Some people don’t like change
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Faith Fitness
Bro. Sam Kaufman
They say change is hard. Perhaps it requires acclimation or some getting used to, but change is spectacular when it is God’s change.
Seasonal changes are now evident. Leaves are changing color and falling during fall. The wind is blowing them from trees.
How do I know? They’re all over our pool. Reminder to self: Winterize the pool. I’m such a procrastinator.
We can’t put off things with God. He reminds us of that in scripture. With God, there’s no better day than today! There’s no better time than now!
He explains our life is but a vapor — here one day, gone the next. Have you given Him your old tattered garment for a robe of pure white? What an exchange! What a change! We can’t wait too long with our decisions for God.
The Bible states in II Corinthians 6:2, “(For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succored thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.)” Tomorrow can be too late! Don’t put off those pivotal decisions for God. Tomorrow may never come!
God’s initial change in our life is miraculous and spectacular. It is so thorough that He calls us a new creature in Him. We’re born again of the Spirit! It entails quite the change.
Seasonally speaking, it’s like going from winter to spring. New life appears. The sun shines. Everything’s so vibrant. Jesus is risen from the dead. He imparts new life.
With the Lord, it’s all about change — good change that is as evident (if not more so) than seasonal change. It’s a complete 180 in one’s life. You go from darkness to light.
I went from being a hooligan to a Christian. Straight up. It was the Lord’s doing, and it was marvelous in my mother’s eyes. No more misbehaving my momma. She could tell you. The guys thought I was insane when I no longer partook with them after softball games. The campus police I lied to years before perhaps did a double take when I felt compelled to tell the truth.
Back to II Corinthians. This time II Corinthians 5, which states: “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things are become new. And all things are of God…”
A true salvation experience will reveal a difference in someone’s life. Sins are gone (praise the Lord), and Christ takes up residency in the heart! Some mock at the transformation.
“Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you.” – I Peter 4:4.
Nicodemus had a hard time grasping the concept. Jesus told him a man must be born again to enter the Kingdom of God. Nicodemus basically asked, “How can a man re-enter his mother’s womb?” In this conversation, Jesus was zigging, and Nicodemus was zagging. Jesus was speaking in spiritual terms, and Nicodemus was focused on the natural.
Jesus eventually responded with this in John 3, “Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.”
Basically, Jesus said God performs an inner work in a man that is not observable to the naked eye, but the result — or the change — is easily detected. You can’t see the wind blowing — but you see the effect of it. In a natural analogy, I don’t see the actual wind in our backyard, but leaves are rustling and then falling into the pool. Time to do something about it!
Sam Kaufman pastors The Church of God at 405 13th Ave. N in Alex City. Contact him at 432-266-0154.