Have you ever had a makeover? I've had a few, ha, but the most difficult makeover has been working on my heart from the inside out. Transformation is not easy, whether it's weight loss, mindset, or a change of heart. This week's episode co-hosts Renée and Theresa discuss our human need for change and how to get started!
Have you ever had a makeover? I've had a few, ha, but the most difficult makeover has been working on my heart from the inside out. Transformation is not easy, whether it's weight loss, mindset, or a change of heart. This week's episode co-hosts Renée and Theresa discuss our human need for change and how to get started!
I have been to makeup artists, to wardrobe, makeovers, to changing so many things that I wanted to change in my life. The hardest thing was after my divorce and realizing that something needed to change. And I spent many, many years with a therapist helping me do that because all that makeup and all that wardrobe was just the outside. But I realized pretty quickly if I didn't change the inside, nothing else was going to make me pretty. So you want to stay tuned today. If transformation is something that you want, but it's difficult. I get that. And you're going to want to hear today's podcast. So stay tuned.
Speaker 2:Welcome to episode 64 of the well-versed woman podcast. I'm Renee teller
Speaker 3:And I'm Theresa Morgan. You see Renee and I are two perfectly imperfect women. We come to you week after week to share our faith and our life's journeys with you in hopes that your faith will grow and that you can carry a beautiful relationship with the Lord.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly. Relationship. That's what we love to share. This is a podcast about relationship, not about religion, and it is the best relationship for transformation that you'll ever find. But before we get started, we know what's important is for us to be still enough to hear the small voice that we're talking about to plug into our creator so that he can download wisdom to us. We do that by being still, we're going to take just 20 seconds to be quiet and still to close our eyes, to take in some slow, deep breaths and ask God to actually open your eyes, to see your ears, to hear and your heart, to know the wisdom he'd impart to you today. 20 seconds start right now.[inaudible] That's it. That was 20 little seconds. And I'm going to encourage
Speaker 1:You to grow that time. You can do it morning, noon, or night, whatever works for you, but it's a must to be still, especially when you're looking for transformation, you need to take time for yourself to really go inward. Don't we Tressa.
Speaker 3:We do Renee. And you know, I'm thinking about the last podcast, and I'm thinking about the beautiful experience of water back tourism that we talked about on our last episode, and that we experienced in the waters of skinny Atlas lake at your home. So talking about being baptized, we talked about being immersed into Christ. So just a quick refresher on that, because that is going to launch us into today's podcast. You know, when a human being puts faith in Jesus Christ puts faith in the redemptive work on the cross of God, becoming sin that we might become in right standing or righteous with God. Literally, when that happens, God does a circumcision of our spirit, the real loss, and then the holy spirit of God lives. He comes to live inside of our spirit, this, and then he comes Rene in. He seals us, listen to what the Bible says in Ephesians chapter one verses 13 and 14, it says, and Paul wrote the book of Ephesians. It says in him, meaning in Christ. You also trusted after you heard the word of truth. Meaning after we hear the gospel, the gospel of our salvation in whom also having believed you were sealed with the holy spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchase possession to the praise of his glory. Wow, let's look at that. Let's take that apart just a little bit today, Renee, when we are born again, and when there is a brand new spirit created within us is the Bible talks about it. Second Corinthians five 17, the holy spirit actually seals our spirit. He's our guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchase possession. So what is he saying? He is saying in that moment, when a person is born again, they are saved and they have eternal life in Christ at that moment. Wow. Grenade does that mean we don't have to work? We don't have to be good enough to enter heaven in our eternal placement. Well, that's exactly what that means. That means that that moment, because we are in Christ and he is in us. We have eternal life, Ephesians chapter four verse 30 says again, do not grieve the holy spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Isn't that beautiful? So the day of redemption that the Bible talks about is our eventual placement. When we pass from this earth, when we are in heaven with God, that's our eventual placement. That's the day of redemption when we're totally redeemed onto himself. But for now what a beautiful truth that we have eternal life right now, Renee, isn't that wonderful. That's where the holy spirit resides in the spirit of a human being, the real loss. I'm thinking, you know, again, we use
Speaker 1:The term born again and it's about being born in the spirit. So just a step back from that, the, after the decision is made, it's that whole idea, right? Theresa of making a choice to turn your spirit on. So if the real us is spirit, when we're born, we have a spirit. It's that decision point of we were born in the flesh, through the womb physically, which we're all very familiar with. I think the difficult thing for me back in the day was what it meant or why I had to turn on the spirit. And if we went back Theresa, this is episode 64. Wow. That sounds, that sounds like a lot of episodes, 64 episodes. But if we went back way to the beginning tree, so where we remind everybody why we have to make that decision, because God is love, love is a choice. So if we don't choose to be born in the spirit, right, Theresa, then, then we can't and don't, and won't be a follower of the holy spirit, which is God, the father, son and holy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's absolutely correct. Renee, John chapter three comes to mind where Jesus is talking with Nicodemus. And very simply says to Nicodemus that unless a man be born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of God unless a man be born again. He cannot see the kingdom of God. And if when we flip over to Romans 14, 17, it says, you know, the kingdom of God is not eating or drinking, but it's righteousness, peace enjoy in the holy spirit. So the occurrence, the experience, if you will, of being born again is just that we hear the gospel. We put faith in the finished work of Christ in then God, the holy spirit does the renewal. If you were, if you will, we talked about it last week, the circumcision of our spirit. And that's when he comes to live within us. You know, there's a wonderful scripture that I love. It's first fess Aloni, ans five verses 23 and 24 that talks about us being a three-part individual. It says, now may the God of peace himself sanctify you. That's a big word. That means make you holy may he make you holy completely may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord, Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful, who will also do it. I again love the truth of the scripture that God wants us to accept Jesus Christ as Lord and savior. And then when the holy spirit comes into our spirit, then he tells us to work out our salvation through our soul, through our body. So that, that part of us can line up with the work that has been done in our spirits. And he goes to work helping us with that process.
Speaker 1:Hmm. So going back to my intro and this idea of transformation, and when, you know, I went through divorce to be perfectly open here. I remember Theresa walking into the therapist's office and sitting down and saying, you know, and, and for all, all of you listening, remember I was a C, I was a CPA am an accountant. You know, I've got that analytical brain. And I had a list. I list the things I wanted to work on things I wanted to transform. And I just wanted to go through the checklist and I wanted to know how long it was going to take for him to help me get through this list. It was so funny, I think back to that, and I'm so grateful that that therapist didn't like laugh in my face or throw me out of his office saying, you just don't get it. This transformation is gonna take time. It's work from the inside out. And it started with what you're talking about, Teresa, the circumcision of my heart, this idea that my heart had to start getting work done in a different way than anything I had done in the past. And at the end of the day, when I think about all the struggles that I've had in my life, whether it was that situation and divorce and trying to understand my part in that failed marriage or the cancer tumor every single time, I would go back to asking God first to me, transform from the inside out, help me understand what was going on. Really in my physical, right. My brain is my physical, my, my way of life that I had recorded and just gotten roundly walking through, you know, day to day, not really realizing, growing up what I was becoming or where I was off the mark. Again, that's where Theresa's talking about working out my salvation. Then this idea that I had to get on a path where I was in constant transformation, you know, so many of us, we don't like change and I love to work with everybody on you do love, change, change that thought process, because change is a beautiful thing. It's not easy. But when I think about how much I've changed and I continue to do it right, I have not arrived. I have to apologize for things all the time. I, I misstep so to speak for what I know truth is and the way I want to be. But this holy spirit now living in me gives me strength to go through and to keep working out my salvation.
Speaker 3:That's very true in a change, brings us to maturity, right? The essence of life is maturity. The essence of life is maturation that we go from one place in our lives, right to another. The Bible says, we go from glory to glory, to everlasting glory. Now, why is this important? And what does that mean? He brings us from glory to glory. He brings us from one place of maturity to another place of maturity. Well, why is maturity important? Because the highest calling in life is love in order for our soul, our thoughts, our will, our emotions in order for them to line up with the beautiful work that's been done in our spirit, we need to mature the hat, right? We want to be a good conduit of the love of God that is in our heart. So we want to mature. We want to be a good example for the kingdom of God, for the God that we love and serve. So it's all about growing up, right? Renee, we want to, we want to grow up what parent wants their children to stay in diapers. No, we want them to grow up so that they can experience this life in a whole and a healthy fashion so that the relationships that come into their life can be fruitful in joyful and loving. So that really is a high goal. It's a high goal in it's, it's pretty lofty, but I know from walking with the Lord for 27 years, he is the one that helps me to change, to change my behavior so that it is more loving and more kind. And then I become a really great representation of him.
Speaker 1:Couple of things, come to mind. Treece. I think about Jesus. And so many of us, you know, well, who was this? Some people say he was just another man, a great man, a great prophet, a great leader, but he wasn't God. And the reality is when we think about how he walked on the earth and why so many were attracted to him, is it because as it says in the word, God is love. And he was God walking around the earth. So he was love walking around the earth. And of course, people are attracted to him. And when you were talking trees, I was thinking about your transformation and how people are attracted to you because you are love walking around the earth. And that's what we all want to be. Now reminds me of the very simple scripture that everyone has probably heard. If they've been to a Christian wedding and it comes out of Corinthians, right? Theresa, it talks faith, hope and love says these things remain faith, which we talk about a lot, hope and love. And then it goes on and the greatest of these is love. And we are to do everything out of love. So if I'm doing things on the earth and we've talked, I'm a doer, I'm a worker. I like to execute on things, but if I'm not doing them out of love, they're meaningless, right? Theresa, they're just meaningless. So this transformation is to get me. I always like to say out of my head and into my heart so that I'm constantly working out of my heart, not out of my head. And that's a big transformation for me.
Speaker 3:It sure is Renee. And the scripture you quoted, which is just so beautiful is from first Corinthians chapter 13, verse 13, it says, now these three remain faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love. So the Bible talks about that. We are becoming, we are being made into the image of Jesus. And I love that what you said, Renee, because he was the perfect, right? He still today is the perfect lover, lover of humanity, lover of our souls, lover of those that are in the worst place of life. In those that are in the best place of life. He's a lover of mankind. I was with a group of people last night, and we were talking, thinking about the scripture that says for the day joy set before him, he endured the shame of the cross for the joy set before. And that edge joy was you Renee and me in really the rest of mankind because he knew to satisfy the legal requirements of God. His blood had to be shut. The Bible says without the shedding of blood, there's no remission for sin. He knew that joy of being reunited to God almighty because sin had occurred in the world. He knew the joy of the reuniting of humanity to God would not have taken place. Had he not gone to the cross in? He did that. The Bible says for, you know, the first time in humanity, he began came sin. And when he became sin on our behalf, the father turned his back. There was a separation, right? He took that supper that occurred many years in the garden. When Adam and Eve had sin, he took that for us. And then rose again on the third day that we might be raised to new life. As we talked about last week in, when we put our faith in that story, the new birth occurs to us and we are reunited to God once again. And the transformation that we're talking about here today, he does, in a moment of time, he circumcised our spirit. He transformed. That's where he dwells in. Then he says, come on, you also have a saw your mind, your well, your emotions. We're going to start to make that holy as well. And I can tell you for 27 years, he has worked on me and I'm not the same, the same person. I'm not the same person I was yesterday. Definitely not a year ago or 27 years ago in what he says, Renee in John 10, 10, and the thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy. But I have come that you may have life inhabit in abundance. It's that abundant life. When the holiness that has occurred in a human being spirit starts to trickle into their soul, into their behavior. When that happens, that abundant life begins, where you have joy and peace and patience and kindness, not to say that everything goes completely right in life, but the response to it, with him leading and guiding it, that always turns out in a victorious stance in that really is the life of a Christian going from one place in life to another, with his help. We can't do it without him, Renee. And I want to thank you for the beautiful compliment of walking in love in you're such a beautiful example of that as well, especially as I watched last week, that beautiful water baptism and welcoming people from afar into your home and into the beautiful place that you have made for the beautiful experience of water baptism.
Speaker 1:Well, that was a beautiful, beautiful summary of what we're trying to get across. And I have so many things I want to say right after that, Teresa, but I think we'll save them for next week as we continue this very idea of transformation. And I bet everybody listening has that sense of boy, I need to change this or that because we all really realize at the end of the day, we're not perfect. So stay tuned for next week, but we do have a favorite scripture that we always quote. And if you've been listening, I bet you can tell us what it is, but since we can hear them, Tracy, what is that scripture?
Speaker 3:Absolutely. Renee Romans 10 17. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.
Speaker 2:Thanks for listening. We love him. We're so grateful that you tuned in today and we'd love for you to subscribe to this podcast rate and review it. Give us feedback. We'd love to know what you want to hear more about. So please subscribe. And we will send you a journal right in the mail. We also have a Facebook community called well-versed woman search for us on Facebook. We'll pop you into that group. And last but not least, the show notes to every podcast are included in the episode. Just scroll down where your favorite platform says more details. And you'll get to the show notes, which contain the exact references to all the scriptures that we talked about today. Stay tuned next week for part two of the transformed life, find them relaxing. You bye-bye.