Yes, that is exactly what I concluded - it hadn't worked so give it more time and eventually it will.
b. 2 Corinthians 5:17 As a thing made anew of God, for though a man be not newly created when God giveth him the spirit of regeneration, but only his qualities are changed, yet notwithstanding it pleased the holy Ghost to speak so, to teach us, that we must attribute all things to the glory of God: not that we are as stocks or blocks: but because God creates in us,
both the will to will well, and the power to do well.
[*]The footnote makes the crucial point, that God produces in the regenerate both the will and the ability to be regenerated.
[*]But I'm not sure how to fit this in with scripture for example:
Romans 7.19: I dont do the good that I want to do, but I do the evil that I dont want to do.
Gotcha!
Because we are a new creation it bothers us when we mess up hence Rom 7:19 but I love this chapter because our answers are in the subsequent verses especially:
Rom 7:24-25 said:
24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to Gods law, but in my sinful nature[d] a slave to the law of sin.
It takes a while but eventually I'd gotten to a point where in prayer I would address those occasions when I mess up, but when I confess what I have done I also ask Him directly to assist me in changing what is learned behaviour that is within me to conform to the new creation that He has rebuilt in me.
Basically there is a clash between the two - our learnt behaviour and this "new us".
A loose analogy I saw recently was the changeover I had to do with an old laptop I've got.
Ever since we purchased this laptop 10 years ago, we had Win XP with all the device drivers attached to it. As you know Win XP became obsolete and MS ceased doing the security updates in April. Those who continue using this OS will probably be vulnerable to system attacks. I recently installed Ubuntu which imvho
is far far superior to any Win operating system. However I am still tweaking the current devices so that they can match up with this different operating system. Example, I had to hunt around for a sound driver which would match up with the sound card etc.
So using the above - we say our prayer of salvation, in our heart we mean it and believe it (re: Rom 10:9). We now have the 'new OS'.
However some of our devices (mindset/habits) are accustomed to the old operating system and there are occasions where we behave/carry out actions in line with that (references in the Bible to 'the flesh') old system purely on the basis that we are unaware of the expectations of the new OS. We basically have to unlearn this and re-learn new habits.
Solution - 1) Prov 4:23 i.e. watch what we expose ourselves to. In some translations it says that we must jealously guard our heart because it influences our thoughts and processes/decisions. Having small kids has restricted what I play and what I watch to the degree that I am now unable to watch any cert 15 movies let alone any cert 18. It shocks me lol! So this is 11 years of being restricted to CBBC, CBeebies etc. But...in a way it has served to act as an involuntary information detox for me. Things before that I wouldn't even notice, like what I see on the news, I now notice - it's like I see it through more innocent eyes. So without the clutter of Eastenders and other grey-matter killing programs I am retraining myself by restricting such drivel.
2) James 1:21 (which is I think the stage that you're working through now). As well as making that decision to not do what we've done before, we resolve to find out how we can attempt to live more Godly lives, the source of which is the Bible. Constantly contemplating, digging, studying what we read. Questioning what we read, looking into the original languages to establish deeper understanding. This contributes to changing our current mindsets.
3) Challenging and questioning our current beliefs and adjusting whenever we cement any new concepts - as an athiest this was the hardest thing for me to do
. I was very comfortable with my knowledge and current understanding based on my school/college life experiences, but I was very challenged to change it. I had to - on occasions - swallow my pride and entertain new concepts.
Son is currently recording selfies where he is screaming into my tablet. Lost what else I was going to say
But I hope this also helps, Mork (not the screaming selfies which I will have to delete when I can prise the tablet from his hands).
God bless - it's exciting to see that you are looking into this.