Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like him. -Colossians 3:10 (NLT)
The change in your heart that occurs when you’ve been saved is stark. You see the world differently. You see people differently. There’s a layer of compassion you never could muster or possess on your own, but He now blankets you with it.
Sometimes you shrug it off when you’re in the midst of severe pain. Just remember that the walk toward Christlikeness is a journey, not an instant thing. You’ll sometimes have to put on your new nature again after having doffed it in moments when you’re less than Christlike. It happens to all of us.
Just be honest with yourself and with God that you stumbled. Confess and repent to give Him your burdens, and you will once again walk unencumbered with the lightest garment you have ever worn: your new nature, bought for you at a heavy price.
Following a crippling betrayal, a fellow agent wrote this poem after Jesus helped heal their heart by showing them how to see through His eyes:
Yesterday/Today
Yesterday, my world was turned upside down
Today, my Savior gave me HopeYesterday, I dwelled in darkness and solitude
Today, the Son has given me His Light and FriendshipYesterday, my soul drowned in tears
Today, my lips sing of His unfailing LoveYesterday, my heart pumped with anger
Today, it beats with Compassion and ForgivenessToday, with my Redeemer’s help I will press onward and forget, Yesterday
And with this Christlike view, God could work through the human hurt and heal that agent’s relationship, when nonbelievers would very conveniently lick their own wounds and dismiss the betrayer as irredeemable.
This excerpt from John Piper Ministries speaks to putting on the new man, and the six layers of corruption apart from Christ:
And so after you hear the voice of Christ and are made alive and brought to faith in him and enter into his school to let him teach you how to live, the first thing he says to you is: “change your clothes.” Take off the old person and put on the new person.
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