"Dad, we learned about the transforming power of the Holy Spirit. It was awesome..."I just happened to sit down next to one of our departing 3rd term campers and his dad tonight at dinner. I didn't know the young man or his father. I just happened to overhear the boy's comment as he explained camp to his dad.
And of course, I was thrilled to hear it.
I've been focusing my teaching this summer on this most awesome gift of the New Covenant - the gift of God's Spirit coming to live in those of us that are following Messiah into his coming kingdom. I wrote a little bit on this a few days ago in this post.
You know, there's a lot of "good news" in the gospel message - that greatest of all messages - that proclaims Jesus as the Jewish Messiah and the Lord of the whole wide world.
I mean, forgiveness for the sins of our past is indeed huge - how could we ever hope to stand before God without that awesome news?!?
But equally awesome is that part of the gospel where we find that God has sent his Spirit to dwell in us. He fulfilled his promise from Ezekiel 36 to put his Spirit in us and cause us to keep his laws.
Now that's huge! It's huge because by his Spirit we are actually liberated from slavery to sin. Paul describes this process in 2 Corinthians 3:18 as being "transformed from glory to glory" into the image of Jesus himself.
We are given the power to say "no" to sin and "yes" to God - to actually do what God intends for us to do. YES!!!!
I'm thrilled that some of our counselors are getting it. And they're learning to share and model this transformed lifestyle with our campers.
In fact, the young man I mentioned above heard this message from one of our intrepid counselors that has been paying attention over the last several weeks. Needless to say, I'm proud of our counselors and I'm thrilled to see the impact they're having in the lives of our campers.
Bravo!
"Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." - 2 Corinthians 5:17
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