Forty Days Full - An Invitation To Real Life

conditions. I've heard it said that religion is form without power. Changing behavior without the power of the Holy Spirit is like telling someone to drive to the store without any gas in the tank. To start a transformation with an emphasis on behaviors is like trying to tell a pig not to roll in the mud. Without the power of a changed identity, a pig will always roll in the mud. Our belief in the work of Christ is that He came to make all things new...even me!!

“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 NIV)

Jesus didn't just take my sin upon himself... He became sin for me. There is a dramatic difference! He became the embodiment of sin. The last time the holy had become sinful was with Adam and Eve. When Jesus became sinful even the creation reacted to the contradiction—there was thunder, lightning and an earthquake. But sin could not contaminate Him, and death could not hold Him. In His death he destroyed both sin and death. He burst forth into the gates of hell and took from Satan the keys that held all humanity captive. God demonstrated in both earth and heaven that holiness is more powerful than sinfulness. In the same way we don't take on righteousness - we become righteousness. Righteousness is gifted to us. We get what Jesus got—rightness with God. Jesus is the first born of a new breed of humanity—the righteousness of God. It is impossible by human effort to accomplish what Christ already did. I've been made righteous by His extreme generosity! Jesus didn't just pay a price we didn't have enough money to pay. He changed our nature.