I’m A Christian Too!

The Bible teaches that there are secrets things that belong to God and for at least the time being He’s chosen to keep many of them to Himself; but on the other hand, there are secrets that He had kept hidden for ages, but eventually determined to reveal so that we’d follow Him. Those secret things are often referred to as “mysteries.” In the New Testament one of those mysteries is revealed to us as “Christ in you,” the Eternal God of the universe taking up residence in the heart (the inmost being) of every Genuine Christian and absolutely no one else on the face of this earth. Stop and think about that for a minute! By understanding that concept you’ll hopefully begin to see the impact that will have on the life of a genuinely converted person – another way of saying a Genuine Christian.

This is not only an amazing truth, but a major contributing factor in why every Genuine Christian can and will live a unique life; not a perfect life, but certainly one that’s different than the world around us. Yes, a Genuine Christian can fall into sin. We are capable of looking as much like the world as the worst of heathens at times, but that is the exception not the rule. Think about it. If God indwells every Genuine Believer, then He goes everywhere we go and everything we do, He is in some sense along for the ride. The truth is God simply wouldn’t allow us to go that far for that long. So while the concept of God taking up residence within the heart of a sinful human being is hard to fathom, and although it’s difficult to understand, it’s a fact and is the defining difference between a Genuine Christian and the rest of mankind. That’s why I said “A Genuine Christian is a Unique Human Being …” That would make us unique wouldn’t it? And if that’s the case we would live and think and act and set priorities something like unique human beings or we’d have to conclude either one of two possibilities; our sinful natures have the capacity to trump God’s Spirit in us, or God’s Spirit in us is for the most part anemic, pathetic and without effect, or at least without any significant effect. Those would be our only two options! God is hardly anemic and He is certainly not pathetic. He is “omnipotent” meaning “all powerful.” Neither can our sinful natures trump His powerful presence in us, therefore, we’d have to conclude that even weakened by our sinful natures we’d still live different than the world around us - if we are Christians. The Bible doesn’t question that concept, people do and for very good reason. Try this one.

There are millions of Professing Christians who know something about what the Bible teaches about being a Believer. They really do want to be one, but it seems that as hard as they try they are powerless to live it out. They want to be Christian because they understand the benefits, but their sin nature always seems to get the upper hand. Now, they do have a fix for that dilemma which is to reinterpret the orthodox teachings of Scripture to conform to the particular characteristics of their sinful natures they don’t seem to be able to get under control, rather than bring that facet of their lives under the authority of God’s word. And they get plenty of help and encouragement from other Nominal Christians, many of whom are teachers and preachers “bent” in the same direction. But the fact remains as hard as they try they just can’t seem to do the Christian life for any prolonged period of time, part of which is to rightly interpret and submit to the authority of the Bible. Other professing Christians both “Nominal” and “Genuine” sympathize with them and don’t understand it either because “they say they’re a Christian,” and rather than entertain the thought that they might not be, they cling to “once saved always saved” which is absolutely true if the Spirit of Christ lives in them. As I said in the very first paragraph of this book I’m not judging anyone, but the Bible does and clearly teaches that “everyone born of God overcomes the world” where “overcomes the world” means that those born of God are no longer controlled by their sinful natures, but rather by God’s Spirit who lives in them. Clearly the Bible teaches that when it says, “You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature, but by the Spirit if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.” That verse is just one of many that teach the same thing, that if God has taken up residence in you, then your life will be characterized by His Spirit, not by the world. Why would we think anything different given our uniqueness? The Bible doesn’t.