In our last installment of “I’m A New Christian, Now What?”, we examined the reality that as a “born again” person, we have begun a new life. And this new life involves “growing up” into the fullness of Jesus. And this life is lived out by cooperating with the life and power of the Holy Spirit.
Before we delve into a deeper examination of this “life in the Spirit”, there are fundamental concepts that we must establish right from the beginning. This is the first concept that needs to be grasped. Before you became a believer saved by grace through faith, you were a sinner by nature and dead in your sins. But now that you are saved, you are – here it comes – you are no longer a sinner by nature. What?!?!? I have been preaching and teaching this for over 30 years, and the reaction is always the same: incredulous horror! No! No! This can’t be true, I still sin! Ah, but I didn’t say you wouldn’t sin, I said that you aren’t a sinner by nature. Let’s unpack this.
In Colossians 2:11-12 we read:
11 When you came to Christ, you were “circumcised,” but not by a physical procedure. Christ performed a spiritual circumcision—the cutting away of your sinful nature. 12 For you were buried with Christ when you were baptized. And with him you were raised to new life because you trusted the mighty power of God, who raised Christ from the dead.
Your “sinful nature” was “cut away”. The moment that you believed, and received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, your old sinful nature was cut away. This “cutting away” is also described by Paul as that moment when we were “crucified with Christ”. In Romans 6:6 Paul expands this concept:
We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. (Romans 6:6 NLT).
The old sinful nature was cut away; the old sinful self was crucified with Christ. And this was so that “sin might lose its power in our lives” AND – so that we “are not longer slaves to sin”. That’s it – we no longer have a sinful nature, because it has been crucified and cut away and that means we are no longer slaves to sin, sinful by nature and we don’t have to sin.
In Romans 8 Paul paints an incredible picture. You can read the entire chapter, but Paul makes it very clear that because we no longer have a sinful nature, we:
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- No longer follow our sinful nature but follow the Spirit (Romans 8:4)
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- No longer think about sinful things but by the Holy Spirit, think about things that please the Spirit (Romans 8:5)
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- No longer controlled by our sinful nature but controlled by the Spirit (Romans 8:9)
And here is another aspect of the Gospel: from Romans 8:12 we read –
“Brothers and sisters, you have no obligation to do what your sinful nature urges you to do”. (Romans 8:12 NLT).
The question remains, if I no longer have a sinful nature, and I am no longer a slave to sin, there are times that I do sin, how do I get to a place where I am walking in freedom from sin. Those are important questions. And of course, the answer begins to come from Paul in Romans 8:13, where he instructs believers to “put to death the deeds of your sinful nature”.
This is the first of two answers. We are to live the crucified life. Jesus said in Luke 9:23, “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross daily, and follow me.” “Give up your own way” is equivalent to “die to self” or being crucified by nailing the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross (Galatians 5:24) and crucifying them there. We were crucified with Christ and we are to be crucified daily as we submit our sinful nature to death by putting to “death the sinful, earthly things lurking within you” (your old nature) (Colossians 3:5) and putting on our new nature (Colossians 3:10).
The second answer to how we get to a place of walking in freedom from sin is by the power of the Holy Spirit. We will explore this in the next installment.
Our summary of today’s Good News: as a born-again believer, you are no longer a sinner by nature. You are a child of God who sometimes sin.
Rejoice with this scripture verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
