Out with the old, in with the new

“I’m tired of just playing defense.”

These heartfelt words spilled out from my friend as we were recently eating breakfast together at a favorite local café.  Was he expressing disappointment about not getting enough shooting opportunities on his local YMCA basketball team?  No, something much more profound.

He was grieving that the Christian life (at least the way he’s been taught it) seems to be primarily about avoiding sin (“playing defense”).  But his deep longing is for something far more hopeful, inspiring, and significant.

Have you ever felt this way?  I know I have.  Despite growing up in a good Christian home and attending a solid, Bible-preaching church, I hit a similar crisis of faith when I was in college.  I remember lamenting to a dear friend, “What is the Christian life all about anyway?  Because if it’s about avoiding sin, it’s a miserable and futile existence!”

Why “miserable”?  The more I tried to avoid sin, the more aware I became of my failures.  I tried to confess all my sins to the Lord.  But even as I did my best to confess all my sins of commission (the wrong things I did), I became virtually paralyzed as I attempted to identify and confess all my sins of omission (the right things I didn’t do).  Constant confession led to sin obsession.  When people asked me my life verse at age 20, I responded with Psalm 51:3b: “My sin is always before me.”  Yes, you could say that I was sincere in my faith.  But I also was sincerely miserable.

Why “futile”?  The longer this went on, the more defeated I became.  How could I ever “be perfect” like God (Matthew 5:48)?  How could I ever love God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength (Mark 12:30)?  I knew that I couldn’t.  And I doubted that any person could.  So why, then, did God apparently set us up to fail?  My Christian experience was slipping into the despair of Ecclesiastes 1:2: “Meaningless, meaningless … everything is meaningless.”

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Like my friend, I too had become weary of “just playing defense”.

So let me ask again: what about you?  Have you ever felt this way?

I believe many of us either presently do, or at least did feel so in the past until the sands of disappointment slowly began to cover over the precious jewel of this God-given desire for “newness of life” which our souls once held dear.

What is the issue with the perspective my friend and I (and perhaps you) struggled with?  After all, aren’t we supposed to avoid sin?  Of course we are.

Our problem wasn’t our desire to avoid sin, but how we were going about it.  We were trying to live the Christian life in the “old way of the written code” rather than “the new way of the Spirit” (Romans 7:6).  Put another way, we were trying to obey Jesus in the old way of the Old Covenant (i.e. doing our human best to keep the letter of each law) rather than the new way of the New Covenant (i.e. letting the indwelling Spirit guide and empower our new hearts).

The difference between these two ways of living is a matter of life and death – Paul’s words, not mine: “He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:6).

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Old Covenant living shines a spotlight on our insufficiency.  No amount of self-discipline or self-reliance will ever be enough to enable us to obey God.  It didn’t work before we were saved, and it doesn’t work now that we are saved.

New Covenant living, however, shines a spotlight on the presence and work of God for us, in us, and with us (Hebrews 8-10; Jeremiah 31:31-34; Ezekiel 36:25-27).

“For us”.  Through His sacrificial death, Jesus fulfilled the righteous requirements of the Law for all who believe in Him (Romans 8:2-4).  Now in Christ, we are dead to both the Law’s condemnation as well as its basis as our way to life (Romans 7:1-4, 8:1).  Jesus is our Way, Truth, and Life now.

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“In us”: We are brand new creations in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17).  We have “a new self” which has been created to be like God in true holiness (Ephesians 4:24, Colossians 3:10).  God has made our hearts new (Ezekiel 36:26).  No longer are our hearts (i.e. the core of who we truly are) wicked and deceitful as they were before being saved (Jeremiah 17:9).  Now, the real us, the person we truly are in the eyes of our Savior, is a person that has both the God-implanted desire and the God-empowered ability to do what pleases Him (Ezekiel 36:27, Philippians 2:13).

“With us”: Father, Son, and Spirit have made their home in us (John 14:16, 23).  The Spirit dwells in our very bodies (Ezekiel 36:27; 1 Corinthians 6:19).  God has come near to us – as near as near can be.  And now He, the Omnipotent One, is exerting the full power of His mighty love to help us abide in Christ and be fruitful (John 15).

My Old Covenant living was like a stationary bike connected up to a motor and light bulb.  I pedaled furiously, trying to conjure up enough power to make my bulb flicker.  In the end though, all I did was exhaust myself without producing “fruit of the light” (Ephesians 5:9).

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New Covenant living is like God plugging me into the electrical outlet of His limitless power.  When my new heart abides in Jesus, depending on His Spirit to joyfully do whatever He desires in and through me, oh how my little light shines!  And rather than being worn out and burned out, I am sustained, invigorated, and enlightened.

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God has given us a far grander vision than just to “play defense”.  Life is about more than just avoiding sin and waiting for heaven.

Ultimately, God’s vision is that we as new creations with new hearts would joyfully live life with Him – not just in heaven in the future, but right now on earth.  And that as Jesus fills us with His life, joy, and hope, we would get to see Him “draw all people to Himself” and “make everything new” (John 12:32, Revelation 21:5).  I don’t know about you, but I can’t imagine anything more hopeful, inspiring, and significant than that.

Written by: Don Reynard