2 Corinthians 5:21: For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Are we really just sinners saved by grace? Worthless scum equipped only to barely endure the painful circumstances life throws at us? The enemy LOVES that I believed that. But guess what? It’s a lie. Before we receive Jesus, yes, we are unworthy, defeated, hopeless, yes to it all. Without Jesus, we have nothing but death.

But what DO we have now that we have Jesus? Now that we are saved, we don’t live life continuing to mentally or physically “pay” for the sins we committed, the troubles of the past, or the hurts that were done to us. We get to let all of that go by full forgiveness, healing, and receiving God’s perfect love. God doesn’t see our hurts and shortcomings. He sent Jesus, and when we receive Jesus, that stuff is gone, it’s no longer imputed to us. The bill is cleared. It’s all cast into the sea of forgetfulness. If we can’t leave the old and embrace the new life Jesus came to bring, then Jesus would have come for no reason. It’s covered, taken care of, completely settled on Calvary.

It’s finished. Jesus said it, it is done. Our lives as believers were made to be the city on a hill that cannot be hidden, to bear fruits of joy, peace and love, not heaviness, burden and sadness.

Hang on, now… hear me y’all. I know life is hard. I know things happen in this fallen world, and I’m the first one to know deep, raw, loss of family members who go to be with Jesus, agonizing pain and hurt. I’m the first to know betrayal of friendships, effects of unforgiveness, bitterness and depression. Disappointment and heartache could easily identify me, and I could easily find my identity in it, if I chose to. It probably feels easier that way in the beginning, after all, any dead fish can float downstream…

But here’s the biblical reality— it’s a choice to have a change of focus: to turn around and swim against the current, to choose to stop embracing the less than, the inferior, the unbelievable, that we were before the cross, and curling up with it. It’s dead, it’s lacking life, it’s no good. Tell me, how much closer to Jesus do you feel, focused on your painful thing? I know it stole way too many months of my life, and its time it stops stealing from you, too.

Friend, we as believers in Jesus are in a different kingdom now. We are not stuck in the law, in the bondage of sin. Jesus came for us to have life in abundance, it’s the thief that steals, kills and destroys. Will you walk with me forward? Just one step, stepping out of death and darkness and into His glorious light, where we get to live and thrive and experience life that Jesus died to give?

Its time to shed the junk, the old— leave it. Go ahead, taste and see… see what you think. Try it out, put on the new- it’s nice, it’s comfort, it’s peace, it’s healing. And I love it. Let’s start letting go, and begin representing our King.