Senior
Pastor, Sovereign Grace Church of Indiana, PA
One of the incredible results of Jesus’
resurrection is that God makes believers into completely brand new creations.
The Bible says we are completely new creations – we aren’t
simply reformed or refurbished. We’re brand new.
We aren’t just the same old people who have now made
resolutions to change or improve. It’s not like Jesus bought an old piece of
beat up dirty furniture in a junkyard, washed it off, and is now beginning to
sand it and polish it up.
No. That decrepit rotten piece of junk is gone. It no longer
exists. Now there is a brand spanking new, beautiful creation in its place. God
tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17:
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The
old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
When God saves us, he not only washes all our sins away, but
he joins us to Christ. He makes us one with Christ. When God looks at us he
sees Christ. When he looks at Christ, he sees us in him.
We aren’t just refurbished old
creations – we are completely NEW.
We are nothing like we were before. We are NEW creations in
Christ. We have to remember this – the old has passed away. It’s gone. The new
has come.
But we don’t always feel like new creations. When I first
prayed to receive Christ, I expected fireworks or goosebumps, but didn’t feel
any different. I still felt like the old me. I still felt tempted to sin. I
didn’t realize that for right now, while we are still in these earthly bodies,
we can still be tempted to sin. We will still have desires and cravings from
what remains of our sin nature in our bodies.
But we ARE new. Whether we feel like it
or not.
We must believe God’s word. Early in my Christian life, I
felt like it would be impossible for me not to sin. Then I heard someone teach
that believers are no longer slaves of sin. As it says in Romans 6:12-14:
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you
obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for
unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought
from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.
For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under
grace.
Did you catch that? Sin will have NO
DOMINION OVER YOU!
And why not? Because we are no longer under law but under a
whole new system – we are under grace. We are new creations, no longer enslaved
to sin, no longer under its dominion. We don’t have to sin. We don’t have to
obey it’s urges, no matter how strong they feel.
God isn’t simply refurbishing the old us. He has created us
anew and is shaping us more and more into the likeness of his Son:
And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the
Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to
another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. 2 CO 3:18
We are new creations, and God is taking us from one degree
of Christ’s glory to another. We are one with Christ, and God makes us more and
more like him every day.
This is incredible! Even the highest
seraphim in heaven can’t claim to be new creations.
The angels around the throne aren’t being transformed into
the likeness of Christ. The most glorious angels have not been adopted by God
as sons and daughters. They can’t call God “Father” like we can. And they are
not one with Christ the way we are.
When God gave Isaiah a glimpse of his glory, he saw the
seraphim:
Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two
he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. IS
6:2
These glorious heavenly beings who had never sinned had to
cover their faces – they could not look upon the infinite glory of God.
Yet look what God says we will
experience:
Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not
yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we
shall see him as he is. 1 JN
3:2
We are now God’s children, and someday, we shall be like
Jesus – clothed in his glory, and we shall see him as he is!
We shall gaze directly upon the face of
Jesus Christ in all his infinite radiant glory.
And we will never grow tired of taking in his beauty,
because his beauty is infinite. For all eternity he will show us new, amazing,
astounding, breathtaking, mind-blowing, vistas of his glory and majesty.
Why? Because Jesus died for us, then rose from the dead to
make us who believe in him into new creations.
Someday we all will die unless Jesus comes back first. But because
Jesus rose from the dead, believers will rise from the dead. We will have new
glorious heavenly bodies. We will be like Jesus and see him as he is. In the
meantime, though we live in this dying world, WE are right now, new creations.
We have imperishable, everlasting life. The old is gone, the new has come.
Jesus isn’t just sanding and polishing up the old you. You are a brand new you.
Mark Altrogge has
been senior pastor of Saving Grace Church of Indiana, Pennsylvania, since 1982.
He has written hundreds of songs for worship, including “I Stand in Awe” and
“I’m Forever Grateful.” Mark and his wife, Kristi, have five children and five
grandchildren.
Photo Courtesy: Thinkstock
Source: https://www.biblestudytools.com/blogs/mark-altrogge/
