We’ve talked before about becoming a new creation when we make a profession of faith. But how do we do that? This change is brought about by our learning about God. This devotion explores putting off our former self, renewing the spirit of our minds, and putting on a new self.
Nuggets
- When we search for Christ, we learn about Him.
- Knowing Jesus has to change us.
- We search for and seek Him in the same way.
- Putting on the new self is a lifetime process.
Devotions in the What I Believe series
Devotions in the Religious Education category
Learning to be a New Creation
Yeah! My new computer got here today. Okay, it is still in the box right now, but it is here. Pretty soon, I am going to have a computer that is not trying to audition as a disco ball in a 70s movie.
Plus, I got an email from tech support. Hopefully, tomorrow’s devotion will be back to normal. I am really missing giving you the buttons so you can drill back to resources and previous posts.
(NOTE: I was able to update this post once my issues were fixed.)
What Have We Been Talking About?
What is the purpose of education? The Holman Bible Dictionary wrote, “The primary purpose of education among the Jews was the learning of and obedience to the law of God, the Torah.”
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To me, religious education is instruction to teach us about the Plan of Salvation and the character of God, in order to build relationships so that we can imitate Him.
Worship is our personal or corporate response (confession, thanksgiving, praise, etc.) based on our attitude to God’s presence. Praise is also our response to God, but it usually involves music.P
Let's Get Started
We recently talked about being a new creation. We said that we have to believe in Jesus to become a new creation.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
We’ve look at this passage before. We talked about it as regeneration. We’ve looked at it as renewing our minds.
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But God doesn’t just flip a switch, and we are that new creation. It takes work on our part. That work is done as we learn Who God is and what He wants us to be.
Let’s take a look.
Beginning Instruction
“But that is not how you came to know Christ, assuming you heard about him and were taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus” (Eph. 4: 20-21 CSB)
When we search for Christ, we learn about Him. We have to hear His Word, read it, study it, meditate on it, and memorize it. All through that, we need to be in prayer, asking God to provide the meaning.
As we are pulling in all this new information, we have to decide if we are going to believe it. We have to determine if we believe what we read and hear is the truth.
Yes, Jesus said He is the Truth. “Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’” (Jn. 14: 6 NIV).
But what exactly is truth in the Scriptures? The Holman Bible Dictionary indicated that “The essential idea of truth in the Bible is not conformity to some external standard but faithfulness or reliability.”
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That is saying, to me, that we have to have faith that the Scriptures are true. Faith is the belief that the doctrines stated in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them.
The worldview standard is we — or someone we respect like a scientist — have to understand what is being presented. It also is based on a morality of tolerance to sin.
When we come to know Jesus, we are called to abandon our previous sinful life. We are to embrace God’s laws and commandments.
Dale reminded us that we do not do that on our own. He wrote, “The ethical change was not to be partial, but complete. But this complete moral revolution is not accomplished either by one supreme effort of our own will, or by any momentary shock of Divine power. It is a lifelong and painful process.”
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But isn’t part of the problem our expectations? We think we just have to learn the ritual and the rules, and we’ll be good to go. We don’t realize that just learning it is not enough.
Spurgeon gave us a list of the forms of knowledge we have to access. He advised we need to know the following:
- Jesus as our personal Savior.
- His nature.
- His position of authority, so we can give Him the honor due Him
- How He completed the plan of salvation for us.
- The nature of His influence over us.
- Know Him we’ll enough to imitate Him.
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We learn about Jesus. In other words, we get to know Him. We establish a relationship.
But this isn’t something we can learn on our own. We can only come to God when He sends the Holy Spirit to call us. “For no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them to me, and at the last day I will raise them up” (Jn. 6: 44 NLT). He is going to reveal Himself to us.
It is fairly easy to make a profession of faith. Well, it is easy to say the words. The next step is a kicker.
Dealing with the Old
“to take off your former way of life, the old self that is corrupted by deceitful desires” (Eph. 4: 22 CSB)
Like we said, knowledge isn’t enough. Jesus has to change us. We need to divest ourselves of what used to be.
Don’t worry. God will show us what needs to be changed.
No, God won’t bop us over the head — unless we need it. He will correct us through love. Bayne assured us that “faith works by love …”
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What are we taking off? We are divesting ourselves of our corrupt nature of sin. No, we won’t be able to totally do that. But we have to strive to follow God’s laws and commandments.
What God has said is a sin is a sin. We can’t contradict Him or negotiate. We have to submit to our Creator. We are changing our character that does not fit with God’s.
We are giving up our sinful habits. We have to mortify our sins. Mortify means to place a death penalty on our sins.
Glossary
Watkinson cautioned that this renunciation must be complete. He wrote, “The purity demanded of us is inward, spiritual, moral.” We can’t hold on to our pet sin.
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Sounds like a difficult task, doesn’t it? Dale gave us a couple of hints on how to do that.
- Self-evaluation to look for our sins and weaknesses
- Self-discipline to correct what we find wrong
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Oh, yes. Every part of us will need to go under God’s microscope to make sure all sin has been cut out.
And oh, yeah. We will probably be our own worst enemy.
Don’t worry. That is a lifetime, progressive process called sanctification. Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul beginning with regeneration and ending with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
Glossary
Switch!
“to be renewed in the spirit of your minds” (Eph. 4: 23 CSB)
This is where the actual change takes places.
How do we facilitate that change? We have to:
- Hear His Word: “So faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ” (Rom. 10: 17 NLT).
- Read His Word: “Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near (Rev. 1: 3 ESV).
- Pray to Him: “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4: 16 ESV).
- Study His Word: “They searched the Scriptures day after day to see if Paul and Silas were teaching the truth” (Ac. 17: 11 NLT).
- Meditate on His Word: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. (Ps. 1: 1-2).
- Memorize His Word: “I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Ps. 119: 11 NLT).
Yes, we said earlier that this is how we search for God. We search for and seek Him in the same way. We do these activities to establish and grow our relationships with Him.
Eadie pointed out something I hadn’t caught before. Where does verse 23 say we are to be renewed? “… in the spirit of your minds” (Eph. 4: 23 CSB). How is “in the spirit of your minds” different from “in our minds”?
When Eadie explained it, it was understandable. He wrote, “The organism of the mind survives as it was, but the spirit which inhabits and governs it is entirely changed.” That makes sense. What we do with our minds is changed.
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Welcoming the New
“and to put on the new self, the one created according to God’s likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth” (Eph. 4: 24 CSB)
Putting on the new self is a lifetime process. We don’t get the new self immediately. We only get it at the end of the sanctification road.
What we get is continual instruction from Jesus. Maclaren wrote, “His teaching is not one act, but a long, patient discipline.”
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Watkinson discussed some obstacles disciples run into sometimes. There are times we are disappointed with our lives. He also stated that disciples can possess poverty of character. Our old character must be replaced with character representing God.
We talked about poverty of spirit in How Are Disciples Docile?. We said it is really about knowing we are nothing without God. Poverty of character would be something similar. We don’t possess God’s character.
When we are putting on a new self, we should choose things that imitate God. Watkinson wrote, “We are to aspire to a Divine moral likeness, to be ‘perfect, even as our Father who is in heaven is perfect.’”
Resource
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
What new things are we supposed to welcome?
- New thoughts
- New habits
- New motivations
- New character
- New preferences
- New opinions
- New likes
Making the Connections
Oh, yeah. Making the profession of faith is easy. Sanctification is a long, difficult, painful process.
But it is worth it. Allen wrote, “Those who learn Christ properly, to the salvation of their souls, learn the WORTH of Christ.”
Making the Connections to Self-Discipline
We’ve been looking at defending our beliefs when we are witnessing. That means we have to be secure enough to convince someone to accept our beliefs.
Our questions should still serve us to determine on what we need to focus.
- What does the Scriptures say?
- What do I believe?
- Why do I believe the same/differently than the Scriptures?
- What are the talking points when witnessing to a non-believer?
Related Links
I have created a worksheet of the questions above. Click on the button below to access it.
How Do We Apply This?
- We have to learn from the Holy Spirit, not the world.
- We’ve got to change to imitate Him.
- Wilmot-Buxton wrote that we have to conquer ourselves.
The whole purpose of our learning is so that we progress on the sanctification road and become more like Jesus. We have to follow the promptings of the Holy Spirit as He teaches us about Jesus. Then, we will get our well-done-good-and-faithful-servant (Mt. 25: 21) at the appropriate times.
Father. We can’t wait until the day we see You face to face. Help us in our walks so that we remain firmly on the sanctification road. We look forward to hearing You say, “Well done.” Amen.
What do you think?
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