Made New

 DEVOTION

THE LETTER TO THE EPHESIANS

MADE NEW

Eph 4:20-24

20 You, however, did not come to know Christ that way. 21 Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

NIV

We just examined the negative aspect of thinking, this futile thinking of people who do not want Jesus in their lives. Now we can look deeper into the positive way we who love Jesus have the opportunity to live. It is interesting as Gentiles in the time right after Jesus secured our salvation, they had to learn about living in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. Today, as a non-believer content with our former way of life, we still had to learn about the truth that is in Jesus. However, we have far more available to us to continue to learn more about Jesus for we have the advantage of the whole bible. Nevertheless, we still have to contend with that old way of life, even though we are to take that old way of life aside, put it to death, so to speak, and put on a new self. That sounds a lot like being born again or being born from above. There is no question that our former way of life was one of corruption with all its deceitful desires. The question that plagues us, is whether we have truly put that old self completely off. We would think that if we are born again, that would mean we died and were reborn, but that is supposed to mean that when we were reborn, we think completely differently, we have a whole new attitude about life, and we can now understand that we were created to be like God, that we were made in His image which would have meant God intended Adam and Eve to be imperishable and immortal beings. This is the new self that we are to clothe ourselves in, a new being that is created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. The problem is that as long as we are captive to this flesh, we have no righteousness and holiness within ourselves, even this new self that we have put on. Therefore, that is the importance of being in Christ, because He is our righteousness and our holiness. However, our new self is now an immortal being for we have been given eternal life in Jesus and one day this corruptible will finally put on incorruptibility and this perishable will put on imperishability and we will then truly be like Jesus, even being able to sit upon His throne with Him. As we continue to live out this life on earth, we have this new attitude, no longer one that generates futile thinking, but an attitude that desires to be like Jesus. Do we still fail at perfection? Of course, we do, for we still have this corruptible flesh that we must live in and that old self rears its ugly head every so often. What we do not understand is why there is still evidence of pride, boasting, jealousy, envy, greed, bitterness, and unforgiveness, along with a host of attitudes from that old way of life present in our new lives. How do we correlate the old self with the new self when we are supposed to put it off with all its futile thinking and be made new in our attitudes of our minds, with productive thinking? Even though we are born again, this new life is a process that we must continually make every effort to put on fully. We have been made new.