What has changed?

Transformation isn’t always readily or immediately apparent.

Go to a new car lot and it may be hard to tell the difference between the 2012 and 2011 models.  But underneath the hood, there are likely to be significant improvements.  Or when looking on a store shelf and seeing the label “new and improved” affixed to a product, we tend towards skepticism.  It’s true, sometimes only the label is new and improved.  But sometimes there really has been an advance in produce development and the new really is better than the old.  But looking at the box, we can’t see it yet.

Similarly, in the life of the believer, at the moment of salvation, there are immediately many things that have been changed and transformed.  They are not yet readily apparent.  But they will be.

In 1 Corinthians 6, Paul identifies three realities that change for an individual at the moment of salvation (v. 11).  [A seminary professor once identified no less than 36 transformations in the believer at salvation.]  And these inward realities will produce outward realities in keeping with the inward change.

You were washed.  There was a pattern of life that was contrary to God and fitting one only for hell (e.g., fornication, idolatry, adultery, homosexuality, covetousness, and swindling among them, vv. 9-10). [Aside:  Notice two things that Paul says about those sinners — and all of us fit somewhere on that list — they will not inherit the kingdom of God, and there are and will be those who attempt to deceive us about the truth that those kinds of sinners will not inherit the kingdom of God.]  But at the moment of salvation, even the most heinous kinds of sins have been washed, cleansed, and renewed by the Spirit of God through regeneration.  The black and deadly stain of sin has been made white by the red, life-giving blood of Christ.

You were sanctified.  The dominion of sin was broken making it possible for the sinner not to sin and to do righteousness.  That doesn’t mean that everything he does is righteous; he will still fight against the flesh daily.  But it does mean that whereas he could never do anything righteous before salvation, now it is possible for him to please the Lord with acts and motives of righteousness.  And because of his salvation, it is not only possible to be sanctified and do right, but he will be sanctified and do right.

You were justified.  Before salvation, he was before God the righteous Judge as a condemned sinner.  And after Christ, he has been declared righteous and just.  His sin was imputed to Christ at the cross and Christ’s righteousness was imputed to him at that same cross (2 Cor. 5:21).

Note this:  for the one who has been saved, his washing, sanctification, and justification are not merely a hope, but a reality.  This is what happened in the Corinthians and itis what happens in all who believe in Christ alone for their salvation and are saved.

Transformation isn’t always readily or immediately apparent.  But the one who has been saved will — like the Corinthians who were transformed from idolatrous, sexually perverse, and corrupt lifestyles into sanctified, God-glorifying believers — be changed and renewed into new kinds of living.

As you look at your life, because of the work of Christ, what has changed?