What does it mean that a Christian is a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17)?

This is a work of God in which man can have no share. There is no human material to enter into it, for that had all gone in death before this work was wrought. Justification has here no place, for it is a living man, not a dead man, who needs to be justified. The whole question of responsibility as children of Adam is at an end, for Christ having gone into death for the very purpose of meeting our responsibility, and having settled that question for all that are His, has been raised from the dead in a new character of life (in resurrection), to which responsibility does not belong. He is in a sphere into which responsibility never shall enter, and we are there in Him. It is a work absolutely and entirely of God, a new creation, the character of which is that "all things are of God." (2 Cor. 5:18) The old things are passed away, gone in death never to return; the things that we have now are all new — new, not in the sense of being fresh merely, but as never having existed before. The great thought in the passage is that all that is of man has entirely disappeared from view, and what is of God alone is now seen. The day is coming when this will be true actually, when all within and around will be characterised by being of God, but in the meantime this is true of believers, of all who are in Christ, "if any man be in Christ there is a new creation."

This great truth is doctrinally unfolded in 2 Cor. 5, where we read, "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." (ver. 17) The apostle does not say, "If any man be in Christ he is pardoned — his sins are forgiven — his debts paid." All this is divinely true; but the statement just quoted goes very much farther. It declares that a man in Christ is a new creation altogether. It is not the old nature pardoned, but completely set aside, with all its belongings, and a new creation introduced in which there is not a single shred of the old. "All things are become new; and all things are of God."

The first mention of new creation in the New Testament is in 2 Corinthians 5:17, where we find that every one "in Christ" is brought into it. It is "new creation" in this verse rather than "a new creature," and the language of Paul here appears to be very vigorous and emphatic. He omits the verb altogether, and exclaims, "So that, if anyone in Christ — new creation!" as one who exults in this glorious fact. Nothing short of this is involved in our being in Christ Jesus.

In reconciliation everything is in the life of Christ: "Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." This is what is true in Christ. It is not exactly what is true as we view one another in this room; here we have to know one another after the flesh. In our pathway of responsibility through the world we have to do with the old order: we have parents, children, husbands, wives, masters, servants, etc., and we have to walk in these relationships to the glory of God. But this will all come to an end. It will come to an end at death, or the coming of Christ, when He will take us up in glory; but in the meantime we are in them, and we are to walk in them so as to please God. The life of Jesus is to come out in us down here; we are to walk as He walked. But in the life of Christ, as quickened together with Him, we are apart from all belonging to the old. There is nothing of Adam or of the flesh in our life in Christ. Personal identity, of course, abides to eternity, but that has nothing to do with the order of man. When I speak of the old or new it is a matter of relationships, nature and affections. All these new things are of God. This does not merely mean that He made them. He made the old also, but they became corrupted. But the old was not of Him in this sense; the new is of His nature. They are of God, in the sense that they are of Him morally and spiritually. They are in Christ and of His order.

Therefore the Apostle says, “Of Him are ye in Christ Jesus.” In Christ is new creation; old things are there passed away, and all things have become new, and all these new things are of God (2 Cor. 5:17-18). Of God are we in Christ. There is nothing of the old order there. We have a new life and a new nature, and all that we want is a new body to have parted with the old altogether.

But, as we have read, if any man is in Christ there is a new creation. There is little doubt that "in Christ" in this scripture goes farther than the same expression in Romans, where, though the life we possess in Christ is that of the new creation, the new creation itself is not revealed, for the reason that we are not there said to be risen with Christ. This truth is unfolded in the Colossians; and it is in this epistle that Christ is said to be "the Beginning, the First-born from the dead." (Col. 1:18.) That is, as the cross of Christ was the judicial end of the first man, so the resurrection of Christ - Christ as the risen Man - was God's new beginning according to His eternal counsels. He was ever the object of His counsels; and having glorified God concerning the sins and sin of Adam and his race, the first and responsible man, He in His own person, in His resurrection and glorified condition, is the Beginning; the beginning, because God has predestinated us to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the First-born among many brethren. As another scripture says, He is the beginning of the creation of God (Rev. 3:14); that is, of God's new creation.

The man in Christ belongs to a sphere where "old things have passed away" and where "all things have become new." This is truly Christianity according to the thought of God. All in Christianity proper is new; the revelation of God is entirely new; a new life has been manifested; new relationships have been formed; new associations now exist; a new man has been created; everything is heavenly in origin and character, and all our thoughts, desires, feelings, joys and affections, are altogether new. How good for us when we live in the light and power of these things; when we view the old order of things in which we once lived as gone forever from the sight of God, and gone forever for us also. It is true that we have to live still in old creation relationships and circumstances, but we can bring into them the light and character of the things that are heavenly and new.

Paul was not as a vessel broken, and another formed by the potter out of the same clay. No; it was a new thing altogether. He was a new creature in Christ, old things had passed away. Nothing as regards the flesh was changed in Paul, but the mastery of the flesh was. The law of sin and death is not taken out of the flesh, but I am delivered from it, brought out of the position where all is death into that where all is life. I have eternal life in me to give me power to live unto Christ "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me;" is not that a blessed truth? Are you walking in the power of that life, in the light of eternity?

Are you in Christ? Do you believe in His name? Have you given Him the confidence of your heart? If so, you have "eternal life" — you are "a new creature" — "old things are passed away." God does not see a single shred of the old thing remaining for you. "All things are become new, and all things are of God." You may say you do not feel that old things are all passed away. We reply, God says they are, and it is your happy privilege to believe what He says, and "reckon" yourself to be what He declares you are. God speaks according to that which is true of you in Christ. He does not see you in the flesh, but in Christ. There is absolutely nothing before the eye of God but Christ: and the very weakest believer is viewed as part of Christ, just as your hand is a part of your body. You have no existence before God apart from Christ — no life — no righteousness — no holiness — no wisdom — no power. Apart from Him, you have nothing, and can be nothing. In Him you have all and are all; you are thoroughly identified with Christ. Marvellous fact! Profound mystery! Most glorious truth! It is not a question of attainment or of progress. It is the settled and absolute standing of the feeblest member of the Church of God. True, there are various measures of intelligence, experience, and devotedness; but there is only one life, one standing, one position before God, and that is Christ. There is no such thing as a higher or lower Christian life. Christ is the believer's life, and you cannot speak of a higher or a lower Christ. We can understand the higher stages of Christian life; but there is no spiritual intelligence in speaking of a higher Christian life.

I have died with Him, and am now alive unto God in Him. I am in Christ and Christ in me, effected by the Holy Ghost dwelling in me. Having died, I am freed from sin as a principle, have got my discharge from its dominion. I am under a new headship; the law of sin and death is for me annulled, and the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has taken its place and is liberty. This is a generic thing. There is a new creation, of which I am part, and Christ is Himself the Head and Beginning thereof. I am taken out of my condition in Adam as guilty, and "under judgment to God," and set in Christ in new creation and under new headship. This being made ours in the unction and energy of the Holy Ghost, dwelling in and working with us, is the fruit of Christ's being glorified; for it is as set at God's right hand He is made unto us Lord and Christ, and has shed forth the Holy Ghost. It is our new order of life and blessing - the new creation.