“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV).
A Christian is fundamentally unique and is not just like everyone else. Nor is he, more or less, just like all other religious people but is instead radically set apart. A Christian, as the verse above indicates, is a miracle and a new creation. He is a marvelous theater in which God displays His wonderful grace and power for all creation to see in awe. Perhaps you think I’m exaggerating or being extreme. But the Bible doesn’t think so. Indeed, it teaches that the entirety of the Christian life is defined by the supernatural and gracious working of God.
To better understand this, we first must realize that man is not naturally good, but is rather conceived in sin and iniquity (Psalm 51:5). All our hearts — yes, including yours — do not naturally desire God but hate Him and His law (Romans 8:7). Instead, they desperately seek evil and delight in it; as the Bible says, “Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them” (Romans 1:32). This perverse and wicked heart is nothing less than a “slave to sin” (John 8:34) and under the “power of Satan” (Acts 26:18). Such words are not of my own making but are the words of Jesus Himself. He even said that the Pharisees — the (seemingly) most moral and religious people on the planet — were “of [their] father the devil” (John 8:44). Such a deadly, heart-piercing condemnation is, again, not just for the “really bad people” but describes all who are currently outside of Christ, no matter how many good things they’ve said or done (1 John 5:19, Romans 3:10-20). Anyone apart from Jesus is “dead in” their “trespasses and sins,” “following the prince of the power of the air,” and are “by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind” (Ephesians 2:1-3).
What hope is there for such evil, wretched sinners? None in themselves, for no amount of good works, religious devotion, tears over sin and penance can wipe away even one, or a fraction of one, of the innumerable offenses that justly condemn one to God’s eternal wrath. Only Jesus’ death on the cross can cleanse us from our sins. It was there that He bore the wrath and punishment our sins deserved so that those who believe and put their trust in Him are fully forgiven and reconciled to God (Colossians 2:13-14, John 3:14-16, 2 Corinthians 5:17-21). When one believes in Christ and Christ alone for their salvation, they who were once “children of the devil” (1 John 3:10) now have become “children of God” (John 1:12). We, who were once God’s “enemies,” are reconciled to Him (Romans 5:10) and have “[received] adoption as sons” (Galatians 4:5). We, who once considered the cross as foolishness and folly (1 Corinthians 1:23), have been fully cleansed by it and “have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus” (Hebrews 10:19). We, who were once happily in “the domain of darkness,” have been “transferred” by God “to the kingdom of his beloved Son” (Colossians 1:13). We, who were once slaves of sin and opposed to the things of the Spirit, have now been made slaves of righteousness and are in-dwelt by the Spirit, love God’s law and hate sin (Romans 6:17-18, Galatians 5:17, Ephesians 1:13). We see quite clearly, then, that we were “guilty, vile and helpless,” as the old hymn goes, but have been supernaturally changed by God’s grace and power (and by nothing we have done or accomplished). So marvelous and radical is this conversion that it is described as being “born again” (John 3:3), being brought “from death to life” (John 5:24, cf. Luke 15:24), and mirrors the very words of God in creation, “Let light shine out of darkness” (2 Corinthians 4:6).
Yet this is not the end of God’s work in the believer at all but the beginning. God continues to grow the believer in holiness and conformity to Himself (Philippians 2:13). In Him and “the strength of [H]is might,” we are able to battle and be victorious against sin and the “schemes of the devil” (Ephesians 6:10-11). And it is through the Spirit that our minds are renewed and that we have a greater knowledge and love of God (Ephesians 1:17-19, 3:16-19). Such things may seem a far-off or abstract reality to even many Christians, whose lives feel trapped in an endless mundane cycle of work, busyness or continual sadness and disappointment. While we should not expect that every day will bring us some rapturous experience of God, we must also remember the words of Scripture: “And we all, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18), and “Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16). God continues to work in the believer every day; in His sovereignty and goodness, we grow both in good times and bad, both in light and in darkness, on the mountaintop and in the valley and everywhere in between.
But far greater still will be that day when God completes His work in us, and we will forever be with the Lord in glory. What an amazing day when the great company of believers, redeemed and now glorified and perfect, will praise God for His grace upon grace with those words, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Revelation 7:10). Looking to this coming day and seeing what He has already done, how can we not now stand in awe of and glorify God for His wondrous and supernatural working in us who believe?
Andrew Sveda is a senior at Notre Dame from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, majoring in political science and theology. In his free time, he enjoys writing (obviously), reading and playing the piano. He can be reached at asveda@nd.edu or @SvedaAndrew on Twitter.
