I Am A New Creation

What happens when we ask Jesus to be our personal Saviour and to forgive all our sins? We start a new life. We’re born again. We’re new creations. I’ve always loved this song by Dave Bilbrough:

‘I am a new creation, no more in condemnation, here in the grace of God I stand.
My heart is over-flowing, my love just keeps on growing, here in the grace of God I stand.
And I will praise You, Lord, yes I will praise You, Lord, and I will sing of all that You have done.
A joy that knows no limit, a lightness in my spirit – here in the grace of God I stand’.

But God doesn’t want us to stay at that new born baby stage. He wants us to grow up in His Kingdom. ‘If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory’ (Colossians 3:1-4).

We start in the ‘kindergarten’ as we begin to learn about God’s revealed Word, the Bible.
Some of us were not brought up in a home where there was much encouragement to have faith in the Bible as the word of God. There may even have been false worship of other gods, as in the days when Paul was evangelising in Greece and Turkey. There may have been influences in our families which need to be renounced for the sake of Jesus; ‘knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot’ (1 Peter 1:18-19).

But all of us, regardless of what kind of home we come from, need to be consciously seeking to grow in spiritual ways, as we trust in our heavenly Father to change us by the power of the Holy Spirit. I believe we shouldn’t have a passive attitude as we wait for God to change us into His image.

Paul wrote to new believers urging them to put to death sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness. He told them to stop speaking with anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk. And he told them not to lie to one another. The reason they were to put these things to death was because they had ‘put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator’ (Colossians 3:10).

Prayer: Dear heavenly Father, thank You that I am a new creation and I’ve taken off the old self and put on the new one which is being renewed in knowledge after Your image. Help me to actively seek after this knowledge of You as I follow Jesus and open myself to Your Holy Spirit moving in my life. Amen.