“Christ’s resurrection is your resurrection too. This is why we are to yearn for all that is above, for that’s where Christ sits enthroned at the place of all power, honor, and authority! Yes, feast on all the treasures of the heavenly realm and fill your thoughts with heavenly realities, and not with the distractions of the natural realm. Your crucifixion with Christ has severed the tie to this life, and now your true life is hidden away in God in Christ. And as Christ Himself is seen for who He really is, who you really are will also be revealed, for you are now one with Him in His glory! For you have acquired new creation life which is continually being renewed into the likeness of the One who created you; giving you the full revelation of God. In this new creation life, your nationality makes no difference, nor your ethnicity, education, nor economic status—they matter nothing. For it is Christ that means everything as He lives in every one of us!” Colossians 3:1-4, 10-11 TPT
Happy new You indeed! We don’t need new year resolutions, what we need is the renewed mind revelation. There’s no way we can read those verses and not get excited all over again about all Jesus has done to make us new. Your new life is not what you’re trying to make it, but what has already been done for us. All we need to do is walk in it. We have been given a lifetime guarantee of being continually renewed into His likeness.
If you’re given to feeling badly about yourself read the entire chapter. What you were or used to do has been swallowed up by the life of Christ in you. You’re no longer your past sins and behaviors. Not if you have turned from your old life to embrace the sacrificial love of Jesus. Remember the old is gone and the new is here because we are in Christ. You are thrice loved: God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit has adopted you into their family. Jesus Himself has revealed the Father to you. You have been resurrected, passed from death to life.
Listen to these words of the apostle Paul. He knew what it meant to celebrate his new life. None of us have even come close to doing the things Paul did before his conversion, yet you’d never know it by the way he lived his new life.
“My old identity has been co-crucified with Christ and no longer lives. And now the essence of this new life is no longer mine, for the Anointed One lives his life through me—we live in union as one! My new life is empowered by the faith of the Son of God who loves me so much that he gave himself for me, dispensing his life into mine!”
Galatians 2:20 TPT
Paul also wrote that in order to move forward in our new identity we must learn to forget the past failures of our lives. The enemy knows that condemnation is his best weapon against those who have a low estimation of themselves, or aren’t confident in the love God has for them. If every time you mess up you immediately think that God no longer loves you, you’ll run away instead of running towards Him. You’re still new no matter how many times you mess up. How do I know that? Before Jesus Christ came into your life, sinning never bothered you. It was who you were, a sinner. It was pleasurable to you. What you’re experiencing now is an awakening in your recreated spirit that you have displeased your Lord.
Your conscience is alive to God’s Spirit in you. Repent and continue enjoying your fellowship with Him. Run away and the enemy torments and taunts you. Do what Paul says: Forgetting those things that are behind and press into your new identity. Draw upon the life of Christ in you. We sin less when we acknowledge Him more. Remember what Paul also wrote in Philippians 4:8? The new you thinks differently.
“I don’t depend on my own strength to accomplish this; however I do have one compelling focus: I forget all of the past as I fasten my heart to the future instead.”Philippians 3:13 TPT
Happy New Year! Happy New You! You are destined to do great things. If you can believe it, you will receive it. See yourself the way God sees you. Speak His promises over your life. Live with a confident expectation of good. Live your new life to the fullest. You can’t move forward in reverse. God has spoken and you cannot annul it. He finishes everything He starts. And He has started a work in you.
“I pray with great faith for you, because I’m fully convinced that the One who began this gracious work in you will faithfully continue the process of maturing you until the unveiling of our Lord Jesus Christ!” Philippians 1:6 TPT
“I am the Lord, who opened a way through the waters, making a dry path through the sea. I called forth the mighty army of Egypt with all its chariots and horses. I drew them beneath the waves, and they drowned, their lives snuffed out like a smoldering candlewick. “But forget all that— it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.”
Isaiah 43:16-19 NLT
Forget what was. See what He’s doing for you. You haven’t been this way before. It’s all new, prepared and planned just for you. Move with the rhythms of His grace. Paul did. The old is gone, the new is here. Leave 2021 in the rear view mirror of history. Don’t look back. There’s too much ahead of you. Seize the moment. Shake off old mindsets and destructive habits. Start dreaming again. Start singing again. Get your joy back. Look in the mirror and declare, “I’m back! Happy New Me!” To the glory of God!
Remember that in order to look back, you’ll have to turn around. Keep moving forward your good Shepherd is leading the way to green pastures. This is your year to thrive!
Written by permission of the Holy Spirit
W. Tennant
January 14, 2022