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Sometimes we read a verse in the Bible and nod and say to ourselves, “Yes, indeed.” And then we move on without realizing how radical or profound that verse is. This is the case with Galatians 5:16: “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.” The radical part of this verse is this “walking by the Spirit” that we are supposed to do. What is this? And just exactly how do we do this? What are its implications? These are the questions that will guide our pondering now.
First of all, to answer what Paul means by walking “by the Spirit,” we need to speak to the clear things. From the context, it is clear that “the Spirit” here is not our spirit but the Holy Spirit (see 3:5, 14). And then “walk” here in 5:16 is a common Old Testament metaphor for conducting one’s life in this world. For example, one “walk[s] with God” like Enoch (Gen. 5:22, 24) or Noah (6:9) rather than in the counsel of the wicked (Ps. 1:1). Our love for God is to shape our whole lives (Deut. 6:5; Matt. 22:37), and thus we walk “in his ways” (Ps. 119:3; see also Deut. 5:33). New Testament authors also use this walking metaphor, saying that we are to walk in the daytime (Rom. 13:13), in the light (1 John 1:7), and as “children of light” (Eph. 5:8), for God is light (1 John 1:5), which for us in the New Testament era means to walk in Christ Jesus (Col. 2:6).
One last clear question to settle is what Paul means when he states the result of this walking by the Spirit: “You will not gratify the desires of the flesh” (Gal. 5:16). “Flesh” can simply refer to our bodily existence. For example, Paul says, “We walk in the flesh” (2 Cor. 10:3). But he also uses “flesh” in a more sinister sense to signify the endemic fallenness at work in the hearts of those who are “by nature children of wrath,” walking “in . . . trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1–3) as enemies of God (Rom. 5:10) and consumed by “the passions of our flesh” (Eph. 2:1–3; see Rom. 8:6–7). This comes out more clearly when we understand that “desires” of the flesh in Galatians 5:16 are not desires like wanting to get warm when cold but are lusts or evil cravings of the world (1 John 2:16) arising out of sin (Rom. 6:12; Titus 3:3) that gives birth to death (Rom. 7:5; James 1:14–15). The Spirit is diametrically opposed to the darkness of the flesh and its worldly lusts because He is not of this world but is of the light of the world to come (Rev. 4:5; 21:23; 22:5), which is “already shining” (1 John 2:8) and sent into our hearts in this age (2 Cor. 1:22; Gal. 4:6).
This leaves us with a key question: What does “by” mean when Paul tells us to walk “by the Spirit”? It could imply that the Holy Spirit is a kind of standard or yardstick by which we measure our actions (see Gal. 6:16; see also Rev. 11:1). This would be a biblical idea and one that Paul more or less expresses in Romans 8:4–5 when he says that we walk according to the Spirit, not according to the flesh. But “according to” is not the same as “by” as we find in Galatians 5:16.
We are thus left with only one good option for understanding walking “by” the Spirit. The gift of the Holy Spirit is a down payment of our resurrection inheritance (2 Cor. 5:4–5; Eph. 1:11–14) given to us now in our new birth (John 3:3–8; Titus 3:5) into new-creation life (Gal. 6:15; 2 Cor. 5:17). The Spirit represents the realm that conditions everything about us now. He is the One in whom we live and move and have our being in Christ Jesus. Accordingly, we “walk by faith” (2 Cor. 5:7), enabled by the Spirit: “For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness” (Gal. 5:5). So we are now led by the Spirit, who is the life-giver (John 6:63; Rom. 8:11; 2 Cor. 3:6). Hence, “we live by the Spirit” and are to “walk by the Spirit” (Gal. 5:16) until He causes us to be “swallowed up by life” in resurrection glory (2 Cor. 5:4).
The last thing that Paul would have us do is to read Galatians 5:16 as releasing us from concern with living our lives uprightly. We are free from the curse of God’s law by Christ’s redemption (3:13) and have received the promised Holy Spirit in consequence by faith alone (v. 14). This freedom, however, cannot become an excuse to live ungodly lives “as an opportunity for the flesh” (5:13). Instead, we are free now to love one another and to love our Lord with all that is in us. We walk by the Spirit in this freedom from the flesh, from sin and death, and with the kind of spiritual power of the age to come that can move mountains. This is what Zerubbabel heard about from the prophet and what we now experience personally through his great descendant, Jesus (Matt. 1:12–13; Luke 3:27):
Then he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of ‘Grace, grace to it!’” (Zech. 4:6–7)
Therefore, Paul declares to us: “Walk by the great Mountain-Leveler, and you will no longer sit in the gloomy valley of death with its cravings.”