(Comments by Joan Boney)
Before I was born again, I pursued my own interest and did whatever was necessary to get my own way in life. I would lie, cheat and do what I thought would make me succeed.
This is the way most people are before they are born again. Inside they are set to do what they can to benefit themselves but outwardly they try to cause us to think they are good people.
Matthew 23 (Jesus says) 25 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
28 Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
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God kept me safe from myself even before I was born again.
I am greatly ashamed of those things I once did before I was born again.
And I am truly amazed at God's protection over me during those years.
Like the apostle Paul, I'm sure I did no good thing and there is no good thing done by me today except by the Holy Spirit WHO dwells in my body.
Romans 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing:
I lived by the ways of the flesh which are the ways of death.
I Corinthians 6
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.
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I thought I was a Christian because I went forward at church and was baptized in water. But I lived totally by the flesh and was out to fulfill my own desires and thought almost nothing of any other person and rarely even had God come to my mind.
Then God brought the following thoughts to my mind to show me what I was really doing all those previous years:
God said to me: "Joan ... you know all those 'mistakes' you've been making all these years. Those weren't mistakes. Those were sins."
I was changed instantly from that person I had been. God gave me a new heart and a new Spirit causing me to be as a new person. Now I desired to learn about God. Scripture became important to me. I wanted to be with people of God, the church. I no longer wanted to be with the people I had associated with before this. I was changed by God.
II Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
Ezekiel 36 (This happened to me):
And I (God) will sanctify MY great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, saith the Lord GOD, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes.
24 For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land.
25 Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you.
26 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.
27 And I will put MY spirit within you, and cause you to walk in MY statutes, and ye shall keep MY judgments, and do them.
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It didn't happen because of my own will or any good thing I was doing.
God chose me to be HIS child. It happened because it was the will of God for me.
It is not that we love God but HE loved us and it was HIS will that we be saved and HE showed us HIS life and HIS way and gave us a new heart and a new Spirit of God and changed us from inside.
And HE changed us instantly.
Then after we were born again by God, we read the Bible and desired to do HIS will because HE changed us and gave us that desire and removed our old fleshly desires and taught us by HIS Spirit WHO lived in us.
It is the greatest thing that has ever happen to me and by this I understand what Jesus meant in the following scripture.
Matthew 13:45-46 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: 46 Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it.
For no cost is too great to pay for this "pearl". Nothing can equal what it means.
Things of the world can seem important and enticing. But their appeal has a way of disappearing in time. And when we go after such desires often we find it isn't worth what we paid to get it.
But we never regret the cost for things of God.
The apostle Paul explains:
Philippians 3
5 Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee; 6 Concerning zeal, persecuting the church; touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless.
7 But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.
8 Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,
9 And be found in HIM, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith:
10 That I may know HIM, and the power of HIS resurrection, and the fellowship of HIS sufferings, being made conformable unto HIS death;
11 If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.
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God chose us not because of our goodness but because it was HIS will to do so. And now our righteousness is of God for HE did all the work in changing us into the image of Christ by HIS will.
As we go through life, after we are born again, we are recreated in the image of Christ each time a scripture is revealed to us and we do what God shows us to do.
God is the creator. We are HIS workmanship
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