The Christian Life: An Owner's Manual

It really is possible to discuss difficult issues in everyday language! It seems like books are either straight talk and simple content, or high content with ten dollar words and puzzling syntax. Why not explain deeper issues like we would to a friend?

From Chapter Six, "Spiritual Growth"

How God views us versus how God wants to change us

When we turn to God in faith, he forgives us. Earlier we used the term "justification" to describe our standing before God. It is a courtroom term that means we are innocent. God so completely forgives us that he views us as innocent. There is no better scripture than 2 Corinthians 5:17 to describe how God looks at us:

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

No matter what anyone might say about me, God looks at me and sees nothing wrong. That is how absolute his forgiveness is. But am I actually innocent? Not at all! The miracle of justification is based on God's choice to forgive me, not on what I do. There remains the issue of what I actually am in day-to-day life--a sinful person with all kinds of flaws. This is where spiritual growth comes in. God wants to change us in our day-to-day experience; to gradually turn us into the type of person he already sees.

Justification is accomplished once and for all when we first become Christians. The process of spiritual growth is constantly changing as God deals with issues in our lives. I have borrowed the following chart from Richard Prior's book, The Way of Holiness.

Justification		Sanctification
1.	Concerns guilt	1.	Concerns pollution
2.	Legal, external	2.	Experiential, internal
3.	Relates to our position	3.	Relates to our condition
4.	Righteousness imputed	4.	Righteousness imparted
5.	Has no degrees (a person is either "guilty" or not)	5.	Has degrees (some have progressed further than others)
6.	Once-for-all, not repeated	6.	A gradual process
7.	By declaration of God	7.	By operation of the Spirit
8.	No place for works	8.	Our cooperation by exercise of the will required.

What actually changes when I am justified?

Justification is an act of God to declare me innocent. But I think everyone wonders what actually changes inside me when God justifies me? God declares me innocent but am I any different than I was before I ever heard of the cross? There are some different answers on this subject, and I think it's an important enough question that we should spend some time on it. One point of view teaches that virtually everything about us radically changes at the moment of salvation. When we are justified, we are transformed through and through by the power of God's Spirit. One author who teaches on this topic explains:

Your old sinful self was destroyed forever. You were made a partaker of the divine nature, the nature of Christ. You became a new person in Christ and you were declared by God to be a saint. This was a one-time transformation. There is nothing you can do to improve upon God's activity in transforming you and justifying you (Neil Anderson, Victory Over Darkness, p. 84-85).

Notice the link between the terms "transformation" and "justification." The author is saying justification also involves a transformation of our nature. This means our desires change, the things that make us happy change, we gain new power. Another author, David Needham, talks about the real change that occurs in a Christian the moment they are justified.

I am a person who in terms of my most essential nature (deepest self, inner man, new man) is a creation of God who does not sin. I am righteous--by nature delighting in the law of God. This new man is not simply a capacity; it is the real me. The person I once was (the old man) I am no more. I am not by nature a 'child of wrath' anymore. I am a child of the light. If I died right now, I would be fit for heaven. And heaven is not a place for people who go against their natural tendencies to do what is right. It is a place for those who by nature do what is right! (David Needham, Birthright: Christian, Do You Know Who You Are? p. 78, emphasis his)

This is a good example of the point of view we are discussing. Something has really changed within this Christian because of justification. Now they want to follow God. Now they hate sin. Their desires, drives, feelings and thoughts have been altered by God.

Some scriptures seem to agree with the idea that we totally change at the moment of salvation. For example, the notion of being "born again," found in several verses in the Bible (John 3:3; Titus 3:5; I Peter 1:23), seems to speak of some radical transformation of our character. Romans 6:1-11, probably the most discussed passage on this topic, indicates a new character or nature at the time of our salvation.

However, there is a frequent misunderstanding of both the term "born again" and Romans 6 . . .

. . . The struggle runs deep

Scripture tells us that the struggle against sin in our lives is fierce, prolonged and very deep. In Galatians 5:17, Paul describes sanctification in terms of a battle.

For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.

God's Spirit is at work within us. He cultivates within us a desire to follow God. Just how strong and how quickly that desire develops is different from Christian to Christian. The point is this godly desire is at odds with our sinful nature (flesh in other translations), which is still very strong within us.

The way Paul summarizes this struggle is interesting. He says, "So that you don't do what you want." Debate ranges on which side is not getting what it wants, the sinful nature or the Spirit? But Paul says neither! It's you who doesn't get what you want! The problem is that you, the real you, wants both. When I submit to the Spirit, my sinful nature is not gratified. When I submit to the flesh, the Spirit is grieved and I feel the grief with him.

It's true that the Christian life can be frustrating. But don't let that take away from the fact that as we let the Spirit change us, there is a growing sense of joy, wholeness, and love in our lives. Just read on in Galatians, as Paul describes the "fruit of the Spirit"the things God will produce in our lives if we let him.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Gal. 5:22-23)

Paul doesn't feed people the illusion that somehow they will have very little struggle against sin now that they have been born again. He is straight up: "You will be very frustrated." Nevertheless, the rewards of letting God have his way are far greater than the fleeting pleasures of continuing in sin.

This brings me to an issue that greatly concerns me. I have seen so many Christians hurt and disillusioned because they were fed inflated expectations. They were told that now that they are new creatures, they should have complete victory over sin! Now that they are Christians, they won't even want to sin anymore! For support, people turn to Romans 6, especially verses 6 and 7, "We are no longer slaves to sin, for the one who has died has been freed from sin." There are some serious dangers in exaggerating the actual change that occurs when God forgives us . . .

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