Be True to Yourself

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ…For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight…” (Ephe 1:3-4)

“For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” (Ephe 2:10)  

In these two passages, the apostle Paul makes it clear that my identity and yours, my Christian brother/sister, is to be found in Christ Jesus. We are God’s workmanship, both before and after we are born again. Before our spiritual birth, whatever natural talents, whatever natural strengths and weaknesses we had came from God, because “…It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves….” (Psal 100:3). But the natural man was choosing to conform to the pattern of this world. We had rejected the identity our Creator had given us, and were not doing the good works God had prepared in advance for us to do. On the contrary we were fleeing from God and were misusing whatever natural talents He had given us to please ourselves and win the approval of this world. That is why Paul, writing to Christians said, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Roma 12:2).

How does this work? How can our minds be renewed? It will happen as we yield to the Spirit within as He speaks to us through His Word, teaching us how the general principles and promises we find there apply to us in our unique situation.  He teaches us to test and approve what God’s will is for us, and He empowers us to do the works He prepared in advance for us to do. We are putting on our true self, our spirit united with the Spirit of God, controlled by His love, freed from slavery to the world, the flesh and the devil. Just as being born again is by faith, so also this process of putting on our true self is carried out by faith as we offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. The life we now live in the body we live by faith in the Son of God who loved us and gave himself for us.