Our story becomes more interesting as we work with God to reveal that we are His children. Listen:
“See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.” 1Jn 3:1 NIV
As we begin to grow into this New Creation that we now are, people around us should notice the changes. This doesn’t mean we become creepy Christians! You know what I mean, right? Where we act so spiritual no one can relate to us. Where we begin speaking “Christianese” all the time and no one can understand what we are talking about. Where we go around rebuking the devil at every trial and shouting a big “Hallelujah” at every triumph. Ok, maybe we can praise God for all the victories, but in a way that is not repulsing others from Christ, but gathering them to Him.
The changes I am talking about though are things like, we begin to be aware of the needs of those around us, and fill them as we can, without any internal debate about it. We begin to control our emotions when someone says hurtful things, instead of becoming defensive and lashing out at them. We begin to stay in instead of going out to bars at night…and not with a “holier than thou” attitude either. We simply start making other choices than we used to make, that line up more and more to Scripture. We begin to live this New Life in Christ, but be aware “the world does not know us” and will react to the changes within us.
It is here where we must hold on to this New Identity in Christ. We must remind ourselves that we are now a child of God, not a child of this world. We no longer have the right to do whatever we feel like doing. But we do have the privilege of representing our Father to those around us. We can show the world Who God is by gently pointing to the changes He has, and continues to make, within us. This takes maturity and finesse…
Join me in memorizing 52 verses this year:
January: 1- Jn 3:16; 2- 2Co 5:17; 3- Jas 2:26; 4- Eph 2:10
February: 5- Jn 10:10; 6- Ro 6:23; 7- Rev 21:4; 8- Php 4:13
March: 9- 1Pe 5:7; 10- Jn 8:32; 11- Dt 30:19; 12- Jn 3:30; 13- 2Chron 20:3
April: 14- 2Chron 20:12; 15- 2Chron 20:15b; 16- 2Chron 20:17
May: 17- Ro 8:28; 18- 1Co 13:13; 19- Php 2:12; 20- Mt 5:4
June: 21- Lk 23:42; 22- Jas 4:7; 23- Pr 22:6; 24- Mt 5:3; 25- Jn 14:6
July: 26- Jas 2:19; 27- Dt 31:8; 28- Jn 14:15; 29- Jn 8:11
August: 30- Ro 8:1; 31- Pr 4:23; 32- Pr 18:21; 33- Ps 118:24; 34- 1Jn 4:4
September: 35- Mt 16:24; 36- Isa 53:6; 37- Ps 23:1-6
October: 38- Heb 4:12; 39- Jn 15:5
40- Jas 5:16
41- 1Jn 3:1
<>< Peace, Diane
