A New Way of Life

We Worship God
A Guide for Worship Leaders:
All Things New

Ephesians 4:17-24 (The Message)

The Old Way Has to Go

 ^17-19And so I insist—and God backs me up on this—that there be no going along with the crowd, the empty-headed, mindless crowd. They've refused for so long to deal with God that they've lost touch not only with God but with reality itself. They can't think straight anymore. Feeling no pain, they let themselves go in sexual obsession, addicted to every sort of perversion. ^20-24But that's no life for you. You learned Christ! My assumption is that you have paid careful attention to him, been well instructed in the truth precisely as we have it in Jesus. Since, then, we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything—and I do mean everything—connected with that old way of life has to go. It's rotten through and through. Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you.

For Reflection
Eye for an eye.
You got to go along to get along.
You can't let them get away with that!
Everybody does it.
Rules are rules.
What is everyone going to say?
You can't do that, Its unpatriotic.
Loyalty is what we expect.
He deserves what he got!

There is a truism for almost every culturally based  behavioral norm.  These codified sayings are the symbols of our culture's attempt to regulate our behavior.  It is what Christ died to save us from.  It is the tyranny that sanctions racism, the tyranny that justifies murder in the name of righteousness.

God, through Jesus Christ, offers us a new way of life, a life centered on love and reconciliation. He offers a life in conflict with the temporal, material cultures which we so earnestly guard.

Pray
for a life renewed from the inside.  Pray that you open yourself so completely that God steps in to reproduce His character in you.  Pray for the wisdom to differentiate among choices influenced by cultural norms and those centered in your faith.  Pray for the courage to participate fully in God's revolutionary counter culture.