Paul is a very visual teacher, something he learned well from Jesus and perhaps Ananias and Barnabas as they each poured into Saul the Ravager during his conversion to Paul the Apostle. It makes sense… it’s much easier to visualize a spiritual truth when you connect it to a tangible and tactile visual experience.
This is why Parables and analogies are so powerful because the help illustrate in your mind, something that may be a little more difficult to grasp. And let’s face it, even for those of us who are born-again, with the very Spirit of God dwelling inside of us… we still can grapple with some texts as to what they really mean.
In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he teaches so much about how we ought to live out our born again lives, in this broken world. He’s frustrated that many new and young Christians were falling back into their worldly ways. There are some false teachers out there that will attack Christians who “fall back” into worldly ways and accuse them of either having lost their salvation (which is completely unbiblical) or perhaps telling them they were never saved to begin with. This kind of guilt treatment is horrible and wrong. I’m not saying that calling out a Christian brother or sister for their worldly actions is wrong… we ABSOLUTELY should be doing this… but there’s a right way and a wrong way… and Paul gives us the example of the right way in Ephesians 4.
After pointing out their worldly acts… he says “But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus” (Eph 4:20-21). But he doesn’t stop there at the call out… he reminds them of a really important spiritual truth we all need to remember… and he does it with a visual as simply as changing your clothes.
He says, “to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Eph 4:22-24)
While many well meaning, good-intentioned Christians will point out that receiving the Spirit was a once and permanent thing… and they are right… Paul is not suggesting actions to “receive the Spirit” again and again. You receive Him once at the moment of salvation. But that Spirit is still dwelling in a sinful human who is living in a broken world. The ‘garment’ we wear from birth is our flesh. We will not be fully rid of this ‘garment of flesh’ until we are with Jesus in Heaven.
Until then, this ‘garment’ hangs around our wardrobe like a favorite piece of clothing that is beyond its life. Despite it looking ragged and worn, we keep putting it back on. Paul is remind the Ephesians (and us) that we need to “continue to” or to “keep” putting off this old garment. This is something that takes repetition, and discipline. It takes good solid Christian friends who love you and are willing to remind you that you’re wearing that old “flesh garment” again.
And why do we keep putting it back on, probably for the same reasons these “fashion models” are paying extra money to wear “old looking” clothes. We’ve convinced ourselves that it’s us… it’s a statement… it’s comfortable… it’s just who I am, etc.
But our “old self” is “corrupt through deceitful desires” and our “new self” has been “created after the likeness of God.”
If you’re a born-again Christians and you’re like any other born-again Christian I’ve ever met in my life… you still have that “old self” hanging around in your wardrobe. I can’t give you the answer on how to get rid of it… because that won’t happen this side of Heaven. But I can be that friend, like Paul, reminding you to keep taking that old self off, and putting the new self back on. Trust me… you look way better in the new self.
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