An Unclaimed Spiritual Inheritance
Christ has the power to change a person’s inner character completely. Yet many believers live empty, sinful, shame-filled lives. Why doesn’t every Christian grow more merciful, compassionate, wise and bold? Why don’t we all start to become more like our Savior?
Jesus died and rose so we could experience new life, so why don’t we?
There’s a key reason why some Christians experience the richness of a transformed life and others don’t.
Growing Up Spiritually
I’ve discovered what a born-again Christian believes about the Holy Scriptures is critical.
The Bible is either God’s inspired word, the earthly source of all divine knowledge.Or it’s just an ancient book, written by a bunch of grumpy, middle-eastern guys.
Dismiss the Bible as a book of fairy tales and immediately Christianity is drained of all its life-transforming power. Only God knows how to set us free from bitterness, insecurity, greed, pride fear and shame. The Holy Spirit acts as our life coach, but He uses Biblical truth to set us free.
Agreeing mentally with God’s truth, however, isn’t enough. Our lives change only when we live by the truth we’ve been given.
Below are three diagrams, illustrating three different types of Christians.
The First Type of Christian
This graphic shows the cycle a new Christian goes through if Jesus’ Lordship is modeled and taught by older Christians and the Bible is treated as God’s inspired word.
In the Bible, almost every miracle of God first required an act of human obedience.
The story of Naaman the Leper is a good example.
Naaman’s Cure
The Prophet Elisha sent his servant to tell Naaman that his leprosy would be cured if he dipped himself seven times in the Jordan River. Naaman was furious. He thought, “Dunking my body underwater in a muddy river won’t cure my disease. How idiotic!”
Perhaps he believed the prophet meant for him to look foolish. As commander of Aram’s armies, Naaman served an enemy king, who was hostile toward Israel.
Maybe Elisha just wanted to make fun of him!
He almost ignored the prophet’s simple instructions and stormed back home. If he had, Naaman would have died a leper. But his servants talked him into obeying Elisha’s words.
Six times he plunged his body under the water. Nothing changed. The seventh time, his body rose up from the water completely cleansed of all traces of leprosy.
Being miraculously healed changed this hostile general’s heart toward Israel’s God forever.
15 Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. He stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel. So please accept a gift from your servant.”
16 The prophet answered, “As surely as the Lord lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing.” And even though Naaman urged him, he refused.
17 “If you will not,” said Naaman, “please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the Lord. (2 Kings 5:15-17 NIV)
Naaman couldn’t buy his healing. Instead it was given freely as a gift by the one true God, who saw Naaman’s suffering and cared enough to heal him.
The Second Type of Christian
The Christians in this group are halfhearted. Yes, they believe in the Holy Scriptures. They may even have prayed and asked Jesus to be their Lord. Yet deep inside, these believers retain full control.
They aren’t serving their divine Master wholeheartedly. Instead these believers retain the right to veto any command that’s too uncomfortable.
This Christian’s heart says, “I will follow You if…”
- What You are asking me to do is not too scary.
- It’s not too painful.
- It doesn’t cost me too much personally.
- Your command makes logical sense to my mind.
These Christians may know the Lord’s will, but they often refuse to walk in the direction He commands them to.
22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23 Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror 24 and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. (James 1:22-24 NIV)
The Third Type of Christian
These are the people who say, “I’ve tried Christianity and it doesn’t work.” They often say this to believers who have a vibrate relationship with the Holy Spirit and are actively being transformed into Christ’s likeness.
I believe these are the people Paul talks about in 2 Timothy 3:5 “having a form of godliness, but denying its power.”
Jesus may be their Savior, but He’s not their Lord.
Often they try to remake Christ into their own image, instead of conforming to His. They don’t bother reading the Scriptures, because the Bible has no value for them. Any godly command they disagree with, they ignore. Handicapped by their high level of unbelief, they never step out in faith, so they seldom experience God’s goodness in a significant way. Their inner self is never transformed.
A Final Word
My obedience to God’s commands under the Holy Spirit’s guidance has altered who I am and how I respond to people. But sometimes I still resist, too lazy or too fearful to obey Him.
Other times I step out in faith and grow more like my Master.
Trust me when I say this; there is nothing emptier than spending your entire life resisting the God who loves you and has called you to grow into someone greater.
