The unquenchable fire

Whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. -John 3:15 (NASB)

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! -2 Corinthians 5:17 (NLT)

For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. -Romans 11:29 (ESV)

I often think about how to communicate to a nonbeliever what happens when you accept Christ as your Lord and Savior. One time, I had the privilege to have a nonbelieving colleague ask me what it meant to be born again!

One of the main charges God has put on this agent’s heart is to find ways of connecting to nonbelievers. One of those ways is through posts here, which disseminate what God has shown me in my walk.

When you become a true believer, many things happen:

• You are reborn as a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). Your flesh still carries some vestiges of the old you, but those continually fall off in your new walk.
• You are marked by God and sealed with the fire of the Holy Spirit, which takes residence in you (Ephesians 1:13-14).
• You are promised eternal life (John 3:16).
• You are justified, declared righteous (Romans 5:1).
• You are glorified (Romans 8:30).
• You are redeemed, paid for by Christ’s own blood (1 Peter 1:18-19)

For me, the wool was pulled from my eyes, and I saw the world for how terrible and evil it truly was. I learned that my perspective of it was through rose-colored spectacles that the enemy had hoped I’d never removed!

But in my heart was where the rebirth began…what it really meant to be born again: your heart is forever changed. You have that definite black and white demarcation of your old and new life…and you will never step back there again!

We become ambassadors for Christ in the Great Commission, called to spread the Good News, and to carry and reflect His light to the corners of the earth. Part of that charge is to genuinely and authentically climb ever higher to Christlikeness, and it’s understood that we will stumble along the way.

It’s important to note that, because true believers can and will still sin, but the Holy Spirit will make them so uncomfortable that they will be forced to face, confess, and repent (turn away) from their sin to return to God’s will and path for them. False believers, even the most convincing ones who can almost be indistinguishable from real ones (at least for a while, as seen in the parable of the wheat and the tares), can continue indefinitely in unrepentant sin, because they do not have the Spirit in their hearts.

But because our hearts truly burn with the fire of the Holy Spirit within us, our outward actions (our fruit) reflect our hearts, which yearn to please Christ. And no one can take that away!

Want in?

If you’re tired of battling on your own, and want to have the God of angel armies with you, walk this way. That hole in your heart has been yearning for the fire of the Spirit to burn there, and it will never be empty again!

Today’s soundtrack

Toby Mac’s “Feel It” brings ’80s pop music back to vibrantly remind us that you know it in your heart and soul when you have Christ in your heart!