If a person ever hopes to enter the new city of God when it comes they will have to accept the need for certain changes in behaviour and accept some hardship. A worthy goal demands a worthy life. The quicker we can adapt to it permanently the better but it does take time for some of us to change our ways and learn God's ways so best to start early. Best to start understanding it now and not putting off change of lifestyle too long. "Sinner get ready there's a train coming..." The inner change we need comes, in my experience and understanding at least, with the powerful preaching of the cross of Christ, the inner cutting to the core of the words of that message when God opens your heart to it, the confession to a real believer that we have a new awareness of our sin and need to change our ways and the prayers of such a believer, then the powerful cleansing as the spirit wells up within in God-given spirit power. For me the message sinks home well about Christ's own example of suffering when God gives me dreams. I learn more in dreams than I ever learn in what people tell me. Nobody can say what Christ endured except the God and Christ and Spirit who witnessed it. They can make it known in their way. Sometimes they use dreams and visions that cut us enough to make us willing to share in those sufferings. It means repent, but it takes faith that certain acts are really bad and others are really good and it takes faith that God does the good but Satan does the bad. Jesus said these things (John 8) but the welling up spirit that is the Holy Spirit given to believers makes it real. I can tell a child it is bad to something but they might not really believe me. Showing us things in our inner being is what the Spirit does and this is grace and truth like Christ had. Notice how no matter how much Christ said openly He still had to deal with people individually and do things to show them what words alone could not fully do. He healed to do this. God acted in Christ and God's actions are what teach our inner being the way we need it most. We need grace. We need action by God and by The Spirit God sends in Christ's name. Power. Not just words. This teaches the way we need to be taught. For Jesus' message to be on one hand that it is up to you and I as individuals to stop sinning and the onus is very much on us to repent but then to say we need Him to set us free to be able to repent and we need to keep a constant permanent hold on His words for Him to do this; It does sound like a change of message. It is not inconsistent. It is just that life does not work like sentences of simple logic that all form one aet of consistent rules, easy to understand. We have to trust it makes sense to Him before it males sense to us. Truth sets free but it remains true even after truth sets free that the onus is still on us. We still have to do the stopping. 'Stop sinning' is still the command even though a lot happens to stop us sinning when the spirit wells up inside and teaches truth to us. We get faith that truth is good and the truthfulness we find in the Spirit is good so we want to imitate it but the message still holds that we have to stop lying too. Tell truth AND stop lying. This kind of repentence I'm speaking of is a partnership with Jesus. Unless you believe that 'He is' the partnership part will not happen and all you are left with is the repentence part. John the Baptist advocated the repentence part in his baptism for forgiveness but told people at the time to look for Jesus to provide this better righteousness partnership. So without it you could find you repent but then go back to sin. Jesus promises freedom from that in partnership with Himself but only if you really believe 'He is'. As as I write these things I only have the work of waiter in a restuarant working with the Chef, Jesus being Chef and the Holy Spirit bringing the food to me the waiter so I can take it to you the customer. I rely on Him and only in God The Father's timing and say-so as manager of the restuarant and owner does this work. So it is partnership. So this means it only works because Jesus ever lives and is ever Lord and Christ and source of righteousness being served to us. He says repent but only in partnership with Him by holding to His teachings and believing that _He is_ can we hope to be perpetually repentant and persist in putting off the old ways of Satan and putting on the new ways of Christ Jesus. Putting off evil lies and putting on truthful conversation and speaking. Putting off evil hatred of believers and loving one another as brothers in Him. This Christ for ages past had been The Righteous Elect One beside the Father but now He has perfected what it is to be righteous as a fully human person and can pass the fruits of this on to us, ever living to do so. And we know it was in His crucifixion that He perfected fully human righteousness. Hence God raised Him to be forever immortal as The Resurrection and the Life. By raising Him, God shows satisfaction that this sacrificial death fully pays for our sins. So now we are to live as free people and live in freedom God's way in Christ. And so achieve perfection and fullest potential forever. Which is of course, He said, to His Father's glory. He is joyful in being glorified in us just as The Father's name is glorified in Him. God is invested in us and we in Him, hence partnership mediated by Christ. It makes baptism into the name of Christ so glorious and so too the gospel which saves us.
