In this series, we've mentioned the massive implications of forgiveness that we did not deserve. Those who believe in God’s power to forgive them because of Jesus’ death and resurrection; in other words, salvation comes from faith. For those who accept this message, what now? What does it mean to be a Christian?

What's the difference?

The most obvious result from the Bible concerns our eternal destiny. Paul puts it this way: “But now you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:22-23). Another metaphor used by Paul is one of slavery—Christians have been set free from a slavery to sin; God is now our master. (Notice that not accepting God is not freedom, but slavery.)

Our response to forgiveness should not be that we continue to knowingly do wrong, because our forgiveness is assured. Rather, Christians are called to live up to the holiness that they are credited with through Jesus (see 1 Thessalonians 4:7). Furthermore, we have seen that this is not possible through our own work (otherwise we could have saved ourselves), but God can change us. For being a Christian is not fundamentally about being a “good” person, but instead a “forgiven” person.

It's about having Jesus Christ as your Saviour and as the Lord—the ruler—of your daily life.

Alive in Christ

Paul says this: ‘As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the kingdom of the air…But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions’ (Ephesians 6:1-2, 4-5).

What does it mean for the Christian to be made ‘alive with Christ’? We should look to the resurrection. Jesus had been dead, but at the resurrection he came out of the other side. Unlike Lazarus, who had been raised back to his old life, Jesus was raised to a new life, defeating death altogether. In the same way that we share in Jesus’ sacrifice, and God sees him instead of us when judgement comes, so we share the new life which he is living in heaven. In that sense, then, Christians already have that new life in Christ.

This, incidentally, is how we come to be members of God’s family. It’s worth noting, too, that Jesus’s death is so powerful that it is completely sufficient to cover all sins—past, present and future. See Romans 6:10—‘he died to sin once for all’. Sin has been covered by one action for all time.

Forgiven—Jesus is Saviour and Lord

While Christians remain on earth, though, there is a tension. We have been declared perfect, but we are not yet perfect. We have been accepted into God’s family, but appearances are to the contrary. The simple fact is that Christians keep on sinning. Our earthly lives have not yet caught up with the spiritual reality. Paul puts it this way: ‘if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.’ (Romans 8:10). On earth, Christians’ bodies are still dead—that part has still yet to be made perfect.

It is normal, then, for Christians to find a conflict. We want to battle the sin that remains, but we find it really hard, and very often fail. The answer to this is not to feel discouraged—it is not that we have not been forgiven properly, but to persevere in the fight, with the Spirit’s help (see 1 Thessalonians 4, where Paul mentions that God gives the Spirit). Just as it's God's work to forgive us, it's his work to sustain us once we have been forgiven.

It may be tempting to think of this on an intellectual level, but the Bible’s application is very practical. The best response to our forgiveness is to strive to live in a way that pleases God. In his letter, James makes this point: ‘Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.’ (James 2:15-17). The point may be shocking, but the comparison is clear. In the example given, how much can the man actually care about his friend’s health if he does nothing practically to help him? Just the same, if our faith is not accompanied by a change in actions, how sincere can we be?

The presence of the tension, though, is actually an encouragement. It demonstrates that the Spirit is working—why else would we want to do things God’s way? Rather, Christians are instructed to work with the Spirit in battling sin in their lives. And it follows that they more the Spirit’s work is done, the more we may be made aware of the sin still present in our own lives. That is why many of the Christians you know will still be struggling with areas in their own lives that they know aren’t pleasing to God, even after being Christian for many years. Perfection is still to come.