New Instructions For A New You

Leon FontaineDevoted

Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the

armor of light. …put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision

for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts. Roman 13:12,14 (NKJV)

 

As believers, we have the power to cast off and put on.

We can cast off selfishness and self-destructiveness and put on love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. But it’s not by sheer willpower. It’s by renewing our minds in God’s Word.

Even after giving our lives to Christ, we’re still going to have old desires, struggles and limiting beliefs to deal with. These are part of our old

nature, which was crucified with Christ the moment we gave our lives to him. The trouble is, our minds need to catch up with this change.

Our minds still operate as though we have that old nature, even though we’ve been made new and we don’t have to put up with old hang-ups! But we need to reprogram our minds with new software—the truth about the new nature we have in Christ.

How do we do that? By embracing what God’s Word teaches! Now, it’s not enough to just read the Bible for information. For the rest of our lives, we need to keep meditating on it to realize where we have faulty thinking. That way we’re putting off the old thinking (realizing it’s false) and we’re putting on the new (realizing the truth).

The truth is you are no longer a slave to sin or fear. You’re a child of

God (Galatians 4:7). You get to live as Jesus is in this world (1 John 4:17), with his power, authority and provision. Every time you read truths like that, read them out loud and say, “This is me!”