New Creature

2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if any man [be] in Christ, [he is] a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

Does this imply that the old creature is completely replaced and dead and gone, or simply that we now have a choice of which voice to listen to and that we are no longer slaves to sin?

Sometimes going to the place of complete freedom is a process because of the sin in different areas of our lives and it takes time .Sometimes God delivers us instantly and we are free from all sin.
For me it was a process . I am still a work in progress but i am happy to be free of sin in most areas of my life. I have come to senses these last few years that i want it all when it comes to God .

The old sinful nature creature is GONE! Day one new creation after repenting and confessing Jesus as Lord and saviour! New creation MUST continue forward in daily sanctification of the word,led by the Holy Spirit and prayer! What He changes,He cast away but we must be mindful not to rebuild a life of sin! We have to ever " pressing " toward the mark ,the prise,of a higher calling in God! Bkessings!💖💖💖

Ideally this is what God expects, and we see the outstanding example in the apostle Paul. Within days of his conversion, he was preaching Christ in the synagogues. And then he moved on to do great things for God.

God has given the Holy Spirit to His children as a gift, so that they may overcome the old nature and its sinful tendencies by the power of the Spirit. But this requires that "the flesh" be mortified or put to death or crucified. And we are to "reckon ourselves" dead to sin and alive to God. Which means that God expects Christians to be "overcomers".

That is not exactly the case. The POWER of the old sinful nature has been replaced by the POWER of the Holy Spirit, but the old nature has not been eradicated (or removed entirely). Therefore Christians are not instantaneously sinlessly perfect. By the same token SIN SHALL NOT HAVE DOMINION OVER YOU.

A new creation is exactly that.....and in all honesty there are two, maybe three absolute truths that are missed, overlooked and or rejected that end up causing many to stray into error........they are as follows...

a. It is the SPIRIT that has been BORN again from above by INCORRUPTIBLE SEED. Said spirit DOES NOT SIN, is ETERNALLY sealed and born again into the kingdom of GOD. SAID spirit ALWAYS seeks to do that which is correct and NEEDS to be fed, matured and GROWN to maturity. The SPIRIT CANNOT be corrupted and is INDEED always willing.....nor can it LOSE salvation

b. The above SPIRIT is still BOUND in a wicked BODY of SIN that is not subject unto the word of GOD, seeks to do that which is contrary, is weak and fails DAILY. IT will be this way until it is RESURRECTED or CHANGED. UNTIL then we WILL have this CONFLICT between the two.

c. THE MIND is the battle ground for CONTROL. IF we are TRANSFORMED by the renewing of the MIND the more we will walk in a manner that is led of the above SPIRIT...if we are NOT transformed or STUNTED in growth the LESS we will walk by the spirit, the more we will walk carnally and the more we will SIN in the body. THIS does not alleviate the bolded above and WHY we are given the IRREVOCABLE GIFT f ETERNAL LIFE

d. LOST MEN are bound to the condemnation and destruction of GOD with NO MERCY.....SAVED MEN are eternally secure and BOUND to the position of GRACE and NOT condemned for SIN, but rather judged in MERCY and will LOSE and or forfeit reward and or even physical LIFE with their works burnt to a crisp yet saved so as by fire.

E. To many CONFLATE justification with ongoing sanctification and in so doing come up with a losable salvation that the bible does NOT support. WE are JUSTIFIED eternally BEFORE GOD because our SPIRIT has BEEN born of INCORRUPTIBLE SEED from ABOVE, the BLOOD of CHRIST has been applied and we are SEEN through HIS righteousness because OUR SINS have been PUT to HIS ACCOUNT. We have BEEN sanctified POSITIONALLY in CHRIST eternally as STATED in HEBREWS....HOWEVER SANCTIFICATION is ALSO dual in usage....we have the process of ONGOING sanctification which is subject to the TRANSFORMATION found in ROMANS 12:1-2.......the greater the TRANSFORMATION the greater the SANCTIFICATION in our daily life...the exact opposite is true

F. Our salvation, justification, positional sanctification and sealing are ALL based upon the FAITH GIVEN by GOD in MEASURE. THE same faith that CHRIST begins and PROMISES to FINISH and if during this walk we become FAITHLESS HE ABIDES faithful because he cannot deny HIMSELF.

AT the end of the day we are a NEW CREATION in CHRIST JESUS......and we have the same standing as the SECOND ADAM that was WITHOUT SIN, HOLY and RIGHTEOUS BEFORE the THRONE.....

Think about this truth....JESUS, while on the planet with saved, immersed disciples and apostles said...THERE IS NONE GOOD but GOD
and while many righteous saved men were on planet SOLOMON said, "There is not a JUST an upon the planet that does good and sins NOT."

The issue is not if we are GOOD or SINLESS because NONE are GOOD and NONE are without SIN....the issues is FAITH and if we have BY FAITH believed INTO JESUS Biblically, the above rings true!!

Hi Oyster, when we sinned prior to becoming believers, we acted ~according~ to the dictates of our (fallen) nature, our "old man/old self", but when we sin now, we do so ~against~ our new nature/"new self" whenever we do. We do so because the "old man", our old self/old nature still loves to rear its ugly head in our lives as often as it can, which also means that it is not completely, "dead and gone".

We are, in fact, commanded to lay aside/suppress the old self and put on the new, so that we can act in accordance with our new nature (unhindered by our old one .. to the greatest degree possible anyway). Since this is true, it seems to me that we have a day by day (and sometimes a moment by moment) choice to make in regard to all of this (on this side of the grave anyway).

~Deut

With the Spirit leading us we are a new creature, for it is a nature that we did not have before receiving the Spirit.

Which a Spirit led life will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh, for they have crucified the flesh with the affections, and lusts, and show the ways of the Spirit, and not the flesh.

And God will not allow them to be tempted above what they can handle, and will give them an escape from the temptation so they can bear it.

So if we hate sin, and do not want sin, by the Spirit we can abstain from sin.

But we are still in the flesh, and Paul said in the flesh dwells no good thing, and the Spirit and the flesh are contrary to each other.

So we still have a choice between good and evil, and make the decision to sin or not, the same as when we were in the world, with the exception that if we do not want a sin we have the power of the Spirit to help us, instead of when we were in the world if we did not want a sin we were trying to beat it by the power of the flesh.

And not being led of the Spirit is a sin itself, for there is no good thing that dwells in the flesh, and those that are in the flesh cannot please God.

We know we are tempted with sin, for we are in the flesh, so we have a choice between good and evil.

So there is no sinless perfection because we are in the flesh, and are tempted, and can sin if we desire to sin.

Which sinless perfection would mean that we are not tempted to sin, and have no desire to sin at all, and will never be in our mind, which can only happen when we put off the flesh.

But if we hate sin, and do not want sin, then by the Spirit we can abstain from sin.

But I do not believe that anybody that was saved, no matter how serious they were about allowing the Spirit to lead them, has not sinned, especially when they first come to Christ, and they slowly want to let go of the world, which we hear of a lot of young people having this problem growing up with much things that are entertaining to the flesh, and they do not want to let it go right away.

The only exception is Jesus Christ who could not sin, and was not possible for Him to sin, for He was conceived by the Spirit, and the man Christ Jesus is the personal human body of God, where we are adopted in to the kingdom.

But Jesus could be tempted but He was always led of the Spirit nothing wavering.

We can sin if we want to sin, but we wanted to sin, not that we could not abstain from sin, for it is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and if we do evil we could of chose the good, and nobody twisted our arm to sin.

People that say they cannot abstain from sin it is not true, for you can, but they should admit they wanted to sin, and enjoy it, and not make an excuse that they could not help it but they will sin whether they want to or not.

Some people might not understand the extent of sin, and sin and not realize it is a sin, for they think it is not a sin, not realizing the extent of sin, and what it covers, thinking that God would be not against what they are engaging in.

But we grow in Christ, but some never come to the knowledge that they can abstain from sin, and say we are not perfect, but we have the same power available to us as the man Christ Jesus had available to Him.

It is up to us, for we are the ones that initiate the Spirit leading us, for if we did not initiate it by our attitude to hate sin, and not want it, then nobody would have the possibility to sin after they received the Spirit, and it would be sinless perfection to those with the Spirit.