If enough professing Christians in America heed this message, we could have a national awakening unlike anything we’ve seen in the history of our nation.
What then is a real Christian? Let’s begin by first identifying what a real Christian is not. Here are the three most common beliefs in our society: 1) One who simply agrees with Christ’s or the church’s teachings; 2) One who attends a particular church or denomination; 3) One who is morally good. None of these definitions are accurate, but yet this is what most of the culture believes.
Now how did Jesus define what a real Christian is?
“UNLESS A MAN IS BORN AGAIN HE CANNOT SEE THE KINGDOM OF GOD” (John 3:3). This powerful statement from the lips of Jesus removed any and every other way of seeing the kingdom of God. Born again people are the only kind of Christians there are! However, to many people in America and around the world “born again” is just another denomination. So the question needs to be:
WHAT DOES IT REALLY MEAN TO BE BORN AGAIN?
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them” (Ez. 36:26-27).
Let me be very plain: A born again Christian is a person who has a new heart and a new spirit from God. Once he receives Jesus Christ he receives new desires. He begins to hate what God hates and to love what God loves. The habitual desire to sin is removed from him. His sinful nature is taken away and he receives the life and nature of God in his spirit. This is the greatest miracle! Without it every man is separated from God for all of eternity, and does not possess an inner grace and power to be Christ-like in this life.
The reason a real Christian cannot keep living the same old way is because he has the nature of God, the very seed of God, abiding in him (1 John 3:9). He cannot tolerate sin in his life. Birds do not swim, fish do not fly, and a real Christian cannot habitually practice sin. To do so would be to go against his new nature. A lifestyle of sin is totally incompatible with the seed of God. For a professing Christian to love sin and continually make every effort to enjoy sin is proof that he is not born of God. Proof of the new birth is a new life.
Once that incorruptible seed (1 Pet. 1:23) is sown within a man, a tree will come forth from his life that bears good fruit (Mat 7:16-20). You know a real Christian by his fruit (his behavior and actions.) There are many who profess Christ, but in works they deny Him (Titus 1:16). A real Christian seeks to please God in thought, word, motive, and deed. It is his nature!
THE BASIC PROBLEM WITH EVERY HUMAN BEING
What a person does comes out of who he is. The basic problem with every human being is that they are rotten in the core of their being. They have a sinful nature and a general hardness of heart. It does not matter how morally good and clean they seem to be on the outside. There is a huge difference between a morally good person and one who has God’s nature and has truly been born from above.
In the sight of God the best of mortal man’s deeds are like filthy rags and polluted garments (Isa. 64:6). It’s not by works we are saved, but by God’s grace through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God (Eph. 2:8). Say that last phrase over and over again; not of yourselves...not of yourselves...not of yourselves. God only accepts what He Himself has done to regenerate a man. God sent His Son, and he that has the Son has life (that is the nature of God), and he who does not have the Son does not have life (1 John 5:12). It’s that simple.
ONLY TWO KINDS OF PEOPLE
There are only two kinds of people in this world: Those who have the eternal life of God in them and those who do not. There are those whose hearts have truly been changed by God’s power and those who have not. It is really all a question of a person’s spiritual condition. There can be no mixture. You’re either born again or you’re not.
There is no such thing as a Methodist Christian, a Baptist Christian, a Catholic Christian or a Pentecostal Christian. God is not a Catholic or a Protestant or an Evangelical. He is not a Hindu, a Buddhist, or a Muslim. He is not a Mormon or a Jehovah’s Witness. Those are man-made labels to identify people and their religious persuasions. God did not come to this earth in the form of man to start a new religion. He came to give us life! Away with religion and give me life!
Here’s another truth: God did not create you and I for sin and evil. He created us to have His life. He created us to be holy and righteous. In the beginning He imparted to man His life and nature, and then restored that life and nature to man through the cross. You cannot have God’s life and nature until you believe on the Son of God, Jesus Christ. One of the problems in Christianity today is that the word, ‘believe’, merely means to acknowledge God’s existence, but in the Bible believe implies obedience. God gives eternal salvation and His Holy Spirit to those who obey Him (Heb 5:9) (Acts 5:32).
GRACE TO OBEY
Not only does God inwardly transform us by giving us a new heart and a new spirit (nature) through his amazing grace, but He also gives us grace to obey. Notice the second part Ezekiel 36:26-27 again: “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.”
The new nature from God will work obedience in you and cause your walk to match your talk. You will keep God’s Word. You will do God’s Word. Once a person dies and his spirit leaves his body it is too late to alter a person’s nature and birth change in him. To say it another way, at the time of physical death a person’s spiritual nature is irreversible. His spiritual condition will remain the same forever. It is only in this earthly life that it can be altered.
A MAN'S TRUE SPIRITUAL CONDITION IS IRREVERSIBLE AT DEATH
“He who is unjust, let him be unjust still; he who is filthy, let him be filthy still; he who is righteous, let him be righteous still; he who is holy, let him be holy still” (Rev. 22:11).
“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God” (I Cor. 6:9-11).
No one with a sinful nature can inherit the kingdom of God. Sin and holiness can never touch each other.
When someone flippantly says, “I’m going to hell because that is where my friends are,” he is telling the truth. A man with a sinful nature could never survive the pure and holy atmosphere of heaven. So if a professing Christian down here on the earth enjoys hanging out in a place where evil and lustful passions rule, and where sin abounds, then his nature has likely never been changed, and he is still in his sins.
Being born again is a radical transformation. It is a miracle of great proportions. To professing Christians everywhere, let us not cheapen the grace of God with definitions and a lifestyle that are not worthy of real Christianity. And let us not frustrate the grace of God by not yielding to the new life and nature of God by which we’ve been changed.
Once again, true biblical grace gives us both the desire and ability to live in obedience to God. If enough professing Christians in America heed this message, we could have a national awakening unlike anything we’ve seen in the history of our nation. (excerpt from THE REAL SALVATION - first among a four-book series, Discerning The True From The False. The others are: THE REAL GOSPEL, THE REAL JESUS, & THE REAL SPIRIT OF REVIVAL).
Please share with your unsaved loved ones and friends. Pray for them. Learn to present the basics of the gospel. This is a year of great joy from reaping a great harvest of souls.
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