“Therefore, if any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come.”
2 Corinthians 5:17 (RSV)
Without the transforming power of the cross, there can be no new creation. Our redemption comes by faith in the blood of His cross, but the renewal of our minds is a lifelong process. God loves us as we are, and yet He sees how much better we can become. While He is transforming us into the image of His Son, He uses everything that happens in our lives to make us the new creations we were meant to be.
We may be asking Him to remove every unpleasant or confusing situation, but it is through these events that He transforms and renews us on our journey of faith. When we can say to Him, “Your will be done,” it’s another step toward letting God transform us into all that He has planned for us to be.
Becoming new creations in Christ means having our minds renewed by the Holy Spirit. A renewed mind in Christ is more concerned with winning souls rather than arguments, but the most obvious characteristic of a renewed mind is developing shepherd like tendencies. If Jesus is our Chief shepherd, that makes us His mini shepherds, and there are shepherd urges deep within each of us.
Shepherd like tendencies are to seek, lead and feed His lost sheep. If you find yourself praying for lost sheep, they were led into your pasture for just that reason. In making us new creations, God is turning all of us into mini shepherds. In my old nature, I would seek whatever is good for me, but as my mind becomes renewed by the Holy Spirit, the old ways start to fade away.
Soon after I became a widow, I missed not having my husband to share the events of my day with. Although I regularly talked to God, I was thankful to have my long time friend of fifty years. I could pick up the phone anytime and share my thoughts with her, and always benefit from her wisdom and insight. Three years later, that friend was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. It was devastating, but I wanted to step up and be the friend she needed in that difficult time. In my mind, the most important thing was to be a good friend rather than to have good friends. I wanted to care for her in any way I could.
Something changed within me and my way of thinking was being transformed. She passed away only three months after her initial diagnosis. Since then, I began to understand the mind of a mini shepherd and those tendencies that are deep within all of us as new creations in Christ.
I recently learned that Mother Teresa cradled in her arms about 16,000 dying people in Calcutta over the span of her ministry. Someone once asked her how she converted so many dying people, who never heard of Jesus, and only knew the popular religions of India. She said that she asked each person who was dying in her arms, “Do you want to give your life to Christ ?” and they would ask her, “Who is Christ, is He like you?” Those she held in her arms never heard the gospel or read one verse of scripture, but they saw and felt the love of Jesus through her, and gladly received Him, dying peacefully in her arms.
That’s the heart of a mini shepherd. There are lost souls, like lost sheep, who might be looking at us and asking, “Who is Christ? Is He like you?” We are all God’s mini shepherds, His voice, His eyes, His hands, and we are called to be His ambassadors on this earth until He returns. To become a new creation is to become more like Christ by the power of His Spirit working within us.
Jesus, help us see people through your eyes, so that they can see You in us. Amen