I believe this is the year of understanding, where God's Church will see themselves more from a relationship with Him, instead of how religion dictates. We've set up laws and regulations, like those in the old covenant, in order to be right with God and in doing this we've lost out of what Grace did on our behalf through Jesus. We've tried making ourselves to be righteous by our own efforts, instead of by faith in what Jesus has already done.
Faith has become a teaching, more than a reality to the Church. Faith isn't a teaching, but is a Truth that God requires of us, to receive what He has already done and provided in Jesus. Religion sees faith as a form of pride. If we say that we're righteous, then we're seen as being prideful, because we still see ourselves the way we were before knowing Jesus and the world sees us this way too. I know in my carnal natural self, that I am not righteous, but we're now supposed to identify with Jesus as new creations.
The moment we received Jesus as our Lord and were born-again, God sees us as His new creations and righteous with His Own Righteousness. You became a new creation in Jesus, which means that you weren't just forgiven, but the unrighteous you died with Jesus on the cross and was raised a new creation being with and in Him. We continue seeing our shortcomings and failures and see ourselves as being mere men and women. God sees us as babies being born into His family that will grow into matures sons and daughters by His Word and His Spirit.
Babies do a lot of things that are wrong in adult eyes, because they haven't grown up yet. This is expected of babies, but if the same baby continued doing these things as adults, then there's something wrong with the baby or with the person who raised the baby. Jesus said in John 10:10 (Amplified), "I came that you might have Life, and have it more abundantly." God's new creation family needs to be taught and trained how to live in this new Life.
This new Life is God's Own Life in us, but we've made it to fit our own natural life, instead of learning how to live the God Kind of Life, here in the natural realm. Paul wrote about this in Hebrews 5:13-14 (Amplified), saying, "For everyone who continues to feed on milk is obviously inexperienced and unskilled in the doctrine of righteousness, of conformity to the Divine will in purpose, thought and actions for he is a mere infant not able to talk yet! But solid food is for full-grown men, for those whose faculties are trained by practice to discriminate and distinguish between what is morally good and noble and what is evil and contrary either to Divine or human law."
Paul wasn't saying that we're not to avoid sinful things and live like we did before we knew Jesus. Paul says that we're not to become righteous, because we now are righteous. Grace doesn't mean that we live any way we wish and we'll still be righteous. Grace covers us, while we grow from babes in Christ to mature Christians. We're still required to stop drinking, drugging and acting like we did before being saved. It's not so much what we do, but why we do it, that makes us mature in Him. We don't change our carnal, sinful habits, in order to become righteous, but because we've become righteous, we train our natural bodies to conform to that righteousness.
This sounds contrary to what religion teaches us. We were born into sin, by the seed of Adam and not because of what we've done. Babies who are born addicted to drugs haven't done anything to become addicts, but were afflicted from their mother's actions. Every human being came from the seed of fallen man and his sin caused us to be separated from the Life of God. Adam's sin caused every human being to become under the Law of Sin and Death, from that time until this time.
Sin wasn't the result of something we might have done, but what we've done was the result of the sin produced through Adam. Sin was transferred with death into our spirit, when we were conceived in our mother's womb. Even after we're born-again, we think of ourselves as sinners, because we remember (with the help of our adversary) the sinful things we did before we were born-again. We don't understand what being born-again really means. It doesn't mean that our sins are forgiven. When we were born into God's new creation family, we weren't born of a sinful seed, but were born of the Incorruptible Seed or Word of God Himself. There's no stain of sin in our new creation being, it is perfect.
We look at ourselves from the outside, instead of the inside, the new spirit born of God. This is what Jesus meant when he said, "I come that they might have Life." This isn't the life of the fallen man of the flesh, with it's dead and sinful spirit. It's God's Own Life that now flows from our new creation spirit, into our flesh.
This Life isn't just for when we get to Heaven. It's Heaven's Life or God Himself being present in us here on earth. This Life won't just affect our flesh, but will cause our flesh to become an instrument of the righteousness that now flows from it. Paul writes about what God's Grace and Sacrifice has made us to be now, in Romans 8:1,2 (Amplified). We've read this scripture before, but did we see and understand what it said? God's Word is the Life Jesus came to give us. Thus, Paul writes, "Therefore, there is now no condemnation (no adjudging guilty of wrong) for those who are in Christ Jesus, who live and walk not after the dictates of the flesh, but after the dictates of the Spirit." If we allow our flesh to dictate us from the old man/woman who was born in sin, then we won't live the Life of God, to the fullness He intended, but will always live by the dictates of the flesh and only be forgiven sinners. Verse 2 says, "For the Law of the Spirit of Life which is in Christ Jesus (the Law of our new being) has freed me from the Law of Sin and of Death." This is a Spiritual Law of the Kingdom of God, into which we've been born. God is now our Father and we're born of His Seed of Righteousness. We must let our new creation spirit to dictate who we've become in Christ Jesus, instead of letting our flesh dictate to us who we once were.
Read Romans 8:3-4 (Amplified) by the dictates of your spirit and not your flesh. Thus, it says, "For God has done what the Law could not do, its power being weakened by the flesh (the entire nature of man without the Holy Spirit), Sending His Own Son in the guise of sinful flesh and as an Offering for sin, God condemned sin in the flesh (subdued, overcame, deprived it of its power over all who accept that Sacrifice. So that the righteous and just requirement of the Law might be fully met in us who live and move not in the ways of the flesh but in the ways of the Spirit, our lives governed not by the standards according to the dictates of the flesh, but controlled by the Holy Spirit."
When we're led by the dictates of the flesh, then the enemy's lies will always condemn us as being sinners. If we allow our flesh to dictate who we are, then we'll continue seeing ourselves as who we were, when we were only alive in the flesh. If we allow the Spirit to dictate who we are, then He will always dictate the Truth of what Jesus' Blood has done for us. The Holy Spirit will tell us the Truth that Jesus' Sacrifice made us righteous, sinless, and pure and holy sons and daughters of God. Who has been dictating your identity to you, the flesh or the Spirit?
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