You and I were born in the natural here on earth. God knew of us before time began, but until we were conceived here on earth, we had not existed before. After we were formed in the womb, we were born into a sin nature that was ingrained into the fabric of our flesh.
Never settle for anything less than the life God has meant for you to live. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5 NKJV). Be that man or woman God has ordained for you to be.
In our sin nature, we cannot be reconciled to God. The Father’s holiness cannot be joined to something unholy. The darkness in our sin nature cannot exist standing in the light of God. The natural life cannot live a spiritual life. Something has to change.
You cannot be joined to darkness and also walk in the light. “…God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 John 1:5-7 NKJV).
Some two thousand years ago, God decided it was the perfect time for His Son Jesus to be born in the flesh here on earth. The Lord chose a young virgin named Mary to give birth to His Son and then God sent the Holy Spirit to place the life of Jesus into her womb.
Jesus Christ was born to die for our sins so that we could live forever. “An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins’” (Matthew 1:20-21 NKJV).
Jesus existed from before time began. In the spiritual realm, He always was, and He will always be. But it wasn’t until the Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary that Jesus was born in the natural. Jesus came from heaven on the grand mission to save us from our sins.
You can’t do what only God can do in you. “The angel replied, ‘The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, and the power of God shall overshadow you; so the baby born to you will be utterly holy—the Son of God’” (Luke 1:35 TLB).
Jesus became the ultimate sacrificial Lamb of God, willingly going to the Cross so that by His blood we could be reconciled to God. His righteousness covers the darkness of our sin nature such that when the Father sees us, He sees the perfect righteousness of His Son.
You will display that which you worship. Perhaps you need a new wardrobe. “He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness…” (Isaiah 61:10 NKJV).
Two things must happen for you to be saved into heaven for all of eternity. First, that you willingly accept the free gift of Jesus Christ, that with His blood you can be covered with His righteousness. You must choose Him as your Lord.
The reason it’s so hard for some people to be saved is not that it costs them too much, but that they can receive it only as a free gift. “People are made right with God by his grace, which is a free gift. They are made right with God by being made free from sin through Jesus Christ. God sent him to die in our place to take away our sins” (Romans 3:24-25 ICB).
The second thing that must happen for you to be saved forever is that you need to be born again in the Spirit. Your flesh was not made for eternity, but your spirit was, and it must be born inside you so that you could then enter into your spiritual life.
When you are born again in God, God’s nature is born in you. “Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God’” (John 3:3 NKJV). “No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God” (1 John 3:9 ESV).
It is by the Holy Spirit that you can be born in the Spirit. He will overshadow you such that your spirit can be born. Just as the Holy Spirit caused the natural birth of Jesus in Mary, so He can cause the spiritual birth in you.
It takes the Holy Spirit to take a natural man and turn him into a spiritual man. “[God] saved us, through the Holy Spirit, who gives us new birth and new life by washing us. God poured out the Holy Spirit abundantly on us through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:4-6 GNT).
When you are filled by the Holy Spirit, you are no longer just a man or a woman. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3:6 NKJV).
Until you are born again, you cannot begin the spiritual life that God has for you. But even after you are born in the Spirit, it requires an ongoing yielding of your spirit that the Spirit of God can lead you and teach you to become all that God wants you to be.
The greater the yielding to the Holy Spirit, the greater the filling of the Holy Spirit. “Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is…be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:17-18 NKJV). You cannot fill a cup until it is first empty.
The spiritual birth in you is nothing less than the Holy Spirit causing the spiritual life of Jesus Christ to be placed within you. It takes an act of man to birth a natural child but it takes an act of the Holy Spirit to birth a spiritual child.
If there is no difference between who you were before Christ and who you are after, then perhaps Christ is not in you. “Therefore if anyone is in Christ [that is, grafted in, joined to Him by faith in Him as Savior], he is a new creature [reborn and renewed by the Holy Spirit]; the old things [the previous moral and spiritual condition] have passed away. Behold, new things have come [because spiritual awakening brings a new life]” (2 Corinthians 5:17 AMP).
There are more people who call themselves Christians than there are people who have the life of Christ alive and working effectively within them. The proof of Christ reigning in you is the life of Christ showing through you. The life you live is the life in you.
Christians don’t reject what Christ did on the cross; they reject what Christ wants them to do on the cross. “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20 NKJV).
If you have not received Jesus Christ as your Lord, do that now. Accept His free gift of salvation through the redemptive power of His blood. Then ask the Holy Spirit for you to be born again and then have the life of Christ formed in you by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Until the Word is born in you, it is only dead ink on dead paper being read by a dead man walking. Jesus is the Word. The Lord Jesus taught, “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8 NKJV).
There are many things in life you can get wrong and it won’t matter very much. But getting right with God is not one of them. Your eternal soul depends on getting it right, not by doing anything on your own, but willingly letting Jesus Christ rule in your life.
The greatest accomplishment you can have for Christ is to let Him reign in you. “But if God’s Spirit lives in you, you are under the control of your spiritual nature, not your corrupt nature. Whoever doesn’t have the Spirit of Christ doesn’t belong to him. However, if Christ lives in you, your bodies are dead because of sin, but your spirits are alive because you have God’s approval” (Romans 8:9-10 GW).
Blessings to you always,
Paul Balius