Monday, October 15, 2007

What is your nature??

I'd like to take a minute to hopefully dispel the myth that as Christians we need to talk about and focus on our sin, try and dredge it out, bring it up in every conversation we have, add it to every message every Sunday and be accountable to each other reporting our sin issues on a regular basis, or pointing out sin to each other as part of conversations and talking about how we can overcome them!! Why do we need to talk about our sin so much!!! (Okay, Okay, I know all Christians do not do this, but this is where I am coming from, it's a general overview of what went on.)

First of all, as Christians we have died to the sinful nature, the old man, it was crucified with Christ! In other words it's GONE! We no longer have a sinful nature, it was put to death with Jesus on the cross!
"I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me" ~Galtians 2:20

"Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a NEW creation; old things have passed away(died); behold, all thingshave become new~2 Corinthians 5:17

"How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?.....Our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be DONE AWAY with, that we should no longer be SLAVES OF SIN. For he who has died hes been FREED FROM SIN. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him." ~Romans 6:2-3, 6-8

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones says:
"This is, to me, oneof the most comforting and assuring and glorious aspects of our faith. We are never called to crucify our old man. Why? Because it has already happened-the old man was crucified with Christ on the cross. Nowhere does the Scripture call upon you to crucify your old man; nowhere does the Scripture tell you to get rid of your old man, for the obvious reason that he has already gone. Not to realize this is to allow the devil to fool you and delude you. What you and I are called upon to do is to cease to live as if we were still in Adam. Understand that the "old man" is not there. The only way to stop living as if he were still there is to realize that he is not there. That is the New Testament method of teaching sanctification. The whole trouble with us, says the New Testament, is that we do not realize, what we are, that we still go on thinking we are the old man, and go on trying to do things to the old man. That has been done; the old man was crucified with Christ. He is non-existent, he is no longer there. If you are a Christian, the man you were in Adam has gone out of existence; he has no reality at all; you are in Christ."

Okay, so it's pretty clear that our sinful nature is gone, we know that we are already forgiven for all our sins, past present and future, so why do we obsess over our sin......(I will get to that question in a later post). I am coming from a church that has over emphasized the doctrine of indwelling sin and applies it to the believer! Yikes! My desire is that all Christians would come to truly embrace and believe the truth of God's Word, we are dead to our old nature, we have a new nature. Why would God want to join His Holy Spirit to our old sinful nature, why would he allow our old sinful nature into heaven We do not have more than one nature, a sin nature and a New nature(Christs perfect righteous nature)- we are now "in Christ", we have his perfect righteousness, and we have become "partakers of the divine nature." (2 Peter 1:4) We have a new nature -Christ's. We are totally righteous,(Eph. 4:24) and Holy(1 Cor. 3:17).

Does all this mean we won't sin anymore, or that we feel like our sinful nature is gone? No, and I will have to get to that in my next post. My goal is to hopefully share truth that I have never understood before now. Truth that you can truly lay claim to and in so doing renew your mind, and see yourself as God sees you!! When you begin to see yourself as God sees you, you will experience freedom and joy!

(Also, check out the link in my resource list "Do Christians Still have a Sinful Nature?", by Ryan Rufus, it's a free download of the whole book!!)

3 comments:

jul said...

Great post Lydia. You might be interested to check this out:
http://earnestlydesire.blogspot.com/2007/10/question-of-week-do-christians-have.html

lydia said...

Thanks, I will definetly check it out!

Aaron said...

Ditto on what Jul said. Lydia I am so excited for you and Keith as I read your post and speak with you guys on the phone. God is truly transforming you two by the renewing of your minds. You are now standing in what Christ has accomplished for you. It brings a smile to my face as I read the truth that you are trumpeting loud and clear. I know it must bring a much bigger smile to the Father's face as He sees all that you are embracing. Keep it up! Go for it!

Aaron