“…to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to the light; that they might be delivered from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and a place among those who have been sanctified by faith.” (Acts 26:18)
As the world seems to be descending into an unprecedented time of chaos and change, remember that with God there is “no shade or turning,” remaining the same today as yesterday. Yet, in reflecting upon the here-and-now as individual believers and “our place in the world to come,” we might do well to dwell less on our externalization of scripture and focus instead upon our personal internalization of what the apostle Paul meant by, “putting on the mind of Christ.”
The Christian sacrament of baptism is symbolic of a lot more than just a public acknowledgement of our personal repentance and acceptance of the salvific grace of Christ. True baptism constitutes an effectual cleansing that makes room for the Holy Spirit. Although our initial conversion signals a change of conscience regarding our place in the world, it also intuits a corresponding transformation of the heart, mind, and soul in congress with the Holy Spirit. And, while there is a direct correlation between forgiveness and remorse, grace is not a panacea for continuing addiction. It remains a matter of choice then whether we are to die in our addictions, our spiritual ignorance,, or live by the light of Christ, a process which intuits a liberal application of will.
Yet, altering our spiritual perception of ourselves and others is no easy task, as even believing Christians often mistake the simple act of repentance as the promised transformation. To be clear, “Conversion is not regeneration!” While the message of the Gospel can be instrumental in transmuting darkness into light, that is only the beginning of a process whereby we become emmisaries of that light. Although a requisite belief in God and an acknowledgement of the incarnation and meritous sacrifice of His son Jesus is fundamental to the alchemy of spiritual transformation, it is something we must work out for ourselves in agreement with and through the activity of the Holy Spirit.
The call of salvation then is to become acquainted with that activity of faith which promotes the actualization of holiness, “…that through these promises we might become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corrupting influences of the world.” (2 Pet. 1:4) Simply put, acknowledging Christ as the architect of our salvation is not the same as having received something personal and eternal from him. In the same token, we can’t expect to become partakers of his nature if we continue to drink from the fount of worldly corruption–“…for as many of you who have been baptized into Christ, the same have put on Christ.” (Gal. 3:27) The proof of salvation then is not found in baptismal certificates, pledges of faith, or in corporate repetitions of foundational beliefs, but only in confirmation of the fact “that we have been brought to the place where we are able to receive something directly from God.” (Chambers) That place is our own Golgotha, a place of crucifixion that results in a spiritual resurrection into the life and ministry of Jesus. That then is the evidence of our testimony of what God has done for us and through us, that the “hope that is in us might become the hope that they pray for,”…a living inheritance among those who are being sanctified.” (Acts 20:32)
CoupStick Chaplain 