Christians Are Marked

Go back to chapter 4 and verse 24. Put on the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. All of these things describe what it means to be a child of God. We are beloved children. We are to walk worthy. We can walk worthy. We are to walk in love. We can do that. The Spirit of God dwells in us in the inner man. Romans 5.5 says that the Spirit has literally shed abroad the love of God in our hearts. We can love the way God loved, obviously not to the character of that love, which is unconditional, self-sacrificing, and endlessly forgiving.

This should mark us. Our little journey last Thursday in verses 1 and 2 was a sweet time together, as we contemplated the character of this love and began to examine our own hearts to see whether we are truly marked by that love. And it’s an extensive kind of love. It has height and depth and length and breadth. And it’s manifest not only in God’s loving us, but in Christ loving us, and offering his life as a sacrifice, as verse 2 says. So again, I just rehearsed what we learned last week. We are to walk in love.

That means the daily pattern of Christian conduct is marked by love that is sacrificial, unconditional, and endlessly forgiving. And it is possible, because if we love that way according to chapter 3 as I just read, we can be filled with all the fullness of God. The most godly persons are the persons who love the most, who love sacrificially, unconditionally, and endlessly forgiving. Think of how the church would be if that was all being lived out. So since you are the beloved children of God, verse 1 says, be imitators of God and walk in love.

That was the plea. It’s possible because of the transformation. I want to borrow some of Peter’s words in 1 Peter just to expand a little bit on your understanding of what being born again means. Listen to what Peter writes in 1 Peter 1, verse 3. Blessed be. This is a benediction, really, a doxology. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. The way you describe conversion is there’s a new birth.

Peter says it again in verse 23. You have been born again, not of seed which is perishable but imperishable. That is, through the living and enduring word of God. You are a new creation. You have been born again. Peter marks that again in chapter 2, verse 2. Like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation. You have been born again, and Peter extends what that means in the same second chapter. Go to verse 9. You are now a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.

You put God on display. The glory of God shining in the face of Jesus Christ is now shining through us. You were once not a people, now you are the people of God. You had not received mercy, now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you, as aliens and strangers, abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. Keep your behaviour excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the things in which they slander you as evildoers, they may, because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation. So we now have the capacity and the command to live to the glory of God.

We have been transformed to that reality. Peter says more in 2 Peter chapter 1. He says that God, by his divine power, has granted to us, in verse 3, everything pertaining to life and godliness. Everything. You’re not missing anything. Everything. Through the true knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence, for by these he has granted to us his precious and magnificent promises. And then this amazing statement, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped, past tense, the corruption that is in the world by lusts.

What is the new birth? You’re a new creation, and you have been granted the divine nature. You have been transformed. You are a new creation, and God himself, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, all take up residence in the believer. This is the way we are to understand salvation. Let me borrow from Paul in Galatians chapter 4 and verse 4, as he speaks about this transformation. But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.

We are both the born sons and adopted sons. God has sent forth the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father. We speak to God with intimacy because we are one with him, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Thank you for joining us in this exploration of Christians Are Marked. Until next time, remember to keep the faith, stay strong, and continue to shine your light in the world. To hear these daily devotions of your daily bread, please log on to goddessgovernment.com. Goodbye, and may your faith always lead the way. Thank you. [tr:trw].