{"id":9399,"date":"2014-09-11T01:00:35","date_gmt":"2014-09-11T08:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/?p=9399"},"modified":"2014-08-26T05:17:33","modified_gmt":"2014-08-26T12:17:33","slug":"a-new-outlook-on-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/2014\/09\/11\/a-new-outlook-on-life\/","title":{"rendered":"A New Outlook on Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

by David Lee<\/em><\/p>\n

When one becomes a Christian, change occurs in one\u2019s life. As Paul writes in Galatians, the Christian proclaims that \u201cI have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me\u2026\u201d Personally, my life saw many changes when I became a follower of our Lord Jesus Christ a number of years ago. As someone who was enslaved to sin, I joyfully heeded the call to my slavery to righteousness. My then newfound vigor to submit to my Lord (kupios<\/em>) as his slave (doulous<\/em>) brought me great comfort in understanding my life to be in His sole ownership. Moreover, I aligned my perspective of people as well as of Christ himself to one that is consistent with a biblical worldview. I began to view Christ as my Lord and Savior, and to view people with an understanding of their spiritual needs. Alas, here I am now, sitting six years past from the moment the God of the universe grasped me in His grip of salvation. As Roger Alcaraz preached on the eve of a recent midsummer bible study, he posed a challenge to me: Am I viewing Christ and people the way I should be?<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a sermon titled \u201cA New Outlook on Life,\u201d<\/a> Roger expounded upon 2 Corinthians 5:16-17. His first point reminded us that Christ\u2019s death should change our perspective on people. We see that in verse 16, Paul writes that as believers, \u201cwe regard no one according to the flesh.\u201d Before one becomes a believer, the lens through which one views people is, sadly, primarily based on external judgment and under a worldly standard. A further assessment of the unbeliever\u2019s view of people demonstrates that it is most often associated with self-centered motives. \u201cWhat can this person do for me?\u201d \u201c I\u2019ve just met this person, but I don\u2019t know how I feel about him\/her. Does he\/she make me feel good about myself?\u201d These are often thoughts that most people don\u2019t readily admit to have running through their heads. Even as believers, we struggle with these very thoughts. But as those who claim to follow Christ, how exactly should we be viewing people? 1 Samuel 16:7 tells us that \u201c…the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks upon the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.\u201d Clearly, we humans are not capable of looking on each other\u2019s hearts, but the challenge posed here should be rather striking to us. Rather than regarding someone according to the flesh, we should be glancing over the simple outward appearance of man to avert our gaze with deep intention to consider the needs of the soul. Indeed, the clich\u00e9 \u201cIt\u2019s what\u2019s on the inside that counts\u201d comes to mind. But consider this, Christian: our perspective on the family, friends, and strangers around us who are in desperate need of the gospel should serve as an impetus for our desire to share His Word.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, we believers have a new perspective on Christ. In Acts 26:9-11, Paul writes of his former hatred for Christians. Verse 11 reads, \u201cAnd I punished them often in all the synagogues and tried to make them blaspheme and in raging fury against them I persecuted them even to foreign cities.\u201d How marvelous is Paul\u2019s conversion, that he once heavily persecuted Christians himself, but upon his conversion to saving faith, only grew to love God more and more! As I reflect upon my own testimony, I am reminded by this passage of my need to actualize my profession of belief with the manner in which I live my life. I pray that my appreciation for Christ\u2019s death and resurrection would invigorate my zeal for the gospel, flowing from my soul in an outward demonstration of loving others more. As the passage in 2 Corinthians continues, Paul states that we are a new creation. \u201cThe old has passed away; behold, the new has come\u201d (v. 17). As I consider the stark contrast between Paul\u2019s life before and after his conversion, I wonder and present myself with this question: Am I portraying a similar transformation from my \u201cformer self\u201d? Am I indeed an entirely new creation in Christ and not simply an \u201cupdated version\u201d? Roger\u2019s message challenged me to also evaluate how well I am living out the Passion of LBC\u2019s MVP. As a Christian, my perspective on Christ and people should cause me to love God and people more, for it is because God first loved us by sending His son to die on our behalf that I can subsequently love those around me (1 John 4:19). My prayer is that our outlook on life may be one that cherishes our identity in Christ as a new creation and heeds the calling to honor our Almighty Father not only with our reverence of Him, but with our love for all people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by David Lee When one becomes a Christian, change occurs in one\u2019s life. As Paul writes in Galatians, the Christian proclaims that \u201cI have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me\u2026\u201d Personally, my life saw many changes when I became a follower of our Lord […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":469,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100,104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-affinity-groups","category-singles"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/469"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9399"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9401,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9399\/revisions\/9401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}