“Some of the clothes in my closet – honestly, they’re so old and worn, I have no business wearing them any longer, even just around the house. Or their style is so dated; they don’t really belong in this century. But I struggle to get rid of them because they fit me so naturally and comfortably. I’m just used to them.
Sometimes lifestyle choices and habits are the same. You may have indulged lust for so long, for example, or live tethered to pride or anger for so many years that it’s become a comfortable outfit for you. But they are symbolic of your old life. Dated. Antiquated. Out of character. Putting it off daily won’t be easy, but by God’s Spirit, it can be done.“
From the book titled the “Armor of God” by Priscilla Shirer.
Our verse of the day comes from Ephesians 4:17-24.
“Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greed to practice every kind of impurity.
But that is not the way you learned Christ! – assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.”
Let’s break it down.
Two things are happening here. First, there is a description of what a worthy life is not. Second, there is a description of what a worthy life is.
What a worthy life is not.
The believer must not live like an unbeliever. As an unbeliever, life is mentally and spiritually challenging. It is darkened, and that person is separated from God. Ignorance of God leads to alienation from God which can lead to rejection of the truth. Separation from God also leads to various sorts of immoral practices.
What a worthy life is.
A worthy life is personal, and it involves seeking to know Jesus. Taking responsibility is learning more about Christ. To learn him involves three things: 1. Receive his truth. 2. Welcome his truth. 3. Develop a whole new way of thinking.
As Christ-followers, we are commanded to put on the new self and shed the old way of life. Unlike those old, outdated clothes we refuse to get rid of because we might wear them again someday, we are to get rid of old habits and ways of life that do not line up with Jesus’ truth.
We should want to be different, and we should want our lives to reflect the changes. Furthermore, as believers in Christ, we are dead to the old self, and we must put this salvation to work.
If we don’t, how are we any different from who we were before Christ?
This lifestyle choice is about more than cleaning out closets and donating old clothes we haven’t worn in years. This lifestyle choice is about who we are in Christ and what we will do with the gift we have been given.
How will we grow spiritually?
How will we put our salvation to work to bring glory to God?
Blessings!
Verse Of The Day: What’s Wrong with Miracles?
John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that He gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”
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