Cleanse
2 Corinthians 7:1 Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.
The last part of Chapter 6 is important to this verse of scripture. God wants to be our Father. The Lord Almighty wants to be a Father to us, but He needs some things from us. Jesus did all the work for our spirit to be born again. We were made in the likeness and image of God, and we are now a new creature in Christ Jesus, old things have passed away and we have a new life. You are a new creation in Christ Jesus, but you still have a flesh that didn’t get born again. In 2 Corinthians 6:17 (my Mamaw's favorite verse, or at least the one she quoted all the time), tells us to, “Come out from among them and be ye separate." The scripture goes on to say, “Don't touch any unclean thing.” Jesus made us holy, but we need to be perfected in holiness by the fear of God. In other words, from our holy position in God, and because we fear the Lord, we need to keep our body in check and walk out our holiness. The promise we have is that God, our Father, dwells in us, He is walking with us, and we are His people. Because we have these promises, we are to cleanse ourselves from the filthiness that is in the world that tries to attach itself to our flesh. We are to subdue our flesh and not allow it to take dominion in our lives.
How do you perfect holiness? First, you do it by acknowledging you are holy and next, by putting your body under. Then, you offer your body and all its parts in service to God. How do we keep clean? The Word of God is a washing agent. Ephesians tells husbands to wash their wives with the Word of God. You and I cannot keep from coming in contact with the filthiness that is in the world and that is why we need to wash ourselves daily with the Word. We are in this world, but not of it. So, instead of living afraid of the devil's filth, we need to wash it off daily and not participate in it. If we will cleanse ourselves daily, we will keep ourselves in the race that we are appointed to run, and we will finish our course with joy!