"You
must be born again"
John
1:17
The first contact with
Jesus always
produces an initial conflict.
To be face
to face with God's love in flesh and blood has always been
like coming out of a
darkened room into the blazing sun at noon. It hurts our
spiritual eyes! To be
in the presence of Jesus and have Him
looking at us for the first time is always a shock.
Contact with Jesus calls
our own existence
and behavior into question. When our existence and behavior
are called into
question, it is normal for us to want to rush back into the
dark and shut the
door. We may even want
to attack the
light which is hurting our own view of ourselves.
Many people who call
themselves Christians
have never moved from contact and conflict with Jesus to
conversion. They shade
their eyes and say they have given
themselves to Christ yet at the center of their spiritual
lives the room is
still dark and their eyes remain closed.
Until Jesus has access to our center and we let His
light in we, will never
experience a new birth conversion. We
must invite Him into our darkened center.
Jesus will only truly have
us and we will only
truly have Jesus when we meet Him in the light at the very
center of our
life. Conversion is a
new history lived
in the light with Jesus at the center.
Half measures only make us miserable. Jesus needs to be formed in
us over time as we
adjust to the light.
A cry from the center that
says "Jesus
is Lord!" is a sign of
conversion
and Holy Spirit revelation. Conversion
belief is more than mental assent to ideas about Jesus. Conversion belief is to
commit to Jesus like
one saying to the noon day sun, "Come
on inside with
me. I desperately need you at the center."
Give Him the center and
you will be free.
Bud McCord
Abide International
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