You Are Justified

 

DAILY VITAMIN 

- You Are Justified 

"Therefore if any person is [ingrafted] in Christ (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old [previous moral and spiritual condition] has passed away. Behold, the fresh and new has come!" (2 Corinthians 5:17 AMP) 

1 Corinthians 6 tells us that we were once damned but now we have been washed,  sanctified and justified in the name of Jesus Christ,  and by the Spirit of God (v. 11). See it this way: At one point in our lives, we were like a glass cup stained with grease all over with no remedy in sight,  but now having changed our spiritual status through faith in Christ,  we are brand new again, with no trace of any stain. 

That's what our theme verse says.  It says all things are become new - no exception at all. And these all things are of God (2 Cor 5:18). That is,  we have been emptied of our Adamic state and filled with the Spirit of Christ. We have been whisked away from the old path of darkness,  and have been set on a new path in the light of the Son - all by what God has done for us through Christ Jesus. And so when God looks at us,  He sees a people with no past- brand new in the name of the Lord.  

I like how Paul puts it.  He says "by him all that believe are justified from all things,  and from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses" (Acts 13:39). This is what he meant.  For instance,  under the law of Moses, the soul that sins shall die,  irrespective of what may be; but now in Christ,  his past sins are forgiven and he has moved from death to life (John 5:24). He goes further to say that there is no condemnation now for such a man who walks after the will of the Spirit in Christ Jesus,  which we have the capacity to do now in Him; for as the scripture says "our sins He will remember no more" (Hebrews 8:12).

So,  don't worry about what people may say,  that God could never forgive you for what you did in the past,  because He has. We are not endorsing those past wrongs,  we just know that that isn't you anymore. He says of the believer that (s)he is dead and now lives with Christ in God (Col 3:3); and the scripture says that "he that is dead is freed from sin" (Romans 6:7). Hold on! It also says that sin has no more dominion over you, because you have been covered by grace (v. 14). Maybe the old man may have been tied to sin,  but definitely not this new you that has been reborn in and through Christ; and that now that you have been made free,  you are now justifiably servants of righteousness (v. 18).

This is your new identity through Christ: Embrace it. 

Confession:

I am a brand new man.  The past doesn't define me. Though I acknowledge that I did some wrongs when I was bereft of the light,  but now I'm alive in Him. My life has been completely transformed. I'm no longer the person I use to be,  I'm a new man in Christ now free from condemnation and filled with righteousness.  And indeed old things are passed away,  and all things are become new again.