Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices Colossians3:5-9
Two stories:
1. In one of the recent movies, Spiderman discovers an alien material that he uses to make a costume for himself. Unfortunately the material is alive and has a very bad effect on him - it amplifies all his baser character traits. The alien material begins to bond with him and he finds it very difficult to separate himself from the costume and its dark influence. The key moment in the movie is when a church bell is ringing and the sound of the bell disrupts the alien's influence and Spiderman rips the uniform off.
2. A few years ago, when our complex got a new management agent, our complex gardener was issued new overalls....
Paul tells us we must take off the "old self" with its practices. But there is a key difference between Spiderman's situation and ours... In our case, the evil doesn't come from outside, it is locked up in our own hearts...
When we give our lives to Christ, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in our hearts. He begins to root out the darkness in us. This means that we are under New Management. There is a new uniform we can wear.
But we have to take the old uniform off.
That means we identify the old garments and make a conscious decision to remove them...
Thankfully we don't need the clanging of a bell to help us get the old self off, we have the help and resources of the Holy Spirit. Our lives can be transformed.
So... let's be clear: We are not saving ourselves by taking off the old self. We cannot save ourselves. We take off our old self, because we are under new management!!!
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Theo Groeneveld theo@emmanuel.org.za
You can see past EmmDevs at http://emmdev.blogspot.com/
