Sunday October 17, 2021
Spiritual Cocoon
The Bible tells us that one of the highest, ultimate goals that God has in store for each one of us is our transformation in Him. The Bible tells us that God wants to sanctify us and transform us into the express image of His son, Jesus Christ. When we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior we are giving God authority to do this transformation.
God requires us to die to self. He wants to see you ‘die to self’ so He can live ‘in you’. He wants you to completely surrender your life and old self to Him so He can re-create you into a brand new creation.
For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren (Rom.8:29).
Paul expresses it so beautifully.
And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness . . . . (Rom.6:18-19)
Christianity is about change…conversion. A true Christian is a convert in an actual sense, being a person who with God’s help has changed his or her thoughts and actions to live the much higher standards taught by Jesus Christ. A Christian’s assignment in life is this:
So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed (transformed) from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. (Rom.12:2 TMSG)
God expects us to be radically transformed and radically changed. But that’s not the whole story. You will be able to discern and do God’s will only when you let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. The original Greek calls us to “be transformed,” not by our own efforts, but by the power of God.
The verb meaning “be transformed” uses a Greek tense that conveys an ongoing process. Transformation doesn’t happen automatically, once-and-for-all, when we first put our faith in Christ. Rather, it is a life-long process of opening ourselves to God’s renewing power.
Notice that God transforms you by changing the way you think. This renewed mind comes as you allow the Holy Spirit to teach you the truth in God’s Word. Though we cannot transform ourselves, we can participate in that which opens our minds to the Spirit. As this happens, we will be able to know God’s will so that we might desire it and do it. This power of transformation comes from one source. Paul said,
For the message of the cross (the gospel) is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God (1 Cor.1:18).
Transformed lives begin with the gospel message of Christ, for in it is the power of God. It is the gospel that brings us salvation:
I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith’ (Rom.1:16-17).
Only God can effect such a change. The great difference between self-generated transformation and biblical conversion is that God is the One ultimately at work to effect the change. The only way we can be transformed is by operating, in all areas of life, under the grace of God, who gives to all who believe in Him unconditionally. It means letting God put us in His cocoon of transformation. God, who has not only chosen us, desires to change us…a true metamorphosis. (See WORD WISDOM for a deeper study of chosen)
Every day I notice more areas in my life I need to change. I admit I can be tempted to just allow temporary solutions to make me feel better about myself. I’ve learned we can’t change and grow on our own power. We can rejoice and be thankful for a merciful, gracious, and loving God.
When we choose to go to Him, often He will bring strong believers into our lives to encourage us. Our Heavenly Father knows we can’t mature alone. We need Him and one another to “grow in grace and knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Pet.3:18).
That is the beginning of true transformation, and this is the place we should all long to be…wrapped in His cocoon…His very glory!
But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. (2 Cor.3:18)
