Memorials to the Old Man

When we receive Jesus Christ as our personal Savior, we become a new creation. When we are baptized into Christ, our old man is cut off, and we enter in to the resurrection life of Christ.  The old man is dead and we can now live in newness of life.  It is a completely different way of being than we have experienced before.  The Holy Spirit gives us the power to remain in the place of new life.

Giving credit to my husband for this illustration, I want to paint a picture of why we need to renew our minds about the reality of our new position in Christ.  When Jesus died, He died AS us not FOR us.  We are now dead.  The life we live is no longer our own, but it is Christ who lives life in us.

So, the question is, why do we still sin?

We fall into old ways of being and thinking, because there are memories of the old nature that are still alive and drawing us into a false relationship with the old man.

Here is the illustration:

A woman had a child she loved very much.  The child died in a tragic accident.  The woman keeps the child’s bedroom exactly as it was when the child was alive.  All the trophies are still on the bureau.  All the pictures are still on the wall, the clothes are still in the closet, the stuffed animals still on the bed.  The bedroom has become a memorial to the dead child.  She is trying to keep the dead child alive in her mind.  Every time the woman passes the room, she looks in and remembers the child she loved.  The memories take her back, if only for a moment, to the time the child was alive.

We also have memorials (memories) keeping the old man alive in our minds.  When we experience something that reminds us of your old nature, it is like the woman viewing a trophy of the dead child.  It is just activating a memory of the child; it is not bringing the child back to life.  When those temptations or memories surface, we have to remind ourselves they are just shadows of what has already died. 

Temptation appeals to the dead man.  However, it is just a memory of a habit.  It is a false pleasure or a perversion of the life of God.  For instance, the smell of smoke sometimes appeals to the appetites of a former smoker.  It has the potential to activate the nature of the old man, but even if he indulges in the habit of the old man, that is not his true identity.  The fact remains; he is still dead.

The woman can go into the room of the dead child and she can laugh over good memoires.  She can cry over things she wished could be different and re-live experiences in her mind.  That doesn’t change the fact that the child is still dead.  So, when temptation comes, it is just a memory of the old man.  When we recognize that we are participating in a habit, we can remind ourselves that it is just a place of memorial, and the authority it had over our lives has been removed. 

The new creation man has the power to choose new life in Christ.  We never stop being a new creation.  We never stop being IN the new man. 

When we sin, it is like taking a picture of the old man and gazing at it.  We get confused that it is still our picture.  We activate a memory that wants that old man to be alive, just like the woman would like the child to be alive.   Our habits are like that much loved child which the woman cannot let go of.  Continual renewal of the mind will enable us to live on THIS side of the cross; in the resurrection.  The old man is dead.  The new man is seated with Christ.  His life is our life.  Our life is His life.  We need to let go of the old man to fully step into our future.   

The New Man is our identity.  Our new identity is not in what we do, even if we do new things.  Our identity is that we are a new creation and we now have full access to all the resurrection power that Jesus purchased when He was raised from the dead.  When He was raised, we were raised in Him.

When we find ourselves in sin, all we need to do is apologize to God for forgetting who we are, and fall back into our identity as a much loved son; a new creation in Him.  It is as easy as just starting over again to walk in newness of life.