Tag Archives: put off

PUT ON THE NEW SELF

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PUT ON THE NEW SELF

That, however, is not the way of life you learned when you heard about Christ and were taught in Him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness (Eph. 4:20-24).

Paul used the word ‘taught’ twice and ‘learned’ once in these few verses. This indicates the important place that learning and teaching play in a believer’s life. Unfortunately, many new Christians are expected to make their own way in their new lives, leaving them open to false ideas and vulnerable to ‘every wind of teaching’ that blows from every possible source today. Their minds are filled with a hotchpotch of confused ideas which gives them no direction fro living godly lives.

Every believer should be taught, not only the truths about the life and death of Jesus and the salvation He freely offers those who receive Him, but also the practical application of their faith in Him. Paul referred to their need to put off their old selves. What did he mean?

Were his readers aware of the reason for their sinful lives before they came to Christ? Did they know that they had inherited the nature of Adam? How important that they are taught God’s truth from the beginning. Our world has been filled with the pernicious teaching that man is just a product of evolution. According to scientific theory, there is no such thing as creation and no such person as the Creator. Humans are nothing more than superior apes! In some mysterious and unproven way, we appeared on the earth after millions of years of ‘natural selection’.

For the many thinking people, this theory leaves us with more unanswered questions than answers. Through their blindness and stubborn unbelief, scientists have spawned a universal lie which nullifies human responsibility towards their Creator. However, no matter how big or convincing the lie, or how many people have fallen for it, lies do not cancel the truth. Sin came into the world through the disobedience of one man and brought the entire human race into condemnation and subject to death.

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned —
13 To be sure, sin was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not charged against anyone’s account where there is no law. 14 Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who is a pattern of the one to come. Romans 5:12-14

Paul’s readers needed to know that sin corrupted their old nature and made it impossible for them to have any connection with their Creator.  Jesus, the Son of God, whom the Father sent in human form to live a perfect life and to die as a substitute for sinful man, is God’s remedy for sin. Those who believe in Him and receive Him as Lord are released from the power of sin. He gives them a new nature and a new life, powered by His Holy Spirit to live in submission and obedience to Him.

Every child of God has the potential to be like his Master and to live new lives of righteousness and holiness. What does that mean? Although it is impossible for humans always to do the right thing, Jesus has given us the gift of His righteousness – His perfect obedience to the Father – which covers our sinfulness. We have a new standing before God. We are free to approach Him with confidence because He sees only the perfection of Jesus covering us. We are freed from the power of sin to act in our everyday circumstances as Jesus would act. The Holy Spirit in us is the same Spirit that enabled Him to live a life of perfect obedience to God.

It was Paul’s task, and the task of every spiritual leader to teach, the believers how to live out the righteousness which Jesus had imparted to them. Just as one would undress at the end of the day and toss aside the soiled clothing, so Paul instructed his readers to take off their old sinful selves. The blood of Jesus had dealt with their past. Forgiven and cleansed, they were free to don new garments – the garments of righteousness and holiness.

In practical terms, this meant that every time they had to make a choice between doing the wrong thing and doing the right thing, they were free to choose to do right because they were ‘wearing’ their new selves, recreated in the image of their Creator.

Let’s simplify this idea even more. Selfishness and greed are the characteristics of the old nature. Before we came to Christ, we based every decision and choice on these two dominating influences. When Christ came into our lives, He gave us His new self, with the qualities of mercy and generosity which are the hallmark of God’s nature. We are to put on these qualities, that chooses to act in mercy and generosity in every situation just as deliberately as we would put on clean clothes in the morning.

Living this way rather than gratifying the desires and demands of our sinful nature is a process of learning. Every decision and choice we make to do the right thing will strengthen our new nature and weaken our old nature. We will grow up into maturity in Christ as surely as a child grows to mature adulthood.

Do not lie to each other since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator (Col. 3:9-10).

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

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A Sign Of Ownership

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A SIGN OF OWNERSHIP

In Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self – ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through your faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. (Col. 2:11-12).

What was the purpose of circumcision in God’s covenant with Abraham?

Then God said to Abraham, ‘This is my covenant with you and with your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you. For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised . . . My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant. (Gen. 17: 9-11a; 13b).

Circumcision was a sign of ownership. It set God’s people apart from every other male in every other nation. No doubt, when Joseph finally revealed himself to his brothers, how would he have convinced them that he was indeed Joseph? By his mark of ownership as a Hebrew!

The Jews were God’s people by right of birth and ownership. Every Jewish parent would ensure that their sons carry their mark of ownership in their flesh. This was to be symbolic of a greater spiritual reality which would be revealed through Christ. Believers carry a mark of ownership, not in the flesh, but in the spirit, which sets us apart as belonging to God.

Paul spoke of a principle which applies in many areas of our lives – revealed in 1 Cor. 15: 46: The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. It applies here as well. Circumcision was to be a physical (or natural) sign which would be followed by the spiritual when the truth was revealed in Christ.

Many streams in the church have seen baptism as the counterpart of circumcision and have developed the doctrine of paedo-baptism as the sign of God’s covenant. Just as  boys were circumcised eight days after birth to show that they were included in the Abrahamic covenant, so infants are ‘baptised’ to include them in the New Covenant.

However, this idea conflicts with the teaching of Scripture, clearly indicated here, as in many other places (through your faith in the working of God), that it is faith in Christ, of which infants are incapable, that brings people into the New Covenant, not infant baptism.

What is the sign of the New Covenant, the sign of ownership? Paul was in no way teaching that baptism is the sign of the New Covenant which would contradict the principle of ‘first the natural, then the spiritual’.

And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in Him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession – to the praise of His glory (Eph. 1: 13-14).

Paul could not have stated this truth more clearly. God marked us with His seal of ownership, the Holy Spirit who is in us, when we confessed that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that God raised Him from the dead (Rom. 10: 9-10).

What, then, is the purpose of baptism? Baptism was both initiation into and identification with a person, an office or a teaching to indicate publicly that the one being baptised had a new status. Baptism – or ritual washing was a common practice in Jesus’s day. John the Baptist initiated people who identified with him into his teaching about the Messiah, calling them to repent and identify with the One he was introducing to them. Baptism is, therefore the public, visible witness to our identity with Christ in His death, burial and resurrection.

Through baptism we are telling the world that we have died to ourselves and have a new owner, the Lord Jesus Christ, whose Spirit in us sets us apart as God’s possession. We have left the old life of sin and the flesh and are now living in union with Jesus and in submission and obedience to Him.

As the covenant people of God, set apart to Him and marked by circumcision, the Jews were to live in obedience to His commands, which they did not because they were without the Holy Spirit. We who have the Spirit are able to put to death the deeds of the flesh through His power and live a new life In Christ because of what Jesus Christ has done for us.

We must become who we are.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.