July 31, 2018
"For we are God's masterpiece. He created us anew in Christ Jesus, so that we can do good things he planned for us long ago." Ephesians 2:10
When
we are born, our parents take care of us and teach us. We become a version of them. We are a blank slate and our parents help
shape us into who we are.
As believers
in Christ, we are part of another family. When
we commit ourselves to God, we offer up all that we were so that we can be remade. Once we become His, God does just that – He remakes
us so that we become a version of Him.
Here
in Ezekiel 11, God is addressing His people – promising to one day restore them
to the land and to a right relationship with Himself. But we see that we cannot return to the land
until our heart is undivided. When we
receive a new heart, we become obedient to God.
God slowly chisels away at our sin and makes us into Him.
As
believers, we behave differently. The
human heart was created to mirror God’s own heart (Genesis 1:27, James
3:9). We are designed to love Him, love
righteousness, and walk in harmony with God and others (Micah 6:8). But by God’s design, we have free will and that allows us to abuse our heart, just
as Adam and Eve did (Genesis 3:11). God
desires that we love and serve Him. When
we refuse to follow God, our hearts become hard – like stone. And a heart of stone finds it impossible to
repent, to love God or to please Him, (Romans 8:8).
A
person with a hard heart cannot even seek God on their own (Romans 3:11), which
is why Jesus said no one can come to Him unless the Fathers first draws him
(John 6:14).