May 23

Ever heard the old saying, “God loves you just the way you are but too much to let you stay that way”? It’s true. Jesus died for you, for all of us, “…while we were yet sinners…” so it’s evident we don’t need to become righteous in order to impress the Lord; we don’t need to save ourselves before He can save us!

Yet, it’s equally true that He doesn’t want us to continue as we are, to cling to our sin, once He’s washed us in His shed blood through our acceptance of Him as our Savior and Lord. How can we, who have been nurtured in the soil of self and sin, then become transformed?

Psalm 41:3, 4 tells us that it is He who accomplishes the redemptive work in us. We need only surrender to Him as He does the job—sort of like a baby that needs only to sit in the little bath tub while Mommy does the scrubbing. It says, “The Lord will sustain and refresh and strengthen the one who is languishing in sin because he cries, ’Lord, be merciful; heal my inner self for I have sinned against You.’”

Jesus does the work of redemption—makes the sinner spotless to stand before God. The One who inhabits eternity sees what Jesus has done and accepts the penitent child who’s been newly adopted into His family. It now remains for the new member of God’s family to appropriate the mind of Christ to supersede his own mind and to be transformed into a reflection of Jesus. This process assures that he’ll not remain as he was but become like Jesus!