We Do Not Recognize Believers According to the Flesh - Michael Edwards God tells us that all who believe the gospel have become a new creation in Christ. This is a promise from our heavenly Father, who cannot lie. If your faith is in Christ, God sees you right now as a new creation born of God, in Christ, in the Spirit.
Therefore from now on we recognize/ regard no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come….. See 2 Cor 5:16-19 NAS
The flesh is the old creation, a product of flesh, blood, and the will of man, Adam. The flesh has not been redeemed, born-again, or saved by God, nor can we. The new creation is of Christ, in the Spirit, born of God.
Who were born (the new creation), not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1:13 NAS (emphasis mine)
If we do not recognize ourselves according to the flesh, how do we recognize each other? By faith, in the Spirit, as God’s new creation. The old creation was born of Adam with an inherited sin nature and died on the cross with Christ in God’s eyes. The old creation is forever dead to God, and he calls us to agree. The new creation is born of Christ and forever alive in the Spirit specifically because of Christ’s righteousness that has been imputed to us.
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Cor 5:21 NAS
If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of (His) righteousness. Rom 8:10 NAS (emphasis mine)
The primary reason we no longer recognize each other in the flesh, is because…
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