HIS RESURRECTION: A CALL TO WALK IN NEWNESS OF LIFE
Study Text: Ephesians 4:17-24, 2 Corinthians 5: 17
Introduction:
- When we were saved, we became spiritually identified with Christ in His death, His burial and His resurrection. It was then that we died to our old life of sin, and we were spiritually resurrected to the new life we now have in Christ.
- This must cause us now to walk in newness of life, to actually live out in our daily living, the results of our salvation from sin.
- Walking in the newness of life in this generation and end-time is possible and a reality because Jesus Christ made adequate provision for us to live in that realm.
- Jesus Christ did not only redeem us from our sins but also gave us access to the reality of living a new life round the clock. Because we have been given this advantage, and made the partaker of redemptive gifts from God, we are to walk in a manner that is different from the world around us.
- Holiness is the pathway to walking and living in the newness of life .God is committed to beautifying the church with honour and glory, but it is demanded that the church first clean itself from every sin that easily besets it. Hebrews 12: 1-2.
- God is also willing to visit the church with the Spirit of holiness, which enables everyone to walk and live in the newness of life. Righteousness brings honour but sin brings shame and reproach.
- Dearly beloved, we are also being transformed by the same resurrection power that raised Jesus from the dead. But this transformation does not come passively. We are actively involved in the whole process of change.
- We are responsible to live out all that the resurrection of Christ has accomplished for us. Only then do we experience the power of the resurrection working in us and changing us from within. We are going to consider how we should live our lives, in view of the fact that Jesus Christ is resurrected from the grave.
- We are called to walk in newness of life. Paul issues some very specific challenges for all those who are saved. These challenges teach us how we are to walk, and how we are to be different from those who have not been saved.
- We shall discuss the topic under three sub-headings:
1. The Distinction of the Saints
2. The Direction for the Saints
3. The Decision of the Saints
1. The Distinction of the Saints
- Our life after salvation should be new, different and superior in quality to our former life. It should be free from all the sinful and corrupt habits of the former life.
- It lives for heavenly things and not for earthly things any more. This is what we mean by the Resurrected life. We who have been saved, are no longer like we were. We are “new creatures” in Jesus Christ, 2 Cor. 5:17.
- As a result of the “new birth,” we are not what we used to be. And we can no longer live like we used to live. We have been changed. Thus, we are different from the world around us.
- Paul’s challenge here is to mark the differences between the children of God and the children of the devil. We are to mark those distinctions between the saved and the lost, and we are to be different. These includes:
i. The lost live empty lives because their minds are corrupted by the inborn sin that dwells within them. Thus, every thought is corrupted by evil.
ii. The lost mind invents ways to serve the flesh, or the selfish desires of the mind. The lost mind invents false gods, false religions, and foolish philosophies that are designed to showcase man’s brilliance. Yet, the inventions of the lost mind are empty of anything helpful, and they ultimately damning to the soul of man. Proverb. 16:25.
iii. Because of the stubbornness of their hearts, they are separated from the life that could be theirs in Jesus Christ, and they remain trapped in the darkness and depravity of their condition. Whether we like it or not, the lost are “dead in trespasses and sins,” Eph. 2:1.
iv. The lost sinner commits his life to evil, and as he does, he loses his sensitivity toward sin. This leads them to ever deepening levels of wickedness. They yield their lives to “lasciviousness.” It is a life given over to open sin.
v. The lost all around us work themselves to death in the pursuit of their pleasure; never realizing that their wickedness, and corruption is doing nothing but increasing their guilt in the eyes of a holy God.
- They do it for their own benefit, never stopping to consider the truth that their endless of pursuit of wickedness will end with them in Hell for all eternity. That is how the lost live; and the saints of God are to be different.
- Dearly beloved, is your life different now from what it was before you were saved? Do you still love the things that you loved before? If you are walking in newness of life, your values in life will be different.
- You will be more concerned with the things of God than the things of the world, and with things that are eternal, rather than with things that are temporal, and with things that are above, rather than with things that are on the earth.
2. The Direction for the Saints
- While we are to avoid being like the lost, we are to strive to be like the Lord. Having told us what we should not be, Paul now teaches us what we should be.
i. The lost are motivated by theirs lusts; we are to be motivated by the Lord.
- When He saved us, He changed us. He made us like Himself, and delivered us from being like the world. Fulfilling the sins of the flesh is no longer our creed and standard of living; Jesus is!
- He is our example. We are not to allow the flesh and its base, wicked desire to control us any longer, but we are to take Jesus for our example and we area to walk in holiness and in the newness of life.
- When a person claims to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, and still lives like the world, they are either deceiving themselves, or they are a liar. James 4:4
- The born-again believer strives to be like Jesus, discerning the way He walked from what the Bible teaches and by how the Spirit of God leads within. This produces a life that is vastly different from the life lived in sin.
- This results in a life that is pleasing to the Father, and one that emulates Jesus Christ in the world. Philippians 2:5
ii. The redeemed are no longer ignorant and trapped in the death and delusion of their sins.
- The redeemed have heard His voice. They have been taught His truth. They have been brought out of death into life. They have been placed on a different path. They have been taught, and as a result, they have been changed by the power of God.
- When Christ came to us, He brought with Him knowledge and truth. We are no longer in the dark, but we now walk in the light! Jesus has taught us truth and His truth has made us free, John 8:32.
- So, we are to be different from the lost world around us and to follow the right direction, which is following the examples and the teachings of Christ.
3. The Decision of the Saints
- Since have been changed by the power of God, and since we have been taught the truth about God and Christ, we are to make some active changes in our own lives.
- We are reminded of what He did so that we can ensure that each of these things is an active reality in our lives day by day.
i. We must put-off the old man
- The old man of sin remains alive and well within each of us, Gal. 5:16-18; Rom. 7:14-25. He is “deceitful” and filled with “lust,” and he is growing ever more “corrupt.” If we are not careful, he will enslave us in old habits and ways of living that the Lord delivered us from when He saved us.
- We must take decision each day and “reckon” the old man dead to sin, but ourselves alive to God, through our union with Jesus Christ, Romans 6:11.
ii. We must renew our minds
- The lost sinner has a mind that is given over to vanity, or futility. The sinner’s mind gives itself over to things that are empty of value and result in judgment and Hell. The saint of God, on the other hand, is to walk with a “renewed mind.” Romans 12:2
- When the Lord saved us, our dead minds that were given over to vanity were made alive, and we were enabled to think differently. We are to walk each day having our minds renewed by the Word of God and by the Spirit of God.
- The fact that God literally changed our minds when He saved us gives us the ability to live different lives from the world around us. The Christian life begins in the mind! When the thinking is changed, the life is changed.
- When our minds are set on things above and not on the things of this world, our lives will follow the direction of the mind. If we can ever get our minds right, our lives will be right. It is our thinking that either sets us on the right path, or puts us on the path to trouble. Philippians 4:8.
iii. We must put on the new man
- Just as we are to “strip off” the old man of sin, we are to “put on” the new man who is “created in righteousness and true holiness.” This new, holy man was born in us when we were saved.
- When he was created, we were given the ability to live lives that are pleasing to the Lord. When He saved us, He made us a “new creature”. This “new creature” loves the Lord, and he loves the things of God. He desires to serve the Lord, and he has been empowered to walk in the will of the Lord for the glory of God. Our responsibility is to put on this man.
- When Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden, he marred the image of God in which he had been created. He passed his sin and his warped nature down to all his offspring. When we were saved, we were recreated in the likeness of God Himself. Praise God, we are made “partakers of the divine nature,” 2 Peter. 1:4.
- We are not yet perfect, but we have been changed. We have been given all that we need to live lives of “righteousness and true holiness” before the Lord. Thus, we must actively yield ourselves to the Spirit of the Lord within us and allow Him to walk in us day by day, Galatians. 2:20.
Conclusion:
- How are you doing in this business of walking in the newness of life? Can you honestly say that you are living a life that is different from the world around you? Can you honestly say that your life displays Jesus Christ to the world?
- We now have the full, complete understanding of what it means to walk in newness of life. This is the life we must all endeavour to live, since we have become identified with Jesus Christ in His death, in His burial and in His Resurrection.
- We can come to God to give us fresh grace and help us to live the kind of lives He saved us to live.
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