BEAUTIFUL GATE DAILY DEVOTIONAL BY TDE OLUWASIWAJUMI DANIEL
14TH, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER, 2016.

Topic: BECOME NEW
Text: Isaiah 43:18-19.
Memory Verse: Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 2 Corinthians 5:17.

It is in the gracious nature of God that mistakes and failures are not a stick to be beaten with, but an opportunity to change into something better. Forgiveness, however, is not the same as perfection. Although many Christians can look back to a specific time at which they made a decision to make a new start as a follower of the way of Jesus Christ, living up to a new way of being is an ongoing struggle. There is a frequent need to revisit and remember the new start. Church services almost always include a point at which worshippers are encouraged to think about recent failures, confess them, and ask for the mercy of God in absolute certainty that He will forgive.

The Christian faith teaches that a new start is possible.  It is provided by a personal encounter with the risen and living Jesus Christ. He offers the opportunity and the resources to make a new start, despite all circumstances or failings. The Bible records many encouraging examples of people who were able to start again after encountering Jesus. These include a woman caught in adultery who was facing execution by an outraged community, a hated tax collector named Zacchaeus who had been collaborating with the enemy, and Peter, the close friend of Jesus who publicly disowned Him.
 
God’s provision of a new start liberates people from the powerful hold that guilt, fear and memories of failure can have over a human. The life, death and resurrection of Jesus have made a way for humans to find God’s forgiveness. A Christian is someone who has accepted God’s forgiveness and now has the freedom to reject the old habits of bitterness, anger or revenge, like disposing of a ‘shabby old coat’. Many Christians experience this as such a new beginning that they describe it as feeling like a different kind of life.

PRAYER POINT: FATHER IN JESUS NAME, GIVE ME A NEW NAME AND A NEW LIFE.