You have begun to live the new life. In your new life you are being made new. You are becoming like the One who made you. This new life brings you the true knowledge of God.
Wake up! Wake up Zion! {\cf2\super [420]} \par Dress yourself!\par Put on your strength!\par Holy Jerusalem, stand up!\par People that have not agreed\par to follow God {\cf2\super [421]} \par will not enter you again.\par Those people are not pure and clean.\par
\{The Lord prepared for battle\}.\par The Lord put on\par the armor of goodness,\par the helmet of salvation,\par the clothes of punishment,\par the coat of strong love. {\cf2\super [448]} \par
I will bring them together and make them like one person. I will put a new spirit {\cf2\super [98]} in them. I will take away that heart of stone, and I will put a real heart in its place.
\{God said,\} “I will also put a new spirit in you \{and change your way of thinking\}. I will take out the heart of stone from your body and give you a tender, human heart.
Don’t change yourselves to be like the people of this world. But let God change you inside with a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to decide and accept what God wants for you. You will be able to know what things are good and pleasing to God and what things are perfect.
The night {\cf2\super [139]} is almost finished. The day {\cf2\super [140]} is almost here. So we should stop doing things that belong to darkness (sin). We should prepare ourselves to fight evil with the weapons that belong to the light (good).
But become like the Lord Jesus Christ, so when people see what you do, they will see Christ. Don’t think about how to satisfy your sinful self and the bad things you want to do.
So when we were baptized, we were buried with Christ and shared his death. We were buried with Christ so that we could \{be raised up and\} live a new life. This happened the same as Christ was raised from death by the wonderful power of the Father.
God knew those people before he made the world. And God decided that those people would be like his Son (Jesus). Then Jesus would be the firstborn {\cf2\super [69]} of many brothers and sisters.
And our faces are not covered. We all show the Lord’s glory. We are being changed to be like him. This change in us brings more and more glory. This glory comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
God once said, “The light will shine out of the darkness!” And this is the same God who made his light shine in our hearts. He gave us light by letting us know the glory of God that is in the face of Christ.
God has made us what we are. In Christ Jesus, God made us new people so that we would do good things. God had already planned those good things for us. God had planned for us to live our lives doing those good things.
The Jewish law had many commands and rules. But Christ ended that law. Christ’s purpose was to make the two groups of people (Jews and non-Jews) become one new people in him. By doing this Christ would make peace.
God has chosen you and made you his holy people. {\cf2\super [18]} He loves you. So always do these things: Show mercy to people; be kind, humble, gentle, and patient.
The One that was sitting on the throne said, “Look! I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this, because these words are true and can be trusted.”