I said earlier I’d come back to further tests relating to the hypotheses of Romans. So just to bury the apparent reality of a carnal Christian, nail it, burn it, and destroy all traces of it, let me put forward three more tests that it needs to overcome.

Test 2: Practical Evidence of the Carnal Christian in Scripture.

Do we see these carnal Christians in operation in Scripture? These are people who have not yet been ‘baptised in the Spirit’. So they may have been baptised in water, but not yet received the Spirit (Acts or any of the Epistles such as to the Corinthians); or they may have been one of Jesus’ disciples (the 12 or 72 or others).

The 12 Disciples/Apostles are a key group, who, if the reality of a carnal Christian were true, would have to be said to be carnal before the Acts pouring out of the Spirit. This is not in fact what Pentecostals believe, so until I come across an argument that presents this, I don’t believe it needs tearing down. Instead, all we need to realise is that the pouring of the Spirit in Acts 2 was one that gave the Apostles charismatic gifts—so it was not as if they did not ‘have’ the Spirit in any measure whatsoever. They were convicted (Matthew 26:75 together with John 21:15-19), taught (Matthew 16:16-17), given words to speak (Luke 12:12), and even had authority to cast out demons (Luke 10:17-20). This is clearly incomplete, but we need not go on. They had the Spirit, but without receiving the type of baptism of the Spirit, or filling of the Spirit, that would empower them for the next season. Can we at least agree that we need different fillings for different seasons?

The early believers in Corinthians are often understood as ‘carnal’, particularly as Paul describes them as such in 1 Corinthians 3:1-4. Immediately it is apparent that it’s a much better fit to say that Paul is saying “you are acting like carnal people”. In fact, that’s what he says: “For since there is still jealousy and dissension among you, are you not influenced by the flesh and behaving like unregenerate people?” (3:3, NET)

It needs to be understood that the position of those who do not believe in the carnal Christian is not that you go from being sinful to perfect, but that we go from being sinful to being able to be victorious over sin. Thus, we will see evidence of addictions falling off people, conviction of practices once held dear, inner desire for godliness and righteousness—from the beginning and ongoing. So evidence of sin is one thing, but is there evidence of the Spirit in the Corinthians? Indeed there is.

There is significant change towards Christlikeness amongst them (e.g. 1:5-8; 6:9-11; 12:2), and more in the second letter (e.g. 2 Corinthians 7:7-16; 8:7, 10, 24, 9:2). Furthermore, there is constant expectation that they will change even further (1 Corinthians 4:2; 15-17; 6:11, 20; 7:16; 11:1; 13:11; 15:2, 49; 2 Corinthians 1:21f; 2:15f; 3:9; 5:9; 7:1; 13:9). There is absolutely zero expectation that a person can remain carnal, or indeed even be continuously carnal in a significant period of their life. This is because God is committed to their sanctification, washing them (1 Corinthians 6:11), having bought them (6:20), with a gospel that continues to save (15:2), through being born into a new image (15:49), by God’s establishment (2 Corinthians 1:21), that continually produces righteousness (3:9), while also working through others’ prayer (13:9).

So maybe at first glance, it may seem like there is significant room for the idea that a Christian can be saved but remain in their sin for a long time. However, digging a little under the surface and striving to iron out inconsistencies between passages shows that carnal Christianity is simply not even a small feature of Paul’s theology nor of early Christian experience.

Test 3: Practical Evidence of the Carnal Christian Today.

The presence of Christians who are in habitual sin, who do not have victory over sin, and do not exhibit any evidences of the Spirit, and yet who confess to believe in Christ are on the one hand welcomed as Christians (by adherents of Hypothesis 1), and on the other hand rebuked as false Christians who bear bad fruit (by adherents of Hypotheses 2 & 3).

The presence of such people poses no immediate threat to either view, as they are interpreted according to their beliefs.

However, if there were a group of Christians who were not baptised in the Spirit, nor who had any charismatic gifts, but who nevertheless experienced other things of the Spirit, such as conviction of sin, a change of heart and desires, a hatred of sin, a love for God and His Word and other Christians, and the fruit of the Spirit—would not this be a rebuke to the view that one has to have a second experience of God to begin to live a victorious life?

Indeed, there are large swathes of such people in conservative churches, even while mixed in with a large amount of religious goats (false Christians). Pentecostals, Keswick adherents, Wesleyans and others who rally around Hypothesis 1 need to have the grace to see the Spirit’s presence in these godly people—even though conservatives themselves may not perceive the Spirit working amongst them. Now, we may want to encourage conservatives to embrace other aspects of the Spirit, but, we dare not look down them for being second rate, or not knowing the Spirit.

Test 4: How the Theory Fits in Scripture as a Whole.

One of the other huge areas of understanding that we must square this with is that of understanding how you can tell who is a goat and who is a sheep: who is a false Christian and who is truly Christian.

It’s relatively straightforward. Jesus said, look at a person’s fruit (Matthew 7:15-20). If there’s bad fruit, there’s bad roots. If there’s good fruit, there’s good roots. However, the doctrine of carnal Christianity means that we cannot look at their fruit to decide their roots. That’s because there’s still bad fruit coming from them, habitually, and yet it is said that their roots are in Jesus. So either Jesus’ teaching here is significantly problematic, or the idea that a Christian can remain wallowing in their sin is.

John is huge on this point too. There was a difficulty a generation on from Jesus (around 60-90 A.D.) with professing Christians who were really teaching Gnosticism. John wrote 1 John to help combat this, and give objective measurements to tell who was really Christian and who was not. What John writes also serves to help Christians know that they know that they are saved. He similarly points out that looking for a person’s fruit is helpful, like the fruit of the Spirit; also that they will admit they are sinners (1 John 1:8-10)—a sign of the conviction of the Spirit; that they will unite around other believers (2:19); that they will have a new heart (2:15-17); that they will have the inward testimony of the Spirit (3:24); and that they will follow the commands of God (2:3-5; 3:7-8). The carnal Christian cannot relate to this. They are, in John’s words, lying (2:4), deceiving (1:8), haters who live in darkness (2:9), who don’t have the love of the Father in them (2:15), being “of the devil” (3:8).  He leaves no room for those who are justified but not sanctified. Perhaps that’s why so few churches preach on 1 John.

Conclusion on Romans 7:14-20

We have learned that Paul cannot be talking about a group of people who are justified but not sanctified—fleshly and worldly but going to heaven. Instead, we need to either follow the understanding that it’s about a Christian’s battle with sin, or that it’s a recollection of Paul’s life as a non-Christian.

This means that, after counselling people to get saved, we should expect to see something of the Spirit in their lives: a gift, a conviction, a change of heart or similar. It means that while we may continue to believe that the Spirit fills us as different times, for different purposes and seasons, the victorious life of sanctification starts immediately on conversion. We ought to expect a growing alignment with Jesus’ words, character and life from then on.

This may change the way we counsel people to find salvation. We should not treat it differently to any other breakthrough or answer to prayer we are seeking, where we keep on pressing into God until we see, hear or otherwise experience an answer. It will not be a one-off prayer without expectation of change, but a once-until prayer with expectation of the Spirit’s move.

This is Part 4 on a mini-series on salvation, the final part.