June 24 | 2 Corinthians 5:14-15, 17, 21

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DAILY READING

2 Corinthians 5:14-15, 17, 21

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REFLECTION

A New Creation

By Beth Voltmann

 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:

The old has gone, the new is here!

(2 Corinthians 5:17)

I ponder these verses while holding a 6-day old grandson in my arms for his 1:30 am feeding. Gazing at his little face, I feel such love and wonder at the gift of new life. I am reminded that God loved us so much that he sent his one and only Son to die in our place, for our sins, so that we could experience new life. (John 3:16)

What good news - we are not only saved but born again! A new creation. The old has gone – the new is here. Like newborn babies, we are precious in the Father’s sight. He holds us close, feeds us with his Word, guides us in the path of faith, and calls us his own.

See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! (1 John 3:1)

Often, on this side of heaven, I don’t feel like a new creation – do you? It is easy for us to forget Christ’s great sacrifice and the unending love, compassion and forgiveness that the Lord daily provides. Instead, we tend to focus on personal weaknesses, faults, and failures as we experience the effect of passing time on our minds and bodies. New life? It feels more like old life…and getting older.

The reality is that we are not fully mature in our faith from the moment we are born again in Christ Jesus; rather, we are a new creation in process. The Lord is always working to transform us until the day that he calls us to our eternal home. This is the promise for believers through Jesus – the spiritual timeline of our lives of faith:

DOCTRINE OF SALVATION

Justification (saved from the penalty of sin)

Sanctification (saved from the power of sin)

Glorification (saved from the presence of sin)

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us,

 so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

(2 Corinthians 5:21)

In this quiet moment of the night, holding a newborn, I recognize the wondrous gift of new life in Christ. Jesus came to bear sin for you - for me. As his new creation, I bear his righteousness. Therefore, God is not looking on my past but gazing with love at his precious child. He is actively guiding my future and loving me deeply – loving you deeply.

For now I see only a reflection as in a mirror; then I shall see face to face.

Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

(1 Corinthians 13:12)

PRAYER

Father God, thank you for the wondrous gift of new life in Christ.

The old has gone, the new is here!

Hallelujah and Amen!

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

BETH VOLTMANN

After moving to Ohio in 1997 with my husband and four children, I developed a hunger for God’s Word through adult teaching and women’s Bible study at UALC. My passion is to help others understand Scripture so that they may grow in their desire for more of God and experience the new life offered to us through Christ Jesus.