I think many of us have tried to answer that question and we think about all the details of our purpose and our destiny. We think about our personality traits and the things that we gravitate toward, but I want to hone in on one core root of why we are here, to which everything else expands from that. That one thing is transformation.
We are here for transformation. For what purpose? Is it just so we can be transformed and know that we are growing and learning? The why behind the transformation is so that not only can we improve our lives and have a better quality of life, which God certainly wants us to have, but it is so we can reflect Him and His nature and His image. It was God’s heart from the very beginning to create mankind in His image. Scripture that many of us are familiar with is Genesis 1:26 Let Us make man in Our image. We know that God is Spirit, He is Life and agape love. He is life that is very different from what we in our own natural state see as life. Love very different from what we see and experience in human love. God is this fulfillment.
But something happened, didn’t it? Something happened between the time of God stating His heart’s desire to make man in His image and when Christ came and walked upon the earth and showed us what that life looked like. In the book of Genesis, we see the fall of man. What did man fall from? Man fell from the image and the likeness of God. Now instead of being filled with the love and the life of God, now we are in need and desperate.  We are in need of love and connection and some sort of source of identity.
So fast forward, now enters in Christ, now enters Jesus into the world. He came as a man full of the love and the life of God and He expressed the will of the Father. He showed us what a man looks like filled with the life and the selfless love of God and said, “Follow Me.”  Many of you may have wanted to follow Christ and have worked hard to walk in His words and to be like Him. We have tried to incorporate facets of who God is into our old nature.
This is the importance of transformation and of letting go of the old so that we can live from the new. Jesus said that flesh gives birth to flesh, but the spirit gives birth to spirit. We were born into sin with the First Adam. Jesus came as the Second Adam to restore all things, so we can be reunited into the love and the life of God. Can I do that in my own strength? No, you can’t.
This life lived is one of surrender. Jesus said in Matthew 16:24 If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. Deny myself? Jesus, what do you mean? I don’t want to lose my personality and the gifts you’ve given me. What self is He talking about? He is talking about the old nature, the self that we were never created for. Did God make man to be selfish, jealous, envious, hateful, immature, needy? Jesus said when you lay that down, I am going to give you a brand-new life. If you love the old nature, then you are going to lose out on this life that I have come to give you.
Let’s look at Romans 8:29 For those God foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed into the likeness of His Son that Christ might be the firstborn among this new creation and that there would be many brothers also in this new creation. This is the why behind why we are here. We are predestined to be conformed into the image of His Son.
Ephesians 1:5 In love, He predestined us to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ. We are to grow and mature and reflect His heart. We are His child and what are we to reflect? We are to reflect His heart and His likeness. You say, Tonya, that is all great and wonderful, but I have been trying this Christian thing for many years and it is hard and frustrating and at times I feel like I am making progress and sometimes I feel far from what Christ wants me to be. So how do I even make this transition?
I believe first and foremost we need to recognize that we were never, ever meant to be the center of our world and our universe and somehow, we’ve become that through the fall of man. When Eve was deceived, the lie that was breathed into her was, “Don’t you want to be self-sufficient just like God is? Right now you are dependent upon Him, you need His life to sustain you. Don’t you want to be like God in the way that you are independent of that source of life?” I honestly believe that she thought this was the better deal. But it was a lie and that lie still holds true in many of our lives today.
We have this unconscious foundation that we are here, and God is somewhere out there, and we are trying to get God to come to be a part of us and God says, I want you to let yourself go and let Me come in and fill you and make a home in you and I want you to abide in Me and let my words abide in you. Out of that, we will express ourselves to the world and others will see Me through you. Christ paid the price for it all to happen. He showed us, and He walked the life and He said, “Let me help you and give you the strength and the life and the wisdom on how to live and love from a selfless base.  In that, you will have such freedom and liberty and we will transform lives everywhere we go, beginning with yours. There’s a willingness involved. Are you willing to let go of what you were never created to be in order to receive everything that Christ paid for you?
Do you know that the Father sees you? That He sees you full of the life of His Son in you? Do you know that He smiles upon you, and He knows your potential and He knows His intention? Remember, we just read that in Ephesians 1 that in love, He predestined you to become His sons and daughters. Ephesians 5 says let us be imitators of God as dearly loved children. Love is transforming, love will transform your heart and your life, and it will transform the lives of those around you. Not human love, but God’s love.
We are here to be emptied of what we were never created to be. To be filled with His life and His love and allow His grace to chisel away everything that we were never created to be and to see God’s workmanship in our lives. He sees the end in mind, He sees us as sons and daughters full of life and full of love. He just wants us to join Him in the picture of what He sees. It is understanding and believing that Christ not only paid for your sin, but He totally removed your sin. That can be abstract, Tonya, what do you mean?
Everything that has its root in selfishness, fear-based, I’ve got to protect me, I’ve got to defend me, I need to feel good about myself, I need I need I need, I want I want I want, that way of thinking Jesus said, “Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand.” My presence, my life, everything is right here at hand. Everything you need to live a joyful life is here in the midst of any circumstance. He asks us to turn and go in a completely different direction. We let go of the old life in order to embrace the new one of where He is walking, and the Holy Spirit is promised to us to teach us and show us the way.
Let’s put our energy and our time into learning who we are in Christ and living this transformed life. What do you say?