This is the 10th blog in our New life in Christ Series and in our earlier posts, we learnt that when we give our lives to Christ, it is our spirit that is born again and made new. Our old nature, the flesh however continues to seek control of our lives even after our spiritual rebirth; and we are only able to get rid of that old sinful nature, as we depend on God through prayer and obedience to His word.
For every situation you face in life therefore, you have to choose an action that will either gratify the desires of your flesh or gratify the desires of the Spirit of God in you; for what your old nature desires, is contrary to what the Spirit of God now in you, and also prompts you to do. (Galatians 6:16-17)
Over the past few weeks, we have been looking at the manifestations of our fleshly desires outlined in Galatians chapter 5, that we need to subdue by the power of the Holy Spirit. Today, we will examine the sin of murder – as we conclude our teachings on overcoming these works of the flesh. Let us once again quote one of our key texts in these series.
Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal 5:19-21 NKJV, Emphasis mine)
Interestingly, the sin of murder is not mentioned as one of the manifestations of the flesh in several versions of the Bible. The King James and New King James versions of the Bible are however careful to mention it.
Murder is defined as the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another. (Oxford English dictionary) Murder is not only considered a sin by God Almighty (Exodus 10:13), but it is also an unlawful act in almost every human society, punishable by some of the harshest penalties in any court of law.
For the life of the flesh is in the blood, ….. (Lev 17:11, NKJV)
This life of man, on the basis of Scripture, may be accounted from the time a child is formed in the mother’s womb. (Jer. 1:5) In this sense therefore, abortion can be considered as a form of murder.
There are several instances of murders in the Scriptures and unfortunately, even the first family in the Bible fell a victim to this sin (Genesis 4). Cain resented his brother Abel, because the latter was enjoying the favour of God Almighty; and this led him to kill Abel; for he failed to realize that we are each accountable to God for the blood of another. (Gen 9:5)
That was jealousy and envy at play; for when you are envious of someone, we resent the person for enjoying success or an advantage.
Similarly, the chief priests and elders handed Jesus Christ over to Pilate to be crucified because they were envious of Him! (Matt 27:18)
We see another example in Scripture, in 2 Samuel chapter 13, where Absalom harbored so much hatred in his heart against his step brother Amnon for raping his sister, Tamar; ultimately leading him to kill Amnon.
It is also common place to find people resorting to murder as a form of taking revenge on someone or something. Absalom sought to take revenge on Amnon for raping his sister Tamar, and this desire for revenge, fuelled his hatred for Ammon, ultimately leading him to kill him. Difficult though it may be, the believer in Christ should not seek to take revenge. For the Bible says:
If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. (Rom 12:18-20, The Living Bible)
Absalom could have confronted Amnon for committing this abominable sin and demanded an apology from him for his sister Tamar and left the matter in the hands of God Almighty, just like his father David did on countless occasions where king Saul sought to kill him, but he did not.
We see another instance of mass murder at the birth of Jesus. When king Herod heard through the magi that a king of the Jews had been born, he ordered all the male children, born in Bethlehem and who were below 2 years of age to be massacred. Bible historians say that this was because Herod had a bad temper and feared losing his kingdom with the birth of a new king. With Herod’s ambition to probably create a dynasty, the new born king of the Jews seemed to be a threat to that ambition. This suggests that selfish ambition can also lead to murder.
The underlying cause of selfish ambition is pride and it is not surprising to see this sin of pride listed among the six things that God hates. (Proverbs 6)
From all these biblical examples given above, we see that murder is an outcome which is usually triggered by something else – envy, hatred or selfish ambition with the underlying factor, being the notion of considering ourselves better than the other person – pride! That is why the Scriptures state that:
Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. (Phillp 2:3-4, NKJV)
For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing can be found there. (James 3:16-17)
For this reason, it is important for the believer not to entertain the sentiments of jealousy, envy, hatred and selfish ambition from the onset. For these workings of the flesh can easily lead a person to murder another. In our previous posts: 5, 6, 7, and 8, we have examined through Scripture, ways of overcoming these trigger sins and it will be helpful for the reader of this post to take a look at those earlier studies in order to be able to overcome these manifestations of our sinful nature.
Our new life in Christ is patterned after our Lord Jesus Christ, the author and finisher of our faith. It is therefore important to take a look at Christ Jesus’ words on the sin of murder:
You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift. (Matt 5:21-25, ESV)
In this Scripture, Christ Jesus raises the bar on His definition of murder, intimating that murder begins in the heart, before it is manifested on the outward. For out of the heart are the issues of life. So we murder someone when we speak maliciously against that person. Here again in the Scripture above, Christ identifies those triggers at the root of murder that ought to be addressed as anger, outbursts of rage leading to insults and self-conceitedness.
Christ Jesus brings to our fore, that our worship to God cannot be accepted when we harbor ill-feelings against another and we offend one another with our actions or inactions. So then, the maturity of the believer in Christ Jesus is ascertained by our relationships, not only with God, but with one another.
By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another. (John 13:35 NKJV)
For how can we claim to love God whom we have not seen, and not love our brother who is right there in front of us. (1 John 4:20-21) If we love God, we will seek to live a life pleasing to Him by obeying His word and yielding to the promptings of the Holy Spirit within us; while we progressively subdue the desires of our old sinful nature that we naturally would have been prone to.
May the Lord help us all to live a life pleasing to Him as we await the second coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
Blessings!
