Shedding the Old

“Since we have confidence in the new promise, we speak very boldly. We are not like Moses. He kept covering his face with a veil so the people of Israel, who were fearful of it, did not see the glory, even though it was destined to fade away.

“However, their minds became closed, and to this day the same veil is still there when they read the Old Testament so they do not understand the truth. It isn’t removed, because only trust in Christ can remove it. Yet, even today, when they read the books of Moses, a veil covers their minds and they do not understand. But whenever a person turns their heart to the Lord, the veil is taken away.

“The Lord is the Spirit. Wherever the Lord’s Spirit is, there is freedom. So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord – who is the Spirit – makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.” (2 Corinthians 3:12-18 emphasis mine)

The word changed in the verse above in the Greek is metamorphosed. It is where we get the word metamorphosis, which means a profound change from one stage to the next. It is a complete transformation, a rebirth.

As we open our hearts and minds to Christ’s love and grace, we acknowledge law is dead. We allow Christ to remove the veil. We see the Old Covenant for what it was; the chains of the past that Christ died to rescue us from. We rejoice in his resurrection and allow him to restore us into our Father’s embrace.

We must shed the skin of the old and surrender ourselves completely to the New Covenant. We release control and allow and invite full access to the Holy Spirit. We allow the Lord to reign in us, thereby admitting his light and love to fill us, saturate us to overflowing, and fulfill us.

As the Spirit works in us, we awaken to the freedom that this is the way we reflect the true image of God. It is how we continue to grow in his glory. It is through love not law, faith not fear, that his light shines through us onto others. It is only in this surrender, this incredible choice, this willingness to die to self, to shed the old, that we become reborn and fly.

This is how we do it: