One major reason why many Christians do not experience breakthroughs in their lives is because they don’t even understand what the Bible teaches about the New Creation – the New Creation realities.
2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”
Here is the truth: The product of the new birth is not a better, improved, reformed, or refined old self, but an entirely new creation, a new self, a new being in Christ. The word new means “new in every aspect.” This implies “recently made, fresh, recent, unused and unworn.”
In other words, the day got born again, a brand new, fresh, novel being came into existence. The literal Greek translation says you are a new species of being which never ever existed before.
You are a New Creature created by God the Father in Christ Jesus. You are a New Creature with the life of God, the nature of God, and the ability of God in you. You have new interests and new desires. Your priorities have changed. The moment you accepted Christ as your Saviour and confessed Him as Lord, you were recreated.
Understand this: right now, you have in your spirit-man the very life, nature and ability of God. This is an actual re-birth of your spirit-man. All your old sinful ways have been put away.
What then happened to your old or former self who was corrupt, hostile, stubborn and rebellious to God?
It is gone forever having been crucified with Jesus Christ (Rom. 6:6). Your daily victory over sin and Satan lies in you walking in the revelation knowledge of the truth that you are now a New Creation by reason of your spiritual union with Christ.
If you fail to acknowledge, embrace, believe and live by the spiritual truth that you are now a new creation – a new being with a new, holy and divine nature, divine potentials, new status, exalted position and unlimited spiritual authority – you will still continue to think, speak, live, operate, struggle and suffer under the tyranny of sin and Satan as the old being (Jn. 8:32).
What then does the Bible teach about the New Creation? The Bible teaches that:
1. The New Creation possesses a new, holy and divine nature. You were born with a sinful, selfish and corrupt nature inherited from Adam. It was that nature that made you a slave of sin and Satan. But through the New Birth, you have now become a partaker of a new, holy and divine nature (1 Pet. 1:1-4).
No one born of God commits sin (1 Jn. 3:8-9); for God’s nature abides in him, and he cannot sin because he is born of God (RSV). The Scripture states that your new spirit was created in God’s image and after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness (Eph. 4:24, RSV).
The new creation does not have two natures – the sinful, and the holy nature in his heart. No one can have both. The New Creation has only God’s kind of nature in his heart.
Therefore, the New Creation is no longer a slave to sin, but a slave of righteousness (Rom. 6:17-18). It is no longer natural or normal for you as a New Creation in Christ to practice sin or continue in your former sinful habits (Gal. 5:24).
2. The New Creation possesses eternal or everlasting life. In Adam, you were dead spiritually – alienated from God’s life, but now in Christ, you are spiritually alive possessing God’s kind of life (ZOE).
Everlasting life is not a future promise, but a present reality or possession of the New Creation in Christ (Jn. 3:36). The life that a New Creation possesses is Christ Himself, for He is eternal life (Jn. 14:6). It is impossible for anyone to possess or experience eternal life without having Christ Himself first.
The Scripture states that “God has given us eternal life, and that this life is in His Son” (1 Jn. 5:10-11, NKJV).
Eternal life is not a mere spiritual capacity or a privilege of spending eternity with God in heaven, but also the capacity to know God intimately and live an overcoming, victorious, triumphant, prosperous and successful life in this present world even as our Lord Jesus Christ did.
3. The New Creation possesses the Spirit of Christ (Rom. 8:9-10). Also, as a New Creation, you are perfectly like Christ in your recreated or Born-Again spirit (1 Cor. 6:171 Jn. 4:17).
4. The New Creation possesses the mind of Christ. Your Born-Again spirit is renewed in knowledge after the image of Christ (1 Cor. 2:16). The New Creation “is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him that created him” (Col. 3:10). Therefore, the New Creation knows all things in his regenerated and anointed heart, though his physical mind is limited in knowledge (Heb. 8:10-11). John the beloved, clearly states this truth (1 Jn. 2:20, 27).
5. The New Creation in Christ is God’s beloved. As a New Creation, you are unconditionally, completely, and eternally loved, favoured, pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ (Jn. 17:23).
God has made the New Creation accepted in the Beloved (Eph. 1:5-6). Therefore, quit seeking, striving or struggling to impress God, or to earn God’s love by your self-righteousness, performance or good works.
Why? Because as a New Creation, you are unconditionally, completely and eternally loved by God, accepted by God, favoured by God, and blessed by God in Christ Jesus.
6. The New Creation wields unlimited power and spiritual authority. The New Creation is no longer a slave or captive of sin and Satan but a king and a priest unto God (Rev. 5:9-10; Eph. 2:4-7; Rev. 1:4-6).
Because of your spiritual union with Christ, you are presently seated with Christ together in the heavenly places at the right hand of the Father (Eph. 2:6), “far above all principality and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named not only in this age, but also in that which is to come” (Eph. 1:21). The spiritual authority (power) of the New Creation is not inferior to that of Christ. The New Creation is invested with the power and authority of Christ over all the evil forces and powers.
Therefore, no trial, challenge, adversary or adversity of life is expected to intimidate, oppress, harass or overcome you as a New Creation (Matt. 10:7-8, 16:19).
7. The New Creation is God’s spiritual house on earth. As a New Creation you have become God’s spiritual house or temple on earth (1 Cor. 6:19-20; 2 Cor. 6:16). God now dwells in your spirit-man in all His fulness as He dwelt in Christ while He was on earth. (Col. 1:19, Col. 2:9).
Because God lives in you now, you do not need to search for God anywhere else. You are carrying Him about. You can now commune with God anywhere and anytime. As Jesus manifested God the Father while He carried His fullness here on earth, you should also make it your priority to increasingly reveal God to the world (Jn. 1:18; Isa. 43:7, 21; 1 Pet. 2:9).
Watch out for the next edition of Good News from the Pulpit!
Your friend, I. I. Madubunyi (Senior Pastor, HOG)
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