For me to get to acceptance in the grieving process after my wife of almost three decades passed last year, I had to keep a forward focus or risk getting mired in memories. Any move from an old life to a new one is like that. If we are focused too much on what we have lost, we will miss what we have gained. Becoming a new creation in baptism is like that as well. If we do not die to sin and work through the transformation process, then we can never embrace the new and abundant (John 10:10) that God has called us to live.
I. 2 Corinthians 5:17-18. If in Christ, you are a new creation, but how do you life differently if all you know is your old life with its old habits and sinful way of living? Sadly, many people obey the gospel but then only live differently in degree, not in character, than those in the world. Paul spoke of this spiritual war that raged within him (Romans 7:21-23) that was still a transformative process that began at his baptism when he rose out of the water to walk in newness of life (Romans 6:3-5). But, he was working hard to become like Jesus in His death, so He might attain to Jesus’ resurrection in His new life (Philippians 3:10-12).
II. Romans 12:1-2. As a new creation, the old has passed away … but has it? We are to offer our bodies as living sacrifices, not being conformed to the world but transformed by the renewing of our minds. Then when the old has truly been put to death, then we can test what is a good way of living this new life in Christ. We must die to sin first (Romans 6:6-8). The problem with being a living sacrifice is that the offering keeps crawling off the altar. To do this we must forget what is behind and strain toward what is ahead. By keeping this forward focus, Paul says, is how he presses on to the goal of heaven (Philippians 3:13-16).
III. 2 Corinthians 5:19-20. Without Jesus’ reconciling work at the cross and at the grave, we could not have new life, and with this new life comes new work that we also aren’t familiar with. We are to be “ministers of reconciliation” or “ambassadors for Christ” who speak on behalf of God about this new life–even though we have just taken hold of it ourselves. Just as Jesus died to sin and rose to life, we must press on to take hold of this new life that has now come to us (Romans 6:9-11). Instead of looking back at our old life and regressing into those old habits and behaviors, we must hold true to what we have already attained.
Rather than focusing on what I have lost when my old life died with my wife, I am riveted on taking hold of what God has given me as a widower for His Kingdom in this new life. We must all do the same thing with the new life He has given us in Jesus.