Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
If you knew me in middle school, you probably would have known one of two versions of me, but probably not both. The first version is what I would call Christian Chris. This was the kid that was born and raised in a believing household. He went to church every single week with his family. He read the Bible. He had the verses memorized. He sang the worship songs. He did all of the right things. He was polite and kind. He got decent grades in school. He was never a bully.
The Other Side
But there was another side of me that only a certain group of people got to see. This was the antithesis of Christian Chris. He was the one that had a rebellious spirit. He was the one that didn't like rules. He was the one that was making sure he was getting into trouble any moment that he could.
On the outside, I would have said that I was a believer. But if you actually looked at the fruit in my life or the lack thereof, I don't think you could have been much further from the truth.
What I think I needed to hear back then is the same truth that we read in our Verse of the Day today.
It comes from Romans chapter 8, verse 2. Paul writes, "And because you belong to Him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death."
Why I Said I Was a Believer
I've thought about why I might have said I was a believer and yet lived completely differently. To be honest with you, it wasn't because I hated the idea of being a Christian. It wasn't because I didn't want life with God. It wasn't that I wanted to actively lie to all the people in my life that thought I was a good person.
What My Real Problem Was
When I really boil it down, I think my problem was that I didn't fully realize what it meant to have a relationship with God. I don't think I really knew the weight of what it meant to be called His child, that He looks at me like He looks at His own begotten Son, Jesus.
I don't think I had allowed myself to feel the full weight of sorrow that my Savior died a gruesome death on a cross—the death that I should have died.
The Joy of Eternal Life
I don't think it fully hit what joy there is in knowing that there is an eternal life, in a perfect creation, with a perfect God, where every moment will just be spent worshiping Him with thoughts, words, and actions, where every tear is wiped away, where every sorrow and pain is cast aside.
To put it plainly in the way that the Apostle Paul does here, I don't think I appreciated what it meant to belong to God.
Who We Belong to, Who We're Becoming
The truth is that who we belong to, or what we belong to, is directly connected to who or what we are becoming. I think for a lot of us, we love the idea of what it means to belong to God—that we've been saved from hell, that we've been given new life, that God wants to transform us into the image of His Son.
When we peel back the surface layers of life, we find a lot of things that tell us that we're not becoming more like Jesus. We're becoming more like the world. In that case, the reality is we probably in some sense still belong to our sin.
I'm not saying all of us need to be perfect. I'm saying that there should be a path in one direction that we're taking.
Are We Moving Toward Sin or Toward God?
Are we moving closer to sin or are we moving closer to God? For every single one of us, I think it does us well to pause and ask: Who do I belong to? Am I still wearing the shackles of sin? Are all of my old temptations and vices still bringing me down, keeping me from fully appreciating what it means to belong to God and everything that comes along with it?
Have I received the power of His life-giving Spirit? Death is not something that we have to be afraid of anymore. Jesus has died for us so that we might enter into new life.
Let's not just be nominal Christians saying we believe and living in a different way. Let's actually belong to God, receive the power of His life-giving Spirit, and begin to live that truth.
