The Bible explains that when we put our faith in Christ we become something new; something we weren’t before.
“If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” 2Corinthians 5:17
“For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything. What counts is a new creation.” Galatians 6:15
“Put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.” Ephesians 4:24
The creation of something new inside us is not only miraculous it is a compelling insight into our Christian life.
World religions don’t offer newness to their devotees. Instead those devotees must do various things, in their own strength, in order to meet the requirements of their religion.
The truth is that people, sold under sin, cannot save themselves. So nothing they do in their natural self will work. Religions that demand various forms of service are empty and vain, since they call on a machine that doesn’t work (our human lives) to do what they can’t do.
God solves that problem by creating something new within us. The old life that is bound to sin dies and is replaced by something born by the Spirit of God. Jesus called this being ‘born again’, born firstly in human form, then born by the Spirit of God.
“Jesus answered him, Truly, truly, I tell you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John 3:3
“That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” John 3:6
When we are born again by putting our faith in Christ for salvation, our old human life with all its weakness and limitation dies. It is effectively put on the cross with Christ and crucified.
“We know that our old self was crucified with him (Christ) in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.” Romans 6:6
Sadly there are people who have embraced Christianity as a religion and have not been born again. They try to live the Christian life out of the weakness of their humanness, without a new birth within them connecting them with God and breaking their slavery to sin. If that’s you, I urge you right now to put your faith in Christ and allow the Spirit of God to bring new birth inside you, making you ‘born again’, born by the Spirit of God.
There are many lessons we could draw from the truth of our new birth but let me focus here on just the issue of ‘newness’.
When you put your faith in Christ something new and wonderful happened inside you, completely out of your control. It is miraculous. It is a new creation, by the hand of God. You were born new and fresh on the inside, by the Spirit of God.
Also your old life, with all its slavery to sin, was put to death. Suddenly you are no longer living in slavery to sin and you have whole new capacities to connect with God. You are a new creation, the old has passed away and all things have become new.
The Bible says that you have a new attitude to things, with your old heart condition removed.
“I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh” Ezekiel 11:19
That’s an amazing condition for you to have achieved, especially considering you didn’t do it by yourself, but had it all given to you.
I dare say, however, most Christians are barely aware of all this newness.
The problem for many of us is that we keep our old mindset, unaware of the newness within. We have lived so many years in our old mindset, with our old limitations and our old attitudes, that even when those things are radically changed we tend to live in the habits of action and mind that were normal for us before. We tend to migrate to the familiar places of our past.
Many Christians are initially aware of their newness, sensing a freshness and freedom within. However they don’t realise how profound their newness is and they tend to think of it as a refreshing and renovation, rather than a complete knock-down and rebuild situation.
It reminds me of a preacher’s story I heard in my youth. The story is that a man visits and old lady, offering to buy her house for quite a good sum. She accepts and the date is set for the man to arrive with the money. When he turns up she proudly announces she has fixed many of the broken things and had some painting done and other renovations, so the house won’t be such a poor place to live anymore.
The man tells her, sadly, that he will not live in the house, but is going to demolish it and build something wonderful and new.
That story is told to show those who want to make themselves good enough for God that God is not going to renovate their life, but give them a completely new one. We bring ourselves to God as we are and allow Him to work the miracle of new birth within us.
What I urge you to do right now is to recognise that new birth has taken place. Those evidences of newness are not just sideline results of your faith in Christ, but evidence of the major transformation that took place within you. Your new self, born by the Spirit of God, is free from sin, and has a new heart toward God and others. You don’t have to live in selfishness, slavery and sin. You don’t have to live by the patterns of weakness and failure that were your past. You don’t have to see yourself limited by your human frailty.
You are a child of God, born by the Spirit of God, freed from sin and shame and defeat.
You are a New Creature.
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