This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! 2 Corinthians 5:17
For most of my adult life, I’ve been overweight. I started gaining weight after a back injury and five pounds became ten pounds and ten became twenty. I’ve tried probably every diet from the grapefruit diet to Weight Watchers. I watched my weight go higher and higher. Have you heard of yo-yo dieting that was me? I would get to 157 and go back to 197. I saw 157 so many times I have a blog with some pretty emotional writing at http://www.diana157.com about my trials with weight loss. I shared my story with Tracie Miles and she included it in her book Your Life Still Counts. So, in addition, to taking classes I admitted that I’m addicted to food and food at one time was my idol. At my highest weight 233, I made a rock solid commitment.
Beloved characteristic number twenty of a born-again believer is one is a new creation. The new creation’s described in 2 Corinthians 5:17: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” Therefore, tells one to look back at the verses 14-16 where Paul shares that all have died with Christ and we no longer live for ourselves. Beloved, we have a sin nature, an old man, crucified with Christ. Our old sin nature nailed on the cross for every sin we did and will commit, Christ paid the price for our sin nature. When we accepted Christ, we become new creations in Christ Jesus.
Or aren’t you aware that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We therefore were buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father,we too may walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with Him like this in His death, we will certainly also be raised to life as He was. Romans 6:3-5
The sin we once held onto, we now desire to put away forever. We “put off the old man with his deeds” (Colossians 3:9), and put on the “new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24).
We see Paul struggle with sin in Romans 6, the things I want to do I don’t do, the things I don’t want to do I do. But as a new creation, we put sin in its proper place and become saints who sometimes sin.
Beloved characteristic twenty of a born-again believer is one is a new creation.
I admitted that I struggle with food, that many times the food was my God. I made a radical decision to place food in its proper place. I used to live to eat, now I eat to live. I have lost 110 pounds and have maintained a five-year weight loss. Yes, I had a surgical intervention in 2012 but for me, it was the right decision. I made a rock solid decision to never overeat again. I am thinner than most of those that went to class with me because I love God more than breaking the rules.
I became a new creation in all of my choices.
Father God, I pray for the woman who struggles with food. I know that exercise and eating less with better food is the answer to weight loss. Lord, forgive me for at one time loving food more than you. Today, Lord, whatever we need to do to put the old man away, let us be willing to embrace being a new creation. In Jesus name Amen
What do you need to do today to get on track with Jesus? We are a new creation if your life right now is sin-confess, sin-confess, pray and ask God for the willingness to resist the sin. Then it looks like this, temptation, no sin. We have to resist the old man and embrace the new creation we have within our bodies. Perhaps your battle is not with food, God wants to give you victory in whatever area you are struggling.
