Becoming a New Creation

Announcements

Winterjam: January 25th Deadline to register January 15th

Mad River Mountain: February 17th: Deadline to register Feb 5th

Pray for Bev and California

Game

Back in My day: You will be given a current price of an item and you have to guess how much the item cost back in 1995. The person closest to the price wins the point.

Intro

Welcome to 2025 as we begin this new year many times we start thinking about different things we want to do with our year. How to do things differently than we have done them in the past. Different resolutions that we want to set, and promises that we make that this year will be different.

What percentage of people succeed with their new years resolutions? 8%

What percent of people fail their New Years Resolution by the end of the first week of January? 23%

So hey congratulations if you made a new years resolution and you have continued to stick with it. You are already better than 23% of the population.

This week we will be starting a new series titled New. Today I want to discuss how we can successfully set new resolutions and actually follow through with them.

The Best Resolution

So when talking about New Years resolutions there are a ton of them to choose from, but what is the best new years resolution? I would say that the best New Years Resolution would be one to give your life to Christ, and that resolution is the only resolution that we can guarantee that will follow throughout the entire year. Why do I say I can guarantee that making Jesus the leader of your life is guaranteed to succeed. Well thats because it does not rely on you.

2 Corinthians 5:17 NIV

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

This tells us that whenever we give our lives to Christ and allow Him to be the leader of our lives then we are no longer our old self, and if we are no longer our old self then that means that we cannot fail at being a follower of Christ. Now Im not saying that we will be perfect, we will still make mistakes, we will still sin, we will still miss the mark at times. However Scripture tells us that if we make Jesus the leader of our lives then we are a new creation.

How to become New?

So you may be asking ok Todd thats great, but how do I become this new creation. I want to make better choices I want to make Jesus the leader of my life but I just dont know how.

Well first we have to be able to understand what Jesus did for us, and why it is possible for us to succeed, which is the fact that our salvation or following Jesus really has nothing to do with you or me. Which is great news because some of you may be thinking but Todd you dont know what I have done in the past, you dont know the things I have thought this evening right before coming to church. And you are correct I dont know those things, but I do know this.

2 Corinthians 5:21 NIV

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Why can we become this new creation because of the fact that Jesus took our sins, Jesus took our punishment, Jesus took all of that so that we could have His Righteousness, which is a really big word which basically just means His goodness, His perfection. So yes you may have done things that you arent proud of, or would be ashamed of if everyone knew. Guess what you arent alone. Every single person you meet has things hidden in their lives that they have done and are ashamed of.

Ok Todd so I can be forgiven because of what Jesus did, but what did Jesus actually do.

Hebrews 12:2 NIV

fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

We can see in Hebrews that Jesus came to die, He endured the cross which is still one of the most painful and gruesome ways to die. And He did that after living a perfect life for 33 and a half years, without sinning, no lies, no punching his brother, no disobeying his parents, He never did any of that, and yet He was willing to take my punishment on the cross for all of the wrong things I have done, but He didnt just do it for me but for you and everyone you meet as well.

See we have to understand what Jesus did for us to truly appreciate it. We have to truly understand the fact that Jesus gave up everything so that we could have something. So that we could be a new creation.

So how do we make Jesus the leader of our life?

Acts 20:21 NIV

I have declared to both Jews and Greeks that they must turn to God in repentance and have faith in our Lord Jesus.

We must turn to God tell Him that we believe that He came died and rose again, and that we want to follow His ways and that we choose to turn away from our sins.

There is no perfect prayer to pray. There are no special or magical words. It is merely a commitment to Jesus stating that I will follow you for the rest of my life, and that is how we become a new creation.

If you have never made the choice to make Jesus the leader of your life, I want to give you an opportunity to do that now. Like I said earlier there are no magic words in the prayer but it is truly just a reflection of what you believe and your desires.

Give Invitation

If you just gave your life to Christ we would love to know, please raise your hand so that we can celebrate with you, and give you some resources to help you on your new journey through following Christ and being a new creation.

Now some of you have already given your life to Christ but some of your decisions may not have been reflecting the decision you made. I want to give you a few moments to re commit your life to remind yourself of the decision you made possibly years ago to follow Christ. Again there is nothing special about the words but it is merely hopefully the meaning of the your desires to follow Christ.

Pray for rededication

Now if that is something you just did we also want to know so that we can come alongside you and pray for you and help in any way that we can as you continue your journey with Christ.