Flesh vs. Spirit: Why Christian Perfectionists Struggle (and Why It Means You’re Not Failing) | 011

Link to my book, You Will Make Mistakes: Discovering God's Grace in the Midst of Perfectionism

Are you tired of the constant tug-of-war inside—wanting to follow God but feeling pulled back by old habits, perfectionism, or striving? In this episode of The Redeemed Perfectionist, Lenee’ unpacks what Paul taught the Galatians about the battle between the flesh and the Spirit.

You’ll discover:
 ✨ Why your old nature can never be perfected
 ✨ How striving feeds the wrong side of the battle
 ✨ The surprising way to finally walk in victory (hint: it’s not by trying harder!)
 ✨ What it looks like to surrender to the Spirit in your everyday life

If you’ve ever wondered “Why do I still struggle as a Christian?” or felt weighed down by guilt, this conversation will bring clarity, hope, and a fresh reminder of God’s grace.

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Transcript

The War Within: Why Christians Struggle and How Grace Wins | 011

Link to my book, You Will Make Mistakes: Discovering God's Grace in the Midst of Perfectionism

Leneé Pezzano: Do you ever wonder why, no matter how hard you try, you still mess up, you still feel like you're never enough, and that maybe if you just try harder, prayed more, sin less, then God would finally be pleased with you. I wanna tell you, you are not crazy. You are human. And there's something actually deep within you that is not supposed to work without God.

It'll actually do everything in its power to resist him. if you're a recovering perfectionist like me, sis, you're already ping ponging between, okay, that's actually encouraging. And wait, now I can go fix that part of me. Huh, girl, I see you. Seriously. This is the moment where 

I wish I could reach through your earbuds and just say, breathe. Sit back and relax. What I'm submitting to you 

[00:01:00] today is that the struggle you feel, the push and the pull inside of you, it isn't a sign that you're failing. It is a sign that you're in a battle. It's actually proof that God's spirit is alive in you.

Psalm 144:1 says, blessed be the Lord my strength, which teaches my hands to war and my fingers to fight. Consider today's episode God equipping you for battle. And really that's what the Redeemed Perfectionist podcast is about. Through personal testimonies, biblical truths and practical advice, you'll discover how to lay down the heavy burden of performing for God and replace it with living a life of joy with Him.

Hey sis. I'm Leneé Pezzano, Founder of the Redeemed Perfectionist Podcast, and I'm here to help you take the ping outta your pong and 

[00:02:00] equip you with kingdom truths that will help you recognize the war within. I've been walking with Jesus for nearly 30 years. Most of the time I white-knuckled my way through. I loved God, but I was exhausted trying to earn what he had already freely given.

And now I want to help you do it differently. I want to help you upgrade your armor regardless of the Goliaths that you face, so you stop striving in your own strength and start walking in the freedom Jesus died to give you.

in today's episode, we're gonna talk about the war between your flesh and God's spirit and why understanding it is a huge step to walking in real freedom, In real rest, in real grace. So take a deep breath. You don't have to fix yourself. You just need to learn who you really are in Christ how to let him lead and how to partner with him in the 

[00:03:00] journey. Speaking of upgrading your armor, my book, you will make mistakes, dives deeper into these truths and gives you tools to fortify your armor even more so you can live freely from the exhausting cycles of striving.

I wanna make sure you feel confident that the things I'm saying are actually true and that I'm not trying to give you an easy escape route. We know that we're still accountable to the Lord. We know that there. Is always gonna be responsibility we carry. There's always gonna be a part of us that needs to walk in obedience, but sometimes what keeps us from truly being able to do that is a misunderstanding of some of the foundational principles we're talking through today.

First off, it's important to know that we're all born with three parts to us, spirit, soul, and body.

[00:04:00] First Thessalonians 5:23 

says, and the God of peace himself sanctify you holy. And may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete So there you can see we've got three parts to us. And before Sin entered the world, it was our spirit that dominated.

Our spirit is where our intuition and our conscience lies. And it's that part of us that is aware, really of what's right and wrong.

But as we know, God created a world where we're not robots. He created a world where we would walk by choice.

that part dwells in our soul. That's where our mind, our will and our emotions are. That's where our appetites are. And that's the part of us that chooses how we are going to respond to life.

here's where the battle comes in. Galatians 5:17 says, for the flesh, lust against 

[00:05:00] the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. And these are contrary. The one to the other so that you cannot do the things that you would. 

Herein lies the principle of the flesh fighting against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. And when we talk about the flesh, what we're referring to is really the soul. 

When sin entered the world,

guess what became dominant? It was the soul. Think about it. The choice was made to go against God's command. It was in the mind. It was in the will. It was in the appetite of Adam and Eve.

That's the part of us that's really the flesh, not, this outer shell that we call our physical body. It makes up more than that. The body is simply the shell that responds to the choices we make. In other words, it responds to the soul

and it's that part of us that lusts against the spirit. And of course, the spirit is

 [00:06:00] contrary to the flesh. The spirit is that part of us

 that, you know, we just know it. In our knower, we have that feeling that something just isn't right, or we knew better. Have you ever said the words, yeah, I knew better. Or I had a feeling something just wasn't right.

You could say that your spirit knew better.

Now, when you're born again, God restores that spirit in you and he gives you his Holy Spirit all of a sudden. Okay. God's spirit's no longer working outside of your life now. He's living inside of you. inside your heart.

Let's try another one. Ephesians 2:1-3. And you have He quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins wherein time passed. Ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the heir, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience.

Among whom also, we all had our conversations in times 

[00:07:00] past in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were listen by nature, children of wrath, even as others. So to say it a different way, you and I used to be spiritually dead because of our sinful nature, and we were separate from God.

We were following the ways of the enemy without realizing it, going with the flow, whatever our flesh desired or whatever the world told us we needed, and we didn't consider what God wanted. It was who we were, it was our nature to be children of wrath.

And every single one of us starts out this way. That's normal. And that's why sometimes you feel like you cannot do what you really want to do deep down, because there my friend, is a tug of war going on inside constantly. Think of it like having two operating systems in your life. 

[00:08:00] So you've got the old one and it's glitchy and outdated and refuses to take God's updates. And then you've got the new one and it's wired for righteousness, but it can only function when it's connected to the source. And yes, the two are constantly competing for control.

But here is the free news. God already knows this about you. It is exactly why he didn't just forgive your sins.

He gave you a brand-new nature through his spirit because your old one, let's face it it's not gonna be rehabbed, right? It has to be crucified. 

And that new nature that he's put in you is actually designed to run on his power, not on yours. So why does all this matter to a perfectionist? Because perfectionism is really just another form of trying to live by the law. 

[00:09:00] It's the belief that if I just work harder, do better, or keep all the rules.

Then I'm finally going to be enough for God or for others. Are you familiar with the book of Galatians? Paul was writing to a group of believers who were already a part of the body of Christ. They accepted the truth of the gospel that no human can fully keep.

The 613 plus laws given before Christ. And that the only way back to the Father is through faith in Jesus who came in human form and became the ultimate sacrifice for our sins. His blood still speaks on our behalf today, and that was the gospel. They had received the gospel of grace. 

But something had changed with the Galatians somewhere. They began to go back to the law and to relying on it more than the gospel. Paul says in Galatians [00:10:00] one, six through seven, I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting, the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel.

in Galatians 2:16. He has to remind them that works. Do not save. He says, A person is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ, he even reminds them of how they first receive the spirit. In chapter three, one through three, he says, did you receive the spirit by the works of the law or by believing what you heard?

Are you so foolish after beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh? And then in five four he says, you who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ. You have fallen away from grace. Sometimes we're not always 

[00:11:00] aware that we're doing the very same thing, sis, here's what it might look like for us today.

It looks like feeling like you have to check every box on your spiritual to-do list prayer, Bible reading, church attendance, or else God will be disappointed in you. It looks like serving in every ministry because you think your worth is tied to how much you do for him, but secretly you're miserable and exhausted.

Maybe you restrict calories and exercise more because no one will find you acceptable if you gain weight or maybe you constantly compare your faith, walk to somebody else's and try to measure up instead of resting in who you are in Christ.

I would constantly beat myself up over mistakes as if punishing myself would earn back God's favor for me. And how about the old white knuckling? Relying on your willpower 

[00:12:00] instead of the spirit to overcome sin? Which one hits home for you? What Paul was showing. The Galatians is the same thing we need to see today when we slip back into striving, into trying to perfect ourselves.

Which nature do you think we're feeding? It's the old one. The one that never could obey God fully to begin with. And it's going to happily wear the costume of discipline and responsibility and excellence. If it means it keeps you relying on yourself instead of the spirit. But at its core, it's still self-reliance versus reliance on his grace.

Remember, as believers. We've also been given a new nature through Christ.

So how do we get the victory? Well, it isn't by trying harder. It's about surrendering more 

[00:13:00] and trusting him to lead you by his grace. I think of grace as that power that keeps on giving because of what he's already done for you and for me and we tap into it when we trust him and ask him for it.

So when your inner critic says you failed again, you'll never measure up and then you agree with it. That's feeding the old nature. But when you pause and you say, no, my identity is in Christ and his grace covers me. That's walking in the new. When you drive yourself into exhaustion, trying to check every box to feel worthy, right?

That's the old nature talking. But when you rest, even when things are undone. Trusting God's approval over your to-do list. That's the new, when you feel shame and hide from God when you sin, 

[00:14:00] yeah, that's the old, but when you run to him with your weakness, believing he'll meet you with mercy, that's the new, are you seeing the difference?

Listen, good works are important. We are made for them. But they should be flowing out of that connection to our source and our relationship with him.

And that starts with the recognition that you can't do it on your own, you weren't meant to, he's already paid the price. And so if we can step into his grace, knowing that. And into our identity as children of the King, Now we're empowered to walk in righteousness.

Ask yourself this. What would it look like if my expectations aligned with his instead of my own? If I realize that this battle in me is normal and reflects the two natures in me, and that I'm 

[00:15:00] acceptable where I am, what would it feel like to start each day believing God desires to be my daily iv, giving me strength?

I can't sum it on my own. How would my life change if I remembered he already knows my weaknesses and wants to pour his power into me? What if I rest in the fact that he will tutor me on how to starve the old nature and be fully established in the new sis? If you don't understand this war. You could misinterpret it.

we tend to be heavily performance driven. So if there's a battle, we think that battle means we're failing, but in reality, the battle is actually a sign of life. Dead people do not fight sin. Only those made alive in Christ do.

If you expect to get it just right without a fight, 

[00:16:00] you'll end up disappointed, You'll be disappointed in yourself, maybe disillusioned with God, but when you see the fight for what it is, you can stop being so hard on yourself and you can start leaning harder on him. He's already done the work for you.

It's done in heaven. Now he's establishing it in you in the natural realm. Now you get to plug into his power to fill in the gap and keep growing that spiritual muscle. Until that place that used to be dominated by your flesh and your old nature is now dominated by him and his nature. And you know the word kingdom means the king's domain.

And so his kingdom is being built in you so that it can be brought through you. Oh, that's the true gospel of graces. It's God coming to us where we are, not where we think we need to be. 

[00:17:00] It's the spirit inviting us to stop striving in our own strength and to rest in the finished work of Jesus. I imagine you might be wondering, okay, I'm getting this, but how do I actually live it out in my daily life?

So I'm gonna walk you through practical, everyday steps to recognize the battle. To lean into his power and then experience real victory over that push and pull that's inside of you, because you don't have to stay stuck in that exhausting cycle. 

 step one, I would say be a good fruit inspector. Learn how to inspect how you're feeling in any particular situation or on any given day.

Are you feeling frustrated? Are you exhausted? Are you anxious and fearful? If you are not at 

[00:18:00] peace, if you are not demonstrating the fruit of the spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, and so on, you're likely out of alignment with the Lord.

Secondly. Once you identify the fruit, recognize the source of the struggle. In other words, is it your flesh talking or is it the spirit? How do you know? Again, because the fruit told you. Isaiah 26 3 says that he keeps him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on the Lord. If you're not in peace and you're having all these other symptoms.

Something's off and you want to get to the source of it, your flesh is going to push for control,

and so you're going to have to learn to renew your mind. Leave the old nature and feed the new nature. The spirit will lead you towards surrender and trust.

I am an example from my own life. 

[00:19:00] I had just launched my podcast. It was about a month ago, and the mere act of going live literally stirred up all kinds of fleshly activity. I was slipping in anxiety and fear. I was worrying about the future, and I'm thinking I have got to hurry up and produce more episodes because.

I need a plenty of them in the hopper so that I can spend more time creating social media content to make sure I'm marketing everything. And then, oh, I need to keep active in my Facebook community. And, oh man, I've gotta get more B roll and pictures taken and like literally the checklist just formed and launched me into striving.

There was so much stress that my immune system was completely shot, and I totally came down with a really bad respiratory infection. And then of course, I couldn't be fully present with friends and family. I ended up missing work 

And looking back, I

 [00:20:00] recognized the fact that the flesh had taken over and I had stepped out of alignment with his strength. And that's the journey I give you permission to learn this journey now instead of beating myself up for even entering into that state and feeding the flesh. I can now be kind to myself, acknowledge where the fruit came from, be more aware of the fruit in the future, and shift more quickly out of feeding the flesh and into feeding the spirit.

And the more that I learn, the more I'm able to renew my mind. And of course we know That leads to true transformation, right? Romans 12:2 - be transformed by the renewing of your mind. We begin to swap out the lies of perfectionism with God's truth. So in my example, I caught out my own sin of belief ' cause that's what it was.

I've had this pattern happen plenty of times before.

I hit reset and 

[00:21:00] I decided I wasn't going to walk that path again. I was trying to play his role, striving for a particular outcome, instead of just doing the very next thing that's in front of me just for that day. And I was doing it out of unbelief that he really has the outcome already established.

So long as I just obey the next step.

I sow, he gives the increase and he'll guide me. He'll say, this is the way walking it.

Just like he'll do for you.

It's that process of learning to rely on his spirit.

Paul says it in Galatians 5:16, walk in the spirit and you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh.

And remember, we've been feeding the flesh pretty much our whole lives

and while overcoming does take work. Remember, he says his yoke is easy and his burden is light, and that is truly the case when we actually surrender and stay connected to him as our source. 

So maybe one of the things you can 

[00:22:00] do is start your day with a prayer where your head and your heart posture are in a place that says, Lord, I can't do this without you. Lead me today.

And then maybe you could. Take some opposite actions from where you know your flesh tries to control. In my example, I decided to resist the temptation to do all the marketing stuff that was completely feared driving my need to produce the outcome. And instead, I put my energy toward creating episodes that are filled with heartfelt content And then if I had time left over, I could create some social media content,

but coming from a place where I wasn't doing it out of fear.

one of the stories he brought to me recently was the story of the five loaves and two fishes and how Jesus. Fed 5,000 with just five loaves and two fishes. He basically wants you to bring what you have and he will multiply your efforts.

00:23:00] We perfectionists are so focused on the results because we have believed for so long that those achievements define our value, and yet. The destination has really never been one that's reachable or based on healthy standards.

It's hard to let go of control,

but I promise you that when you do, he's your safety net. And that's the moment where. We give him full permission

to really transform us and shape us into the person we were destined to be. So sis, if you're feeling stuck in the exhausting cycle of striving,

I just want you to know this, you don't have to carry the weight alone. God is inviting you to rest in his strength. He knows that we have two natures. He knows our flesh. He knows us better than we know us. He knows we're made of dust, and he wants to teach us to lean on his spirit. He wants to help you through it.

He wants to be with you on the journey, and he wants you to trust that he's [00:24:00] working even when you can't see it and your role. Is to be faithful in the small steps of obedience, bringing what you have coming just as you are, and trusting him to do the rest. So I want you to take a deep breath.

Let go of trying to fix yourself and fix your eyes on Jesus. Learn to rely on his spirit and walk forward with confidence that grace covers you every step of the way. God's way is never about performance. It's never about self-reliance. It calls us into a new life, one that's led by his spirit and then fueled by his grace, and it's rooted in relationship, not in rules

Thanks for listening to today's episode of the Redeem Perfectionist podcast. If this teaching spoke to you, make sure you subscribe Stay tuned for upcoming episodes. You're going to 

[00:25:00] hear a lot more interviews with other people whose stories will be so inspirational. 

if you want to connect in real time with sisters on the same journey, join our free Facebook group called The Redeemed Perfectionist.

It's one of my favorite places to engage with my listeners, we would love to have you

collectively. We can really strengthen one another, and of course strengthen his kingdom in the process. keep resting in his grace. Keep walking in freedom and know that I'm cheering you on sis.