Put to Death What Is Earthly

Put to Death What Is Earthly

By M.T. Clark — P-2068 | 09/14/2026 – Today’s Audio Podcast

Today’s Message on YouTube:

Today’s photo of my canine pal Harley on a grassy pathway in the foreground of two large trees framing a sunlit clearing, under a bright blue sky, comes to us from yours truly, as I captured this beautiful September afternoon at the clearing at the end of Freedom Road in Easton, NY, on September 12, 2025.

Well, it’s Monday, and I share this photo of a sunlit clearing at the end of a country road to remind us that the Lord has a fresh start waiting for us each morning, if we will just start walking with Him toward it.

Some of the best conversations I have had with the Lord have happened on ordinary walks like this one, at the end of a country road where nothing was hurrying me along and I could actually hear what He was saying. Mornings are also a good time to bring the truth about our lives to the Lord before our day gets busy, to set our intention to follow His lead, and to let Him show us where He wants to work.

Speaking of the honest business the Lord invites us into when we come to Him at the start of a new day,

Our series, “Rooted in Him,” continues today with Paul’s instruction to put to death what belongs to the earth.

Put to Death What Is Earthly

The Apostle Paul turns his teaching into a decision that has to be made every day, and Colossians 3:5 (NKJV) puts it plainly: “Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.”

Paul has just told us that we died with Christ, that our life is hidden with Him in God, and that we are to set our minds on things above. Now he tells us what to do with the parts of us that still want to live like the old life is running the show. He doesn’t tell us to just forgive ourselves for our besetting sins. He tells us to put them to death.

That’s right! Paul doesn’t say: “You’ll always struggle with this.”  Paul doesn’t say to tolerate what is earthly. He doesn’t say to manage it. He says to put it to death, and he says it in a way that assumes we can actually do it, because Jesus has already died and we have died with Him. And the Holy Spirit in us gives us the power to overcome and to put to death the works of the flesh.

Then Paul is clear about what we can overcome. Paul names five things, and he doesn’t apologize for being specific. He names fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness. Most of us would rather Paul had stayed general here, because a general list allows us to feel like we are making progress while our specific fights still remain unchanged. Paul refuses to let us hide behind a general list. He calls it what it is, and he adds at the end that covetousness, which is wanting what isn’t ours, is a form of idolatry, because it puts something else on the throne where God belongs.

That last phrase tells us what all these sins have in common. Every one of them is a way of trying to get life somewhere other than from God. Fornication reaches for what only God’s design can rightly give. Passion and evil desire go looking for satisfaction outside of Him. Covetousness worships a possession or a status instead of the Lord. These aren’t just moral failures. They are worshiping the world, the flesh, and the devil who tempts us to look anywhere other than to God for satisfaction.

I know the pull of this list from my own life. Before I came to Christ back in 2010, I was chasing every one of these things at once, and I would cover it all in whatever language I needed to excuse them as acceptable weaknesses or to make them look normal. Even after I came to Christ, I had years where I was saved but stuck, a professing believer with a Bible in my hand and old habits still running in the shadows. What really began to change that, by God’s grace, wasn’t trying harder. It was going through the Steps to Freedom in Christ with the Lord, renouncing the specific things I had welcomed into my life, canceling the ground the enemy had held there, and agreeing with the truth that I was a new creation in Christ. That is what putting our “members which are on the earth” to death actually looks like. Victory and freedom from our sins don’t come from a single heroic burst of self-control.  Freedom from a specific sin comes through a specific and honest transaction with the Lord, one item at a time, and then is lived out one day at a time.

Let’s also be clear about how this happens, because Paul isn’t asking us to grit our teeth. Elsewhere he tells us that by the Spirit we put to death the “deeds of the body” (Romans 8:13). Our part is to agree with what God has already said about our old life, and to actively cooperate with the Holy Spirit as He grants us repentance that puts the works of the flesh to death for good. We agree with and commit to the truth of what God has said; we bring our will into line with God’s will, and the Spirit does what only He can do. That is why real repentance is a rest, not a strain. Real repentance is a surrender to the Spirit’s power, rather than fighting in our own strength. This is the ground on which the new life grows.

Paul isn’t asking us to be perfect this morning. He is asking us to be honest.

What in your life is still operating as though the old man is still running the show? What have you been managing instead of putting to death? Bring that to the Lord this morning. Tell Him the truth about it and then let Him do His work.

It doesn’t have to be weird. Just name the thing out loud to the Lord instead of pretending He hasn’t noticed it. Agree with God about what it is, instead of trying to make it less than it is. Ask the Holy Spirit to do the work in you that you haven’t been able to do on your own.

And hear this: You died with Christ, your real life is hidden with Him in God, and the old parts of you that still want to run the show don’t get to. Put them to death by the Spirit, one honest transaction at a time, and let the life that is already yours in Jesus become the only life you are living.

So, come to the Lord with what needs to go, ask the Holy Spirit to do the work only He can do, and walk today in your relationship with the Lord as a person who is free to leave the old life behind.

Every step we take toward the Lord is a step in the right direction. So, keep on walking and talking with God.

— M.T.

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“The views, opinions, and commentary of this publication are those of the author, M.T. Clark, only, and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of any of the photographers, artists, ministries, or other authors of the other works that may be included in this publication, and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities the author may represent.”

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