11.2- Life Changes
11.2-
Life
Changes Ephesians
4:20-24 Amy
Boucher Pye
Stephen grew up in a rough part of East
London and fell into crime by the age of ten. He said, “If everyone’s selling
drugs and doing robberies and fraud, then you’re going to get involved. It’s
just a way of life.” But when he was twenty, he had a dream that changed him:
“I heard God saying, Stephen, you’re going to prison to murder.” This vivid
dream served as a warning, and he turned to God and chose Jesus as his Savior –
and the Holy Spirit transformed his life.
Stephen set up an organization that teaches
inner-city kids discipline, morality, and respect through sports. He credits
God with the success he has seen as he prays with and trains the kids.
“Rebuilding misguided dreams,” he says.
In pursuing God and leaving behind our
past, we – like Stephen – follow Paul’s charge to the Ephesians to embrace a
new way of life. Although our old self is “corrupted by its deceitful desires,”
we can daily seek to “put on the new self” that’s created to be like God
(Ephesians 4:22, 24). All believers embrace this continual process as we ask
God through His Holy Spirit to make us more like Him.
Stephen said, “Faith was a crucial foundation for me changing my life around
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