Happy New Year! A new year is upon us, and resolutions have already been made – and broken. Why do we often fail at our resolutions? Why do we continually make more resolutions despite how often we fail at bringing them into fruition? I was reading my new devotional book yesterday and ran across this interesting quote:
Because you have been made a new person in Christ, the old Adam in you is not to be indulged, tolerated, or even reformed. The baptismal life calls for the mortification of your old Adam through daily contrition and repentance and the living of that new life that clings to Christ for the forgiveness of sins. (Treasury of Daily Prayer, p. 1445, emphasis mine).
I emphasized the words “or even reformed.” God calls us to mortify our old Adam, not modify it. The Bible commands us to “Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature” (Colossians 3:5, NIV). “For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God” (Romans 8:13-14, NIV).
Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin — because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace. (Romans 6:3-14, NIV, emphasis mine).
I think that the problem with most new years resolutions is that we are trying to reform our old Adam; we are trying to improve our flesh/sinful nature. The Bible tells us that “the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so” (Romans 8:7, NIV, emphasis mine). We simply can’t improve our flesh. It will always resist our godly desires (see Romans 7:7-25). Our sinful flesh was crucified with Christ and then drowned in our Baptism. And we are called to daily kill the old Adam and live from our new hearts in Christ, our new nature. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” (2 Corinthians 5:17, NIV).
This year don’t set resolutions in an attempt to reform your sinful nature. Set a resolution to live from your new heart in Christ. You are a new creation in Christ, live in that reality in 2010.
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Yes. Most folks don’t understand the term “mortify the flesh”.
We have really failed to teach that Biblically. The Old Dead Guys did- as you note from your last Blog.
The Early Reformers Did speak plainly and understood what Jesus said on this. We have done poorly- if at all- contextuallizing this understanding.
Your quotes on Rms are dead on. “The Wages of sins is death” Rms 6 was written to Believers-
There is to be lifelong putting off of sin and a putting on of Christs ways- Righteousness. This is connected to Promises in Baptism- God to us and us to God.
Rms doesn’t stop at Rms 7- it continues as a unit on to Chapter 8- again your context is correct. These are connected units of thought from God.
Back to Jesus and the undertanding- of “Mortify the flesh”.
Matt 5 27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ a 28 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.
Note also- Jesus says this again later in Matt 18.
7 “Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to sin! Such things must come, but woe to the man through whom they come! 8 If your hand or your foot causes you to sin cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. 9 And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.
This is in the context of Church discipline for public unrepentant sin. Why?
I will roughly quote from Walthers Pastoral Theology:
#1 So the person caught up in sin may know how serious God takes sin and Repent.
#2 So the Repentant Sinner may be lovingly restored to the Kingdom of Grace and loving embraced by all in the Congregation
#3 So that the Watchers may take Warning on the seriousness of sin.
End
The Critical point is the Attitude of our Hearts towards our sins.
Have you ever read “The Hammer of God”? It is required at the Sems. It is a quality work. I need to re-read it.
From the Hammer of God pg 66.
The next question came from the housewife in who’s home they were guests. “How great shall our sorrow over our sins be if it is to be sincere?”
So great that one is willing to give up the sin,” answered Linder promptly. “Crocodile tears mean nothing in heaven. But he who wants to be free from the sin has true sorrow even though the heart feels hard as a stick.”
“What Luther Says” by Pless pg 738 :-
Nonetheless man must hear the Law first, then the Gospel.
Before receiving the comfort of the forgiveness, sin must be recognized and the fear of Gods Wrath must be experienced through the preaching or apprehension of the Law, that man may be driven to sigh for Grace and may be prepared to receive the comfort of the Gospel. There fore one should by all means most severely admonish and drive to repentance with threats and intimidation those who are yet without and fear of God’s wrath, are secure, hard and unbroken. That is, no Gospel but only Law and Moses should be preached to them.
On the other hand, where there are hearts in which the Law has performed it’s Office, so that they are frightened by the knowledge of their sin, are timid and fugitive, no Law should be preached and proclaimed any more, but the pure Gospel and comfort. For this is the proper Office of Christ, to perform which He came and commanded the Gospel to be Preached to all poor sinners and enjoined on them to believe it, that He might abolish and remove all charges, frightenings and threatenings of the Law and might give them the purest comfort instead.
End
This has been forgotten in todays churches. -DR
I HAVE QUESTION FOR YOU…When you asked yourself question Is Christianity fake…..?WHAT DID YOU DO WITH QUESTION???
I actually have asked myself that question a few times Nadia. The word Christian simply refers to “one who follows Christ.” So I suppose that in order to test whether one can follow Christ, we’d first have to know that He is real. Historically it is very clear that Jesus Christ was a real man who walked the earth in the first years of the common era, initially named after him in Latin (A.D. = Anno Domini, “in the year of our Lord”). To deny that Jesus existed would be foolish, and would require a great deal of ignorance, much like those who deny the Holocaust today. The next important truth is the resurrection. Can I prove it? Nope. Can anyone disprove it? Nope, no one has produced Jesus’ body. So the resurrection is a plausible reality. If it is plausible that someone could raise from the dead (there are many eyewitness accounts), then it is also plausible that Jesus really was who He said He was: the Son of God. So what did I do with the question? I came to a plausible conclusion: Jesus Christ is the Son of God who bore the sins of the world on the cross, granting eternal life to all those who believe.