2Cor. 5:17 (Amp) says, "Therefore if any person is ingrafted in Christ Jesus (the Messiah), he is a new creation (a new creature altogether), the old previous moral and Spiritual condition has passed away. Behold, the fresh and new has come."
The Church has been taught for centuries that we are forgiven sinners, but not much else has been accepted as the Truth of the new creation. We haven't applied much faith in what else happened to us by the cross. We've mostly lived in the condemnation of our past life before Jesus, with very little confidence in what Jesus' Sacrifice has done for us while we're still here in this body.
In 1Cor. 6:11 (Amp), the Apostle Paul writes about things that weren't right in the lives of those outside of Christ and unsaved. Then, Paul writes to those who were in Christ Jesus, by faith in His Grace, saying, "And such were some of you at one time. But you were washed clean, purified by a complete atonement for sin and made free from the guilt of sin, and you were consecrated (set apart, hallowed) and you were pronounced Righteous by trusting in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit of our God."
Paul goes on in Rom. 1:17 (Amp), saying, "For in the Gospel a Righteousness which God ascribes is revealed, both springing from faith and leading to faith (disclosed through the way of faith that arouses to more faith). As it is written; The man who through faith is just and upright shall live and shall live by faith." Do we have enough faith in what Jesus did for us, that we believe that what God has done and what He says about those who are new creations? Can we have faith enough to believe that God sees us as new creations in Christ Jesus?
The "righteousness that God ascribes," is the complete work of Jesus by His Sacrifice. If you truly believe you're a new creation, then there's nothing like you, prior to Jesus. We're new creation people who are acceptable to God, without a past life at all. If you have a past, then you're not a new creation This earth and universe has no past, because it didn't exist until God created it. There's no past knowledge of a universe, before God spoke it into existence. It's a new creation.
Rom. 8:30 (Amp) speaks about those whom God had in mind, before He made man in His Image and Likeness. God desired family and declared and for-ordained that family, before creating Adam. Through Jesus, we have become what was in God's heart from the beginning. Through Jesus, we've become a people who are righteous and in right standing with God, at all times. There's no stain of sin on you or in you, because of Jesus. God didn't make a new creation who had the same faults and weaknesses that caused His first creation to fail.
Adam fell through the weakness of his flesh and soulish parts, but the new creation person's flesh and body was crucified and died with Christ Jesus. A dead person doesn't sin. We never think of ourselves as being dead into God in the flesh, but alive in the Spirit. We're made so aware of the weakness of the body we're living in, making it nearly impossible to look beyond that and see the full Truth of our being a new creation man/woman. We judge ourselves by the old man/woman that used to be our identity, forgetting what God now says about who we really are in Him. We must accept by faith, what Jesus has really done in our redemption, in order to develop the new creation person we are in Him.
We accept that our sins have been done away with, but people, the devil and our unrenewed mind keep reminding us who we were before being born-again. We must renew our minds by God's Word and see ourselves in the Mirror of the Word, in order to see who we are now and live by faith. Our true life is in our spirit man/woman and the Life we now live is by faith in Jesus. You can live in the flesh and condemnation or you can live in Truth, which will set you free. True, we must hold our flesh in line with God's Word, but now we're to live from the spirit man/woman and not the dictates of the flesh.
Paul teaches the Church about the new creation person in Rom. 8:1 (Amp), saying, "Therefore, there is now 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're living under condemnation about who we used to be, then we're being dictated to by the flesh and not the Spirit. The Holy Spirit will never condemn us about who we were before being born-again. He doesn't see the person we once were, but sees a new creature who never existed before He took up residence in us and gave us Life.
Some believe that seeing ourselves the way God sees us is "being prideful." They ask, "Who do you think you are to are righteous and just before God?"" It's truly prideful to say we're not righteous, because we're declaring that Jesus' Sacrifice wasn't to cleanse us and give us right standing before God. Jesus' Sacrifice was more than enough and it all came by God's Grace. When we don't accept God's Grace, we try making ourselves righteous. If God says we are righteous, then who are we to say He is wrong? Rom. 8:7 (Amp) says, "That is because the mind of the flesh with it's carnal thoughts and purposes, is hostile to God, for it does not submit itself to God's Law, indeed it cannot."
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