In order to fully comprehend and appreciate HOW MUCH God has given us, we need to intentionally and repeatedly remember HOW LITTLE we had without him.
All Christians at some point will BLUR THEIR FAITH LINE and lose touch with how much they have been forgiven. How much they have in Christ. How blessed they are to be a new creature in him (2 Corinthians 5:17)
Here’s how the apostle Paul put the need to remember our life without Christ:
“…you once were Gentiles in the flesh; separated from Christ; alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise; having no hope and without God in the world.” Ephesians 2:11-12
Those powerful statements–no hope; no promise; separated from Christ—should push us to regularly compare our current faith reconciled with Christ to our unsaved life in darkness.
Making that comparison will show us that without Christ we are helpless.
GOODNESS WITHOUT GOD may get lots of likes online, but it serves the world. God wants our goodness to emanate from his character without any BLUR in the line between who we were and who we are now.
When we BLUR the contrast between who we were without Christ to who we are now in Christ, we invite our sin nature to harden our hearts and darken our days.
Remembering our past life like this does not lead to despair, it deepens our understanding of what God promises to his children. Heck, if God could love that OLD person who rejected him, how could he do anything but love this NEW creation?
That’s why we must never BLUR our life’s FAITH LINE “before and after God.”
I ask God to help me fight off the urge to BLUR the line of demarcation between who I was WITHOUT him and who I have become BECAUSE of him.
WHAT ABOUT YOU?
TRIP OR TRIUMPH? Can you say this? “If this or that would have happened to me BEFORE I was saved, I would have tripped…but since it happened AFTER I was rescued by Christ, I triumphed.”
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” 2 Corinthians 5:17
