The Bible says: ‘God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation…So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God’ (vv. 8-9, 11 NLT). God loves and accepts you just as you are. And it gets better. He sees you as already righteous. ‘God made him [Jesus] who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God’ (2 Corinthians 5:21 NIV). Notice the words ‘in him’. Imagine placing a letter in an envelope, then sealing it. You can’t see the letter or read its contents any longer because it’s ‘in’ the envelope. Jesus ‘envelops’ us in His love and righteousness. Another point to remember is that there’s a difference between our position and our condition. When you put your trust in Christ, you’re positioned before God as being ‘righteous’. But what about the condition part? We constantly fall short and make mistakes, so the job of the indwelling Holy Spirit is to bring our condition up to the level of our position in Christ. ‘The Lord – who is the Spirit – makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image’ (2 Corinthians 3:18 NLT). How does the Holy Spirit do this? He draws you back to the place of repentance where you are cleansed. Your position in Christ doesn’t change, but your condition is constantly changing as you become more like Christ.
