Putting on the New Man

 Scripture Reading: Colossians 3:1 - 15. Subject: Putting On the New Man Reflection Question: Are you wearing the heart of Jesus today? We have three closets in our lives: 1. The natural or physical closet: Has clothes, pants, blouses, purses, hats, belts. Things we wear to make our outer appearance look good, make us feel good or look beautiful. Give us a sense of looking good to others. Build up our confidence. Sometimes we decide what to wear based on our feelings. We can wear the most beautiful outfit and look good to ourselves and others. But this is the outer appearance only. Looking good on the outside is not good enough. It's not what we put on the outside that makes us beautiful. It's not how we style our hair or wear our makeup that makes us beautiful. IT is having a heart like Jesus' that makes us beautiful. Nothing is our natural/physical closet matches or resembles anything that is in God's closet. 2. Our spiritual closet: Out of this closet we should be able to put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness, and above all love, which binds them all together. According to verses 13 and 14. Take a moment to examine your spiritual closet. That secret place in your heart. What we put on from our spiritual closet is not based on feelings? The things we put on from our spiritual closet are mandatory. We don't have a choice. We must put them on for the sake of the kingdom. To win souls for God and to be able to love one another as God loves us: Unconditionally! When we put on the spiritual clothing that God has for us, we are putting God's word in our hearts. Does anything in your spiritual closet truly match what's in God's closet? If not, we need to go to God's closet. Everything he has in his closet is ours for the taking. We can wear them whenever we choose and as how long we want to. 3. Skeleton Closet: In this closet are the sins that hunt us from our past. These sins lurk in the corners of our hearts and minds and can crowd up the closet, leaving no room for our spiritual clothes. We need to know that when Christ died for our sins, the skeletons in our closets were buried forever; never to rise again. Psalm 103:10-12 reads as follows: he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. Ps 103:11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us Our dark secrets that maybe others may not see, but remember God can. In this closet are (according to verse 5) are sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, and according to verse 8 we have to throw some things away out of this closet. We can't pass these on. We have to get rid of the anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language and lies from our lips. And really according to verse Colossians 3: 7, we should not even have a closet number 3. These things should no longer be in our hearts because as children of God, and having accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, those things have no business having a place our hearts. In fact verse 7 says "We used to walk in these ways, in the life we once lived in other words the life we lived before we accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Now God only has one Closet. And I am going to show you what's in it: (Pull out Bible). This is the heart of God. When we read, study, meditate on and apply it to our lives we are putting on the spiritual clothes of God: summed up in one word: Love. In having a heart like Jesus, all the things in God's closet are ours to wear permanently. They never grow old, get too tight, have to be washed or go to the cleaners. They don't get outdated and never have to be thrown out. They can be shared, seen and desired by others. These can win souls and build up souls for God. Our life in Christ should be one as if we are putting on new clothes everyday.