The Gospel, Part 3
We have now reached the third of our four talks in our series ‘the gospel.’
Part 1: The problem
Part 2: The solution
Part 3: What changes if we accept Jesus?
Part 4: What happens if we reject Jesus?
[Slide of Adam and Eve]
In part 1 of this series on ‘the gospel’ we first looked at the problem. We went to the opening chapters of Genesis to get an initial understanding of the problem. Adam and Eve knew what God had told them and they knowingly and deliberately did the opposite. They rejected God’s authority and God ejected them from the Garden of Eden. The relationship between God and man broke down. That has been the situation ever since, and THAT is the problem.
[Slide of the cross]
In part 2 we looked at the solution. We went, among other places, to Isaiah 53, which tells us that:
All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
We also looked at a couple of verses in 1 John which use the word ‘propitiation.’
Jesus has intervened to fix our broken relationship with God. On the cross he paid our debt, and his action has turned away, or propitiated, God’s anger. But there is also something we have to do. We have to say sorry and mean it. We have to change our ways and give God the respect he is due.
Today we come on to part 3. What changes if we accept Jesus? Next week, in part 4, I’ll look at what happens if we reject Jesus.
So, what does change if we accept Jesus? I went onto the internet and typed that question in. There were lots of answers – people’s testimonies as to what changed for them when they put their faith in Jesus. [I showed these earlier in the service, with a PowerPoint with some fireworks, and someone gave a testimony about what had changed for him. I’ve also included them at the end of this talk.] I paraphrased some of them a bit. There were 26 things in that list. I’m sure that if I’d looked a bit further, I’d have found more. People testify that basically, everything changes! That’s people’s subjective testimony. But it’s also, clearly, what the Bible teaches.
The Bible teaches that when a person becomes a Christian, two main things happen. Something NEW appears, and something OLD disappears. This is what our verse for today tells us. It’s 2 Corinthians 5:17:
[Slide of text]
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”
“He is a new creation” – something new appears. “The old has passed away” – something old disappears.
[Slide: New and old. Birth and death.]
Another way the Bible describes the change is that there’s a birth and there’s a death. These ideas come up frequently in the New Testament.
Jesus, Peter, John and Paul all used the idea of BIRTH to describe what happens when a person becomes a Christian. Jesus told Nicodemus, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one IS BORN AGAIN he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John wote, “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ HAS BEEN BORN of God…” Peter wrote, “According to his great mercy, he has caused us to BE BORN AGAIN to a living hope.’ Paul discusses Abraham’s two sons, Ishmael and Isaac, and comments that “he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit.” So, Paul believed that Isaac was born of the Holy Spirit! Some people might think it was only in the New Testament that God’s people were born of the Holy Spirit, but we can see from this that it is not so. In the Old Testament too, people who put their faith in God were born of the Spirit.
We need to be born again because until we are born again, we’re spiritually dead. That is also the consistent message of the New Testament.
But what about DYING? Do we also die? Yes, a part of us dies when we become Christians. Jesus, Peter, Paul, John and James all tell us this too. Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” Jesus was using the analogy of a grain of wheat to talk about himself. HE would need to die! But what about us? Does the same apply to us? Yes, it does! Jesus continued, “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” Jesus was even clearer when he said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” “Take up his cross and follow me” means, follow me on the road to crucifixion. It doesn’t mean that we are literally going to be crucified, or it’s very unlikely anyway. But we have to put to death what the Bible calls ‘the flesh’, the sinful nature.
The point is that the New Testament uses both the picture of new birth AND the picture of death to describe what changes when a person chooses to follow Jesus.
Birth and death are really alternative ways to express the thought of our verse for today. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation…” Birth, in other words. Then, “the old has passed away…” Death, in other words.
So, for the person who decides to follow Jesus, there’s a birth and a death. Radical changes!
I’m going to try to explain what birth and death are like for a person who becomes a Christian.
I’ll start with birth. We might ask: how does the birth come about? When does it happen?
[Slide, Peter preaching at Pentecost.]
Let’s go back to the Day of Pentecost. Peter preaches to a large crowd and concludes by saying “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, AND YOU WILL RECEIVE THE GIFT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.”
Peter called on people to respond to Jesus in faith. He told the crowd, “Repent and be baptized … in the name of Jesus Christ.” Baptism was the way they were to indicate faith. Then he continued, “and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”
God gives the Holy Spirit when a person clearly demonstrates that they are turning to God. Some people may not be conscious of the point when they put their trust in Jesus. A woman will not feel the moment a new life comes into existence in her womb. But the child comes into existence at a definite time, and before long, it makes itself felt!
Maybe you have another question. Paul said that we are a new creation. What do we mean by ‘new’? Does it mean that EVERYTHING is different? When we become a Christian, does it mean that a completely different person emerges within us?
The answer is slightly complicated. It’s a bit of both. The things that belong to the old, sinful nature have to go. But things that are part of our character, but are not sinful, remain.
[Slide: néos and kainós]
I’m useless at Greek but I sometimes go to a website called ‘Bible Hub’ for some help. The New Testament uses two words for ‘new’: néos and kainós. Bible Hub says that néos means ‘new on the scene’ or ‘what was not there before.’ Our daughter Sophie recently bought her first car. It’s now sitting on our drive. It wasn’t there before. It’s néos new. On the other hand, kainós means ‘new in nature’. I’ve heard people say that kainós is more like ‘renewed’ in meaning.
In the verse we’re focusing on, Paul wrote, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a NEW creation. The old has passed away; behold, the NEW has come.” THE WORD THAT’S TRANSLATED ‘NEW’ IS KAINÓS IN BOTH CASES. So, the emphasis is more on the person being new in nature, or RENEWED, rather than being a completely new and different person, like in some sort of rather unpleasant sci-fi movie!
[Slide, neglected garden]
Let me try an illustration. A couple reach retirement and buy a small cottage in the country. The garden has been neglected for many years. But the couple are keen gardeners and get to work. They keep what they can. There are some nice roses, for example. They get rid of what shouldn’t be there: the rubbish, the nettles, the weeds. A year later their children and grandchildren come to visit. ‘Wow!’ they say. ‘What a transformation! It feels like a completely new garden!’ It would probably be more accurate to say that it had been renewed. There always was a garden there.
When Jesus comes into our lives, in some cases he finds the garden is quite neglected. In other cases, it may not be in too bad shape. But he’s the new owner. He will work to restore it to what it was meant to be, and we need to cooperate in that process.
I’ve talked a bit about birth. Let me now talk a bit about death.
In 1967, psychiatrists Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe created a scale to rate life events according to how stressful they are. Other scales have been proposed since then. There are 43 things on Holmes and Rahe’s scale. Top of the list is death of spouse. Two is divorce. Three is marital separation. Four is a jail term. Five is death of a close family member. Six is personal injury or illness. If you think about those for a moment, the top-six sources of stress all involve THE LOSS of something. Death, divorce and marital separation all mean the loss of someone who was close to you. A jail term means loss of liberty. Illness means loss of capacity. It isn’t until number seven that we find a positive change – marriage. And birth of a baby doesn’t come until number 14.
I think that probably reflects most people’s experience of becoming a Christian. There is new birth. New birth is relatively easy to cope with. But there is also death – and that isn’t at all easy to cope with. We have a fight on our hands with our old sinful natures. At least, that’s what I used to think. Then I read Galatians 5:24 “And those who belong to Christ Jesus have CRUCIFIED the flesh with its passions and desires.” We can’t properly describe our task as a fight. It isn’t like a little battle over a game of chess. We have to CRUCIFY the flesh. It sounds excruciatingly painful. It requires huge determination. Most of us are loathe to do it. There are aspects of our old sinful life which we dearly want to hang onto. We have to cooperate in this too. If we accept Jesus as lord, we have to get out of the driving seat.
So, we become Christians. A new life starts. We are born of the Holy Spirit. The old sinful nature has been crucified – if we belong to Christ. It may still be hanging around, but it no longer has power over us.
These changes then bring other changes. Births and deaths result in change. It’s the same for the person who becomes a Christian. New creation and the gradual death of the old nature are changes in themselves, and they result in further changes.
Earlier in the service Luke read some testimonies by people to what changed for them when they decided to put their faith in Jesus. They developed a new mind and a new worldview. Their behaviour changed. They made new friends and became part of new families in the churches they attended. They had more desire to spend time with God, more love with others and, for the most part, better relationships with people around them. People’s overwhelming testimony is that the change that happens when a person puts his or her trust in Jesus is very, very good change. How can it not be, when the lord we invite into our lives is so good?
So, what does it mean for us? Birth and death are events. They happen at definite times. We HAVE BEEN born again. We ARE a new creation. So, we may think: “That’s it. Nothing left for us to do…”
Nothing could be further from the truth!
[Slide, parents and baby]
A baby needs to be fed, changed, loved, nurtured. If we think, “We’ve been born again. That’s it. Nothing left for us to do…” – it’s clearly absurd. Yes, we’ve been born again spiritually. But this new creation, this spiritual ‘us’, needs to be nurtured too!
Once we’ve been born again our work is just starting! Peter wrote: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope...” Peter praises God for new birth. But he doesn’t imagine for a moment that that’s the end of the matter. He moves rapidly on to instructions to believers about what they need to do.
Our verse for today started, “If anyone is IN CHRIST…” Notice this phrase ‘IN CHRIST.’ We turned to Christ in faith, but we now need to remain in him. We have to keep on going to him in prayer, keep on following him in faith.
We’ve probably all heard of the Frenchman John Calvin who was at the heart of the Protestant Reformation. I didn’t realise until I was preparing for this talk that Calvin was very much involved in the creation of one of the earliest English-language Bibles, the ‘Geneva Bible.’ Calvin spoke French, English and Dutch and was proficient in Latin. The Geneva Bible was published in 1560. It translated our verse, “If any man be in Christ, LET HIM BE a new creature.” None of the modern translations follow it, so I take it that it isn’t correct. But I really agree with the idea! Yes, we are a new creation. But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing left for us to do. The Geneva Bible says, ‘let him BE a new creature’! It’s an imperative. John Stott once said that New Testament ethics can be summed up in four words: “BE Who You Are.” It’s the same idea. We could say, “I am who I am”, but when Stott says “BE Who You Are” he reminds us not to sit around passively. We have to make it happen. So, who are we? We’re new creations! If we are new creations, we should see things differently, speak differently, think differently, live differently.
Let’s conclude. What changes if we accept Jesus? Don’t underestimate the extent of the change. We are new creations. The old has passed away. It’s as radical as birth and death – or it certainly should be. We can praise God for that! But let’s not imagine that we now have nothing further to do. Not at all! CHRIST has done his job. OUR work is now STARTING. We have to nurture our new spiritual selves and to show our old sinful natures the door.
.................
This is a list I used as an introduction to the talk earlier in the service, based on people's answers to the question, 'What changed as a result of becoming a Christian?' or similar questions. I have a PowerPoint slide of these answers set to fireworks. If you’d like it, please contact me at simon.bartlett@virtuality.co.
1. A new mind, a new worldview and a stronger and better moral compass.
2. A new best friend – Jesus!
3. New friends and indeed, a new family, in the sense of the church.
4. Although we don’t see it, we have a changed eternal destiny: eternal life rather than perishing.
5. God’s sustaining power.
6. An inexplicable joy (e.g. C.S. Lewis’s ‘Surprised by Joy’’).
7. Greater love for others.
8. Less love for the things of the world.
9. Behaviour. For example, we might swear less, gossip less, get angry less and be less judgmental. Better control over the ‘sins of the flesh.’ Positively, we might be more patient, pray more and trust God more.
10. For the most part, better relationships with people around you.
11. More desire to spend time with God.
12. Greater inner peace. We experience more peace with God and more peace with ourselves. We are released from guilt and shame and fear.
13. A desire to tell people about Jesus.
14. Opposition from people who don’t like the path we’ve chosen.
15. Conflict within as we fight the old sinful nature.
16. Blessings of various sorts for most of us.
17. New directions in life; life becomes a journey.
18. Less dependence on feelings, more dependence on God’s word.
19. Gratitude for what God has done, as John Newton found:
Amazing grace! How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found;
20. We are able to say sorry.
21. Confidence in the future. Death has lost its sting.
22. Confidence in the storms of life; a sense of security.
23. A sense that God is taking care of us, looking out for us.
24. There is more that we take pleasure in.
25. Life makes sense
26. In short, everything changes! We are born again. We are a new creation. All things are new!
Talk given at Rosebery Park Baptist Church, Bournemouth, UK, 15 November 2020
