Your New Life!

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2 Corinthians 5:17 – Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.


Speaking of one of my church members, a man who has known him for years told me how different he was now. He said, “He is like a changed man!” I responded, “Yes, because the Lord changed him!”

When a sinner turns from his sin to God and receives Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour he is reconciled to God by the death of Christ (verse 19). In other words, he is brought back into fellowship that was lost when Adam sinned. It was Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection that opened the way for us to have this new life.

The sinner turned saint is now constrained by the love of Christ (verse 14). This certain love is not the Father’s love that created us, or the Spirit’s love that calls us, but the Son’s love that constrains us. It is sacrificial love, which is the greatest form of love. And it is compelling love. “We love him, because he first loved us” the apostle wrote (1 John 4:19). His love has a hold on us; we can’t help but serve Him out of gratitude.

Our new life has purpose now because we are commissioned by the authority of Christ and God (verse 20). Being an ambassador for Christ means we represent Him. We are to reconcile others to God by Christ. D.L. Moody told of two pictures he once saw. The first was that of a woman grasping a cross with both hands as she was being rescued from a stormy sea. The second picture also depicted a woman being rescued from raging waters. But while clinging with one hand to a cross, her other hand was lifting another person out of the waves to safety. We are to be ambassadors for Christ! Do you have a new life? If so, use your testimony to bring others to God.