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Human-ology Series
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Welcome, family. I'm Pastor Dharius, and I want to thank you for being here. Whether you've stumbled onto this channel by accident or you're a regular, I believe this message is going to add real value to your life.
I'm teaching a message called "I'm Acting Brand New." This is a message that I think will challenge and change the way many of you see spiritual growth. Here's the truth: spiritual growth isn't just about getting to a certain place. It's about becoming a certain person. It's not just about managing your sin—it's about becoming more like your Master.
Before we dive in, let me lay down an anchor statement that will guide everything I'm about to share over the coming weeks:
If you don't know where you're going, then you won't know when you're actually getting there.
This truth doesn't just apply to transportation. It applies to our transformation in Christ. Unfortunately, many believers are embarking on a journey of spiritual formation without a clear biblical understanding of what spiritual formation actually means. Many well-intentioned, sincere saints are confusing what they call spiritual growth with what God calls spiritual growth. They've reduced their spiritual formation to simply managing their sin instead of becoming like their Savior.
This produces what I call "Christianity light"—an expression of the Christian faith that settles for some things being different when God promises all things being new. I refuse to settle for just part of what's been promised by God. I want to experience all of what Jesus died to give me.
Let me read to you from 2 Corinthians 5:17:
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
Paul wrote this letter to address a specific context. Let me paint a picture of Corinth for you. Corinth had the location of Miami, the diversity of New York, and the ethical freedom of Vegas. It was a complicated place to live out your faith.
The Corinthian congregation was one of the most complicated in the New Testament. They were saved, but still being shaped. They were found, but still being formed. Their environment was working against their development. Corinth was pulling them one way, and Christ was pulling them another way.
This isn't just about a city in ancient Greece. Corinth can represent an era. Your generation can be a Corinth. There are values in your age group that might not be aligned with Christ. Many of us, whether we realize it or not, are dealing with this Corinthian conflict—the clash between the values of our culture and the values of Christ.
Paul, who loves his people, writes to help them understand: Some old things need to pass away, but all things will become new. Some things need to be removed. Other things need to remain—they just need to be redeemed and repurposed and restored.
Here's what Paul is really saying: In Christ, you are a new creation. This new creation doesn't mean you're something other than human. It means you're a different type of human.
The things you inherited from Adam in the Garden of Eden need to pass away. Spiritual formation is not the escaping of humanity. It is the evolution of humanity. God the Father sends Jesus the Son not to show us how to be a God, but to show us how to be a godly human. God doesn't want little gods. God wants big humans.
Since the Garden of Eden, the enemy has tried to influence humans to pursue godness instead of godliness. When the serpent tempted Eve, he said:
God knows if you eat from the tree, you will be like God.
They ate in an attempt to be like God—unaware that, according to Genesis 1:26, they were already made in God's image and likeness. The enemy exploits your ignorance about who you are.
You see, it's one thing for God to know who you are. It's another thing for you to know who you are. When you don't know who you are, the enemy will use illegitimate means to try to get you to become something God already made you.
God is saying: "You don't have to be me. I don't want you to be me. You can't be me. I want you to be like me. But I already told you that you were like me. You just don't believe me."
You cannot get spiritual growth right if you get this wrong. Everything you understand about spiritual growth will be wrong if you don't understand this distinction.
Many well-meaning believers get confused between humanity and what the Bible calls the flesh. These are not the same thing.
The Apostle Paul—the very same Paul writing to the Corinthians—wrote another letter to believers in Rome. Listen to what he said about himself:
What I am doing, I don't understand. For what I will to do, that is not what I'm practicing. But what I hate, I do. If then I do what I will not to do, I agree that the law is good. But now it is no longer I who does it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that in my flesh nothing good dwells. For to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good, I do not find. Oh, wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? (Romans 7:15-24)
Do you see the growth here? There was a time when Paul would do these things and wouldn't hate it. There was a time when he wouldn't be convicted. Sometimes the growth is in the hate.
When Paul talks about "the flesh," he's not referring to the meat on his bones. He's not demonizing his humanity. He's referring to a sin nature—an inherent disposition we inherited from Adam to operate in a way that's against divine design. In 1 Corinthians 3, Paul says:
I could not speak to you as spiritual people, but as carnal.
The word "carnal" refers to the flesh. It means: "I am saved, but I am still governed and guided by the influences and practices of that fleshly nature."
The flesh is a nature that wants to pull me away from the way God designed for me to handle my humanity. When you don't understand this distinction, you can't get spiritual growth right. You'll end up trying to outgrow the wrong thing.
Spiritual formation helps you outgrow the influence of the flesh. It's not God's intention for you to outgrow the reality of your humanity. The flesh is what's evil—not your humanity. Your humanity is a divine human distinction. It's what makes you not God.
Let me show you how the flesh corrupts what is naturally human:
When people don't understand this distinction, instead of repenting from greed, neglect, bitterness, pride, lust, control, and paralysis—they repent because they're hungry, tired, hurt, successful, have desires, want security, and experience fear.
I will not repent because I'm tired. I will not repent because I'm hurt. I'm a human. I'm not trying to outgrow hurt. I'm trying to learn how to manage my hurt the way Jesus managed his.
Spiritual formation isn't the removal of your humanity. It is the redeeming and restoring of your humanity as God intended.
When you pursue godness instead of godliness, you pick up God's weight. And you weren't built to carry God's weight.
You can't get spiritual growth right if you're pursuing godness. Many people have assumed God's weight and reattached themselves to an expression of religion that Jesus actually came to rescue you from. You've reattached yourself to an Old Testament yoke.
But Jesus extends an invitation in Matthew 11:
Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
Jesus was a rabbi, and for a rabbi, his yoke was a set of teachings. He's saying: "My teaching should guide your life. Your problem is you're under the wrong yoke. But if you come to me, I'm going to put my yoke upon you."
God the Father sent Jesus the Son not to show you how to be a God, but to show you how to be a godly human. And if we don't get this part right, we will always get spiritual formation wrong.
So how do we actually become brand new? Paul answers it right in the text. The key is "In Christ." Let me break this down into four practical things:
First, we need the person of Jesus. Jesus is our example, and he is also God's avenue for salvation.
When we hear "salvation," think of it not in the singular but in the plural. Salvation is a benefit package that includes:
In Matthew 14:25, Jesus walked on water, and the disciples were terrified. They said, "It's a ghost!" Out of everything they thought it could be, why did they say it's a ghost? Because they had never seen a human do it.
But salvation gives you the capacity for being the kind of human God has called you to be. When you access and experience salvation as God intended, you become an example and a picture of possibility to other people—showing what is possible for humanity when it is submitted to divine design.
Second, we need the principles of Jesus. Jesus modeled the power of a principle-centered life. His life was guided and governed by principles that were predetermined—not by passions he felt in the moment.
You make decisions in your time of strength to protect yourself from yourself in your time of weakness.
In Matthew 4, after his baptism, Jesus was led into the wilderness to be tempted. Each time he was presented with a temptation, he responded with a principle. He went without food for 40 days. When you're hungry, even stones start looking like bread. But you can't make a decision about how you'll handle hunger while you're hungry. You have to make that decision before you get hungry.
When you get in the wilderness, people you will never date, opportunities you will never take advantage of, doors you will never walk through—start looking attractive when you're hungry.
And then afterward, you're ashamed. "Why did I ever think that? What was wrong with me?"
Principle-centered living means:
Many Christians have problems because they don't understand a principle-centered life. Their goals are too high and their standards too low.
Third, we need the pace of Jesus. It's hard to be a good person with a bad pace.
Here's something important that's often missed: Jesus's pace was driven not by demand, but by discernment. The more gifted you are, the more opportunities you will have. The more opportunities you have, the more discernment you need.
To whomsoever much is given, much is required.
You see seasons in Jesus's life where he moved with urgency. In John 4, he's working so feverishly that the disciples have to urge him to eat. He's forgotten to eat. In that season, he discerned that urgency was required.
But then you see other seasons. In Mark 1:35:
In the morning, having risen long before daylight, he went out and departed to a solitary place and there he prayed. And Simon and those who were with him searched for him. But when they found him, they said to him, "Everyone is looking for you." He said, "Let us go to the next town."
Everybody's looking for him, but he says, "Let's go to the next town." He didn't allow the urgency of others to override the intentionality of his assignment. Pace discerns the difference between who wants you and who needs you.
I need the pace of Jesus—driven by discernment, not by demand.
Fourth, we need the power of Jesus. A commitment to rely on the same power that enabled Jesus to live the kind of life he lived.
Willpower can't do this. You can't just wake up tomorrow and say, "I'm going to stop going off on people." You might make it through day one, day two... but willpower won't sustain you. You need something greater.
Jesus attributed all of his work to the Spirit. He was:
And then he told the disciples: "In order for you to do what I'm calling you to do, don't just take my teaching. You've spent three years with me, learning from my teaching. But don't move until you get power from on high." Three years of sermons, and he said, "Don't do a thing until you get power."
He calls the Holy Spirit the Helper—in Greek, paracletos, a military term meaning "one who is called to come alongside and help."
I cannot engage in the practices of Jesus without the power of Jesus.
I need the person. I need the principles. I need the pace. I need the power. It's the only way I can become brand new—not something other than human, but a human the way God intended.
Over the coming weeks, we're going to explore the humanity of Jesus and how he managed his humanity so that you and I can be equipped to manage ours. Here's the reality:
That's human to feel it. What Jesus will teach us is how to handle what you feel in a healthy way. Paul says:
Be angry, but do not allow the anger to push you to sin.
Feeling it is not the problem. It's what you do with the feeling that matters.
The Lord is going to be with us on this journey. It's going to be a great time.
