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Conversion

by Jerry Ousley
6/08/2018 / Christian Living

When we were teenagers we loved putting together model cars. It was mostly myself, my brother and my cousin. We would put them together and paint them the color we wanted and we had a lot of fun with that. We would trade them, paint them a different color and so on and so forth. But one day we became bored with just putting them together the way the instructions suggested. So we would take our models and using a hot bobby pin or something similar, would cut the plastic and change it. We’d cut holes in the hoods so we could mount a big chrome breather on the engine. We’d make spoilers out of other parts and glue them to the trunks of the cars. We’d take pieces of scrap plastic and glue them to the axles of the back wheels so that the car would be jacked up in the back. This opened a whole new world of model cars for us and we would basically take a stock model car and convert it into something else. The basic car was still there but it was now different.

Conversion is a vital part of our salvation experience. You see being saved from the destruction of Hell requires us to be converted into something else. 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” And then also in Galatians 5:15, “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.” We look the same on the outside. We still wear the same clothes, but inside when we really get saved we are transformed, or converted into a new creation. The Greek words used for “conversion” or “converted” in the New Testament all have similar meanings (there are three different words used). They all basically mean that we have stopped, realized that we are going in the wrong direction, and turn around and start going in the right or correct direction. This requires us to be a new creation.

I fear that in our efforts to win souls to Christ that we have made it too easy. Yes the Bible does say in Romans 10:9 “That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” This is very true. Many just encourage someone to speak these words then tell them that if they believe what they just said they are now saved. My heart has been smitten as of late that maybe we aren’t telling those coming to the Lord enough. Yes of course the Holy Spirit does the work of saving a soul. Yes, it is God who forgives our sin, and without a doubt Christ died on Calvary as our supreme sacrifice and rose again on the third day to once and for all conquer sin and death. These works are all true. But true confession and honest believing requires our action. How many times have we said “I believe that?” In reality we may mean well but instead of acting on that belief we go right on doing the same things we have always done.

I have come to believe that parts of the old fashioned “praying through” had more truth and benefit in the act than we gave credit for. I realize that many of those who “prayed through” ended up displaying a wild frenzy of emotion. And it came to the point that most folks were praying for that experience rather than what it was intended to do. So we got away from it. We began just calling folks to the altar and talking with them, asking them if they believed. They would generally answer in a positive way; we’d have a prayer with them then tell them they were saved. Now I am not God and I certainly believe that He can save a soul and that the soul can be prayed through if he/she has legitimately confessed and truly believe. The real fact of the matter is that many respond in the way they are expected to respond then walk away wondering what that was all about.

I don’t encourage wild displays of emotion. I know from experience that this kind of reaction more often than not results in someone feeling good for getting something off their chest but that is all that has happened. They got the emotional high they were looking for but still don’t actually believe. What I mean by “praying through” is spending time talking with God until we realize that it is actually true that Jesus died as the final sacrifice for sin, and that He rose again as the first-fruit of conquering death and that if we confess our sin to Him and truly genuinely believe that we have been freed from the curse of sin and death. We are no longer bound for Hell but now we have turned around and are headed for Heaven. This can happen in an instant or take hours. It isn’t that we are waiting for God to do a work, but that we are waiting until we have really realized what Christ has done and we have without a doubt believed. And not just believed that He did it but that He did it for us – for me – for you.

As far as an emotional reaction - when we have come into the presence of the Almighty I don’t think it is possible to do so without reacting with some kind of emotion. We all have different personalities and our emotions are displayed in different ways. Some of us are very reserved and we feel emotion but no one is ever aware that we have. Some are loud and outgoing and have no problem displaying their emotion in the same way. The point is that we aren’t praying for the emotion but for the experience. Our emotional reaction to that will be according to our own personality. But Christ has done the work. When we know that the work has been done then we are converted – turned around and going toward eternal life instead of eternal death. Now that is a conversion to celebrate!

Jerry D. Ousley is the author of ?Soul Challenge?, ?Soul Journey?, ?Ordeal?, ?The Spirit Bread Daily Devotional and his first novel ?The Shoe Tree.? Visit our website at spiritbread.com to download these and more completely free of charge.

Article Source: http://www.faithwriters.com-CHRISTIAN WRITERS

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