January 24, 2014

Psalm 27:1-6, 1 Samuel 9:27—10:8, Galatians 2:1-10

The words that stand out the most to me are in verse 6 in Samuel. "You will be changed into a different person."

What does it mean to be changed into a different person? For some, like King Saul in the Old Testament, or Saul (who changed his name to Paul) in the New Testament, it is obvious. King Saul was overcome by the Spirit of God and prophesied. Paul went from persecuting Christians to preaching the Gospel of Jesus. For others, maybe it is more subtle. Perhaps if you first encountered God as a child, you maybe didn't have as much baggage to turn from. BUT, perhaps getting on the right path early on spared you from all the other options that you could have taken. It's hard to know. Or, maybe you started out on the right path...then took another path...then another...and then had another encounter with God as an adult. Or maybe something else!

Everyone has a different story. But there seems to be a need for change in every story. "You will be changed into a different person." Either a different person than you already were, or into a different person than what you could have been.

2 Corinthians 5:13-21 (I bolded some)

If it seems we are crazy, it is to bring glory to God. And if we are in our right minds, it is for your benefit. Either way, Christ’s love controls us. Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we have all died to our old life. He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, who died and was raised for them.

So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.

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Amen!