It’s time for the real you!

Spring is the time to exchange the old drab clothes of winter for something bright and cool. It’s time for the shorts and polos that have been hidden in the closet and drawers for months to again be worn in the sun and warmth.

It is also time for me to discard those winter clothes that are worn out and not me anymore. But since I am a keeper, this is hard. Thankfully, my wife pushes me to thin out my old clothes, because I have some I have not worn for years. She says, when I get something new, “Now what are you getting rid of?”

For all of us, now is the time to let go of the old garments of our tired self-story and put on the new Jesus story as our life. It is time to let go of the false image you have been trying to portray for years. It’s time to let go of the fears, the private lies you have held onto since a child, and the envy of not getting to be who you wanted to be. You can let all these things and others go because you do not need them anymore. They are false and are not the true you.

Paul teaches us in his Evangel that who we really are is Jesus. Before Jesus came, humanity lived with a false image of itself. Jesus corrected that by becoming our failed humanity, dying to the falsehood, and then raising us together with Him to live in the new humanity, as Him. Paul said…put off from you as regards your former behavior, the old humanity, which is corrupted…and to put on the new humanity which, in accord with God, is being created in righteousness and benignity of the truth. (Eph.4.22-24 CLNT). The new humanity is Christ. He is the new creation that Paul says we have become in Him (2 Cor.5.17).

This new set of clothes, our new humanity, is not strange or unrealistic to us. They are who we have been all along, we just did not know it. Many of us have not realized that we are created to be someone different than who we thought. Hidden under the falsehood of our pretending is the real us, waiting for us to discover in Jesus. Paul said it is as simple as putting off and putting on. Notice again the order. We first put off something that is not true. We realize what we thought was the real us is false. But modern Christianity has taught us the other way around, put on so we can put off. It has taught us to try to be like Jesus, as an exchange for our old life. But we cannot become someone we are not already. We can only be who God created us to be, a son of God in Jesus. This is why we have said in this ministry, be who you already are. Be Jesus because that is the best you there is.

The springtime of your life is here. It is time to shed the drab clothes of falsehood. It is time to always think and speak of yourself as living, walking, and seated with Jesus. See life through His eyes and heart, without any thought or concern for the things of this world. Likewise, realize He lives in you, just as you are with all the frailties of your humanity. You do not have to change a thing. Let Him be your life and transform you as He sees fit.  This is true, authentic life.

Be the real you, be Jesus

Dennis