Bobservations Column
By Pastor Bob Lawrenz
By Pastor Bob Lawrenz
Being a “Believer” should be a truly cherished thing, and a protected possession. With the label comes an identity as a “child of God,” following His Word and looking forward to seeing Him face-to-face, and living with Him on into eternity. Being a Believer means that a person is “of the House of the Lord.” And from Jeremiah 22:5, we find that if a dominant number of professing believers are drawn away into the world, the House of the Lord will be left in desolation. (Jer. 22:5)
While it’s true that every Christian is a sinner-saved-by-grace, that should not be an identity we are comfortable with, for it re-enforces our identification with our “old man.” If one is born-again, then our “old man” in considered dead by Christ, and He affords us the new identity described in 2 Corinthians 5:17: “Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new.”
That is the goal of Christ Jesus for all of mankind, that we would embrace Him, and embrace our new identity, leaving the old one behind. The natural man is a sinner; the Spiritual man is a New Creature in Christ. The writer of 2 Corinthians gives us insight in his letter to the Philippians in 3:13: “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forward unto those things which are before”
If you detect Paul’s struggle, then you can identify with him. Even within the House of God, the world is always trying to draw us away. We are the devil’s preferred target. Be prepared. Be forewarned.
“Be sober, be vigilant, for adversary the devil, as a roaring lion,
walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” 1 Peter 5:8
