New Life in Christ

by Elizabeth Duff

            As each of us began our physical life on earth, we were in a bad way, spiritually speaking. In fact, we had no spiritual life. All of us were born dead in sin, separated from our God. There is nothing we could do to make ourselves alive. But God, by his grace, called us to be his own, making us alive with Christ. God used his gospel message – Christ crucified for the sins of the world and raised to life for our justification – to bring us to faith, whether that be through hearing his word or through baptism. We are no longer on the road to eternal death in hell, but now have God’s promise of eternal life in heaven. This full realization of our spiritual life – being able to see God face to face and that he will make his dwelling with us – is what we eagerly anticipate this side of heaven.

            This new life that God has given us compels us to live out our earthly lives in a new way. No longer are we slaves to sin. This new self in us takes delight in God’s holy law and wills us to carry it out. Our lives have becomes lives of thanks – Christ’s love overflows from our hearts into what we think, say, and do.

However, that is not the end of the story. If it were so, we would simply be doing good works all the time. Any Christian can tell you that the truth is this: we continue to struggle against the sinful nature within us. This part of us continuously rebels against God’s commands – it hates his holy law. Our two natures, the new self and the old self, continue to fight one another.  If it were simply up to us, we would fail time and time again. Even as new creations, we still are weak to fight the temptations that our sinful flesh, the world, and the devil throw our way.

So where do we turn for help? We turn to our Savior. We see what he has done for us on the cross. We see how his blood has covered every single one of our sins – including those times our new self has failed and we have given into our sinful flesh. We see Christ’s work for us and take heart. We are not alone in this fight. Our God and Brother is at our side. He has conquered sin, death, and the devil for us. He now sits at the Father’s right hand, guiding all things for the sake of his church (which includes us).  He continues to intercede for us, perfecting our imperfect prayers. We also see our Father, in turn, graciously blessing us with all good things. He willingly has given up his Son, so how will he not graciously give us all things? He also sends out the Holy Spirit, who dwells within us. This same Holy Spirit makes intercession for us, expressing thoughts that human language cannot contain. He equips us with the great gospel message. Our armor is God’s very Word – in preaching, in baptism, and in communion. When we fail in this life, our God picks us up in his loving arms. We already are his new creation. We continue to trust that he will help us fight off temptation in this life and bring us into the next life. We may fail in our lives of sanctification, but God and his promises never fail. We receive our energy and strength from these great promises – promises of forgiveness, life, and salvation. Our life of sanctification isn’t so much seeing ourselves become better, but learning to fully lean on the cross of Christ.