accuser of the brethren and tried to find fault in Jesus and accuse Him of wrong. They said to Jesus, “You cast out demons by Beelzebub.” You need to be rooted and grounded in Christ or else the devil and his vessels of accusation will make you doubt Him in you. They will condemn, and when you believe it, you will bring witchcraft upon yourself. Even when you are blameless before God, satan will come and lie to you, and accuse you of wrong and tell you that you’re wrong with God or wrong with the letter, that he may lead you into condemnation. That he may vex your soul and make you want to give up and quit. He will come unto you and make you feel sorrow but unto death. That you would beat yourself up, that you would cast yourself down with him like he was cast down.

The accuser wants to steer you in a negative direction, negative thoughts, and negative feelings. And he will take your mind off of what is above, of what is lovely and pure and of good report. He is waging war on the saints that he may hinder them, fool them, and trick them into his devices. God will convict you of something and the devil will come and try to add or take away from the word. The devil will make you think God doesn’t love you anymore, that He’s turned away from you. He will bring up your past and say you did this, you did that. He will bring up old wounds that you would pick at them again. He will do his best to disqualify you or make you FEEL disqualified from all that God has for you. Yet the blood speaks a better word. The blood overcomes the serpent. 

When the devil comes to condemn and say you're wrong, you need to know if you are right with God; and if you are, you need to resist him! Fiery darts come and make you feel a certain way, but you need to take up the whole armor of God and the shield of faith and walk by what God is saying. Faith comes by the word, every word out of the mouth of God. The devil will try to make you unworthy or make you think you're unworthy.  We are worthy by the blood of the lamb. We the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Yet we need to abide in Christ. We need to stay under the shadow of His word. We need to make no provision for our flesh. Lies from the enemy are also flesh and will condemn us if we come in agreement. We are no longer under the bondage that leads to fear, no longer under the law of sin and death but under the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus if the Spirit of Christ dwells in us. We now listen to “what says the Spirit of God.” The Spirit of God convicts us and we start to live in accordance with God. We need to stop living under the letter and start living by the Spirit, and our life will bear witness with the letter. We are epistles read by men. We will be in step with the Bible when we are in step with the author of the Bible. 

God comes to convicts us, the devil comes to evicts us. God will convince us, show us, and reveal to us. The devil is the author of confusion and brings clouds of smoke. We need to know when God is leading us into righteousness and when satan is leading us by his ministers of unrighteousness. Christ did not come into the world to condemn the world but to save it. Jesus comes to save us. He comes unto us with the fruit of the Spirit. In meekness and gentleness. He comes with full assurance and bearing witness in your Spirit. He is the comforter but not a conformer. He will move on your conscience and you’re conscious will bear witness with His conviction. Yet the devil will move on your thoughts and emotions. We cannot live by emotions or carnality. We must live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Don’t tell yourself what is right and wrong or else you will condemn yourself because you will not be able to live up to your own righteousness. Self-righteousness is born out of your own righteousness. Don’t let the devil tell you what is right and wrong or good or evil or else he will condemn you, or he will make you see a way that seems right to a man but brings forth death. Under his form of holiness, he will make you think you are “holier than thou.” Cleaning the cup on the outside but not the inside. 

We need to let God tell us right and wrong. We need to let God convict us and judge us. We need to let the words from His mouth convict us and change us because He will back His words and transform us through His word. It’s the living word that makes us live. Do not see the Book through your own lens. See it by the lens of the Spirit. Do not receive your own thoughts and feelings about you. Receive His thoughts and feelings about you. He will be correcting and adjusting us until He comes back. We are growing unto the full stature of Christ. Some things He will convict us of now and other things later. We are growing in conviction. We must continue in conviction and not condemnation. 

Some have been living under the condemning thoughts of the enemy for so long that everything they do is through condemnation. Every time they hear the word or correction, they feel condemned. You need to shake off the lens of the enemy and receive by God through God. You must let Him convict and not let the devil condemn. God will correct you, and the devil will dissect you. And will try to get his hand in there picking at every little thing you do and bring condemnation, but you need to submit to God and resist the devil. When someone corrects you, God will convict you, but the devil will try to separate you. You need to resist condemnation and receive fresh conviction. 

By Joe Pinto

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