Episode 004: Spiritual Genetics

Have we reduced the gospel to something smaller than what Jesus actually accomplished?

Most of us were taught that the cross is about forgiveness—and it is.

But what if forgiveness is only part of the story?

In this episode of Renegade Grace, Jess dives into what it really means to have new life and a new nature in Christ—and why the gospel is far bigger than just having your sins forgiven.

You’ll discover:

• Why the real problem wasn’t just sin—but death
• How Jesus didn’t just forgive you… He made you alive
• What it means to be a new creation with a new nature
• Why the popular phrase “die to self” misses the point of the cross
• And how living like a “sinner” might actually be the thing keeping you stuck

If you’ve ever felt forgiven but still struggled to feel free, this episode will challenge what you’ve believed about yourself—and invite you into a completely new way of living.

Because the truth is you’re not just forgiven… you’ve been made new.

Show Notes:

Link to Jess’s Books: CLICK HERE

Instagram: @renegadepastor

Email: jess@renegadegrace.com

Website: renegadegrace.com 

Verses Referenced in Today’s Episode: Romans 5:12–18; Genesis 2:17; Romans 6:5; Galatians 2:20; Romans 8:11; 2 Corinthians 5:14–15; Romans 6:10; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Hebrews 10:14; 1 Corinthians 15:31–32; Luke 9:23; Mark 8:34; Matthew 16:24; Galatians 4:6; Romans 6:17; Hebrews 10:16; 2 Peter 1:4; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Romans 3:20–22; Matthew 5:48; Galatians 3:10; James 2:10; Philippians 3:8–9; Romans 6:18; 1 John 4:17; Romans 6:8–11; Romans 6:6; Colossians 1:13–14; Galatians 5:19–23; Romans 8:5–8; Romans 12:2; Romans 8:9; Colossians 1:21–22; Colossians 2:23; Colossians 3:12

Greek Words: Koinónos (Strong’s 2844); Phusis (Strong’s 5449); Dikaios (Strong’s 1342)

Listener Reflection Questions:

• Have you been thinking of the gospel primarily as forgiveness, or as new life? What’s the difference for you?
• Where do you still see yourself as a “sinner trying to do better” instead of someone who has been made new?
• What feels hardest to believe—that you are forgiven, or that you are fundamentally changed? Why?
• What might change this week if you truly lived from your new nature instead of striving to earn it?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Have we reduced the gospel to something smaller than what Jesus actually accomplished? What if the gospel you were taught was only half the story? What if Jesus didn't just forgive sinners, but replace them? We're diving deep today, y'all, so suit up in your best scuba gear and let's jump into the deep end together. To kick us off today, I have a really important statement to make. Salvation is better than just forgiveness. Yep, I said it. Salvation is more than forgiveness. Listen, forgiveness is awesome. I mean, I just spent like 40 minutes in our last episode talking about how cool forgiveness is and how awesome and amazing and big and unconditional that forgiveness is. So don't get me wrong, it's amazing. I love forgiveness. We need it. It's a big chunk of what salvation is, but it's still only a part of the good news. So let me ask you a question. What does the cross mean to you? I'll wait while you think. If you're like most Christians, your answer is probably something like, Jesus died for my sins, or Jesus forgave me. And that's true. Those are good answers, but they're also incomplete. Because the cross didn't just deal with your sin, it also dealt with your death. And this is something we don't really talk about very much. What happened to Adam in the garden post-forbidden fruit feast is something deeper, really, than just sin, disobedience. It wasn't just sin that entered humanity, it was death, spiritual death. Romans 5 teaches us this. Romans 5, verse 12 says, So then, just as sin entered the world through one man and death through sin, so death spread to all people because all sinned. So what happened was Adam took in the knowledge of good and evil, and it literally murdered him from the inside out. God even warned Adam that this was going to happen if he ate from the fruit. In chapter two of Genesis, God says to Adam, You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, because when you eat from it, you will surely die. And Adam did die, in fact, and that death was a spiritual death. So we can see here this kind of dual nature with the fall of man. We have sin and death. So the problem with humanity wasn't just that we were bad, like we disobeyed God and sin entered. It's that we were dead. And here's the thing about dead people, okay? They don't just need a clean record. Pardon isn't enough if you're dead. You also need life. I like to use zombies as an illustration when I talk about this. I love a good dystopian horror flick. I also love cryptids. So, you know, give me Bigfoot, give me werewolves, give me zombies, give me vampires. So I like to talk about zombies with regards to this. So, what are zombies? They they're basically the undead. They look like they're alive, they walk around like they're alive, they move like they're alive, but they're really dead. And all they do is try to quench their insatiable appetite. And so they look for things to consume. They try to consume the living, they try to consume, consume, consume, and they're never satisfied or full. So essentially, before Christ, we're spiritual zombies. We look like we have life, we look like we're walking around alive, but really we're dead inside. And without Christ, we have no life. We have a problem in the church today, and that's that we only preach half the gospel. We preach forgiveness, and forgiveness is amazing. Like I said, but forgiveness alone doesn't fix death. You could forgive a zombie and it's still a zombie. You can forgive a zombie and it will still try to eat your brains. So God had to come up with a better solution. A gospel that is more than just forgiveness of sins. Because the fall brought sin and death, salvation has to bring forgiveness and life. And that's exactly what Jesus did. The gospel is incomplete without the glorious grace of Christ's life in us. The resurrection proves that Christ defeated sin and death. Jesus didn't just die to forgive you, he rose to resurrect you. All of this means that part of the salvation package is Christ's resurrection life in us. As Paul would say in Romans 6, we've been immersed into his death and resurrection. And this is why we get to have eternal life. I mean, think about it. What is eternal life, really? Eternal life means life without beginning or end. Only God has life without beginning or end. Only God has eternal life. And the only way we get it, and we get to also have eternal lives, is if God has given his life to us. Not just any life, okay? Not just extending our lives. He's given his life to us. That's what makes it eternal. Or, you know, in fancy theology terms, he imparts his life to us. This isn't like a behavior improvement plan. This is a total transformation. This isn't life on God's accounting books up in heaven, okay? This isn't like, you know, spiritual accounting. Up in heaven, you have life. No, this is Christ in us right now. Galatians says this. Galatians 2.20, you've heard me quote it many times, but 2.20, look just the second half of that verse. It says, the life I now live, now live in the body. In heaven? No. The life I now live in the body, I live because of the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I think actually Paul says it even more clearly in Romans chapter 8. So clearly. This is what it says, Romans 8.11. If the spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, that would be resurrection life. If the one who raised Christ from the dead lives in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will also make your mortal bodies alive through his spirit who lives in you. Your mortal bodies, your heavenly bodies? No, your mortal bodies alive through his spirit who lives in you. I mean, I don't know how much more clearly Paul can say that. Resurrection life is in you. Right now, today, as you listen to this podcast, right now, eternal life starts now. Not in heaven someday, now. And that means here's what this means, okay? If you have resurrection life in you, this means you've got no more dying to do. Okay, here's where we're gonna step on a few toes. So maybe like consider putting on your emotional steel-toed boots for this part. I know that there is a very common phrase we use within the church. This phrase die to self. And if you caught, I said there's no more dying for you to do. So obviously, I don't prescribe to the die-to-self mantra. So let's unpack it together, okay? Did you know the phrase die to self is nowhere in scripture? I know, it's shocking. But it's true, it's nowhere to be found. In Romans chapter six, Paul tells us to consider ourselves dead to sin. Later in Romans, and again in Galatians, he reminds us that we're dead to the law. But you will not find the phrase die to self anywhere in scripture. It sounds spiritual, right? It sounds holy. So what's wrong with it? You don't need to die to yourself. You already did. You were crucified with Christ already, remember? We just talked about that. And you have new resurrection life. And not because you tried hard enough, but because Jesus actually finished something. The cross wasn't a daily assignment to Christians. If that were the case, what was the point of Jesus? If we needed to be crucified over and over, what was the point of Jesus? No, it was a once-for-all execution. Your old self, buried. Your new self, alive, whole, righteous, not under construction. Okay, so if this isn't a scripture, where did the idea come from then? Well, this die to self-doctrine, I think, comes from a bad interpretation of two specific scriptures. First, Paul telling us or saying that he dies daily for the gospel. And Jesus, which is the big one, Jesus telling his disciples to deny themselves and take up their crosses daily. So uh let's unpack those together. Let's start with Paul, because that's I think the silliest of the two. So this is from 1 Corinthians 15. So if we're gonna take verse 31 by itself, just you know, out of context, here's what it says in the NASB. I affirm, brothers and sisters, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, that I die daily. All right, so looking at this verse by itself, it does kind of look like Paul is saying he dies daily, right? But as you know, here at Renegade Grace, we don't take verses out of context. We've been burned by this in the past, so we don't take verses out of context. Around here, we're gonna, you know, look at the context. So let's add in verses 30 and 32. I'm gonna stay in NASB for right now. Starting at verse 30, why are we also in danger every hour? I affirm, brothers and sisters, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, that I die daily. If from human motives I fought with wild beasts in Ephesus, what good is it to me? Okay, so if you look at this verse in context, you can see that Paul's actually talking about his like actual physical life being in danger, not spiritually dying to self, not, you know, that whole spiritual thing. I actually really like how the NIV translates this. I think the NIVA does a better job at being more clear with regards to this. So let's read it in the NIV. So I'll start with verse 30 again. And as for us, why do we endanger ourselves every hour? Here's verse 31. I face death every day. Yes, just as surely as I boast about you in Christ Jesus, our Lord. So you can see there that it's more clear, like it's talking about Paul facing death every day, physical death, physical harm. It's not about spiritual suicide. And, you know, kind of somewhat ironically to me, the whole of chapter 15 is actually Paul talking about Christ's resurrection and the importance of it. Like if you read the entire chapter, chapter 15, it's actually Paul talking about Christ's resurrection. He says up in verse 17, if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless. You're still in your sins. So he's like really highlighting the importance of resurrection life when it comes to salvation. It will never cease to amaze me how we can get so easily off track and focus in on like one little pixel and miss the beauty of the whole picture that scripture's painting for us. But, you know, I guess that's the enemy's oldest trick, really. Okay, so that's Paul. Now let's tackle Jesus. These words from Jesus to deny yourself and take up your cross daily are actually found in three of the four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. I'm gonna use Luke because I want to. Luke chapter 9. If anyone wants to come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. All right. So do you remember in our previous episodes how I explained that not everything Jesus said is for us? He has multiple audiences, and not everything he said was for us as post-cross Christians. So let's just take a minute to put on our right reading glasses, right? And look at this passage through the correct covenant lens. Did the people Jesus said this to have his resurrection life in them? Well, no, because of course he hadn't died yet and therefore hadn't resurrected. Did they have the Holy Spirit in them? No, this is well before Pentecost, right? Do we have his resurrection life in us and the Holy Spirit in us? Yes, we've already seen today how Scripture repeatedly and excessively teaches this across multiple books of the Bible. So are we different or the same as the audience who heard this message? The writers of the New Testament would say we are very different. These words here from Jesus are his call to his disciples and the followers that were following him to trust him for salvation. He's being evangelistic. Unlike those disciples, we who have accepted him have the incredible gift and privilege to live on the it is finished side of the cross. It's different for us. We have it better than they did. We become more than just followers of Christ. We're God's kids. That's the gospel. We're God's kids. So if the message you're hearing sounds like try harder, die more, do better, that's not the gospel. That's just religious self-righteousness dressed up as devotion. It looks like self-sacrifice, but really it's self-focus. So what's the real limitation? Stop trying to save yourself. Stop trying to fix yourself. Stop trying to become someone God has already made you to be. You are not your problem. You are not your project. You are not your enemy. You are his child. You are his masterpiece. You are his partner in overflowing with good works. You can stop trying to murder what God resurrected. Okay, so we don't have to die daily because we have Christ's life in us. But what does that really mean for us? Well, I think the best way that I can think to explain it is that our spiritual genetics have changed. It's like we are literally a new species of human. We were in Adam and now we are in Christ. We used to belong to earth species, but now we belong to the species of heaven. A while back, a friend of mine said in a message that we're literally aliens, which did inspire a new tattoo for me. So I now have an alien tattoo. We're a new species. We're a species of heaven. We're not from here. And I know that sounds kind of sci-fi and weird, but isn't that what it means to be born again? A new birth, a new life, a new being. We use that language, right? We use that language a lot in church about being born again. But do we really know what it means? Pause for just a minute and think about it. You were born physically into Adam. And with that came an identity. The identity was sinner. Then you accept a Christ. And something mystical and mis miraculous happens. You're born again as a child of heaven. You have new genetics, a new core being, a new heart. This is like, I think arguably the most unrecognized reality of being a new covenant believer, a new heart. Why? Because we've spent decades in modern Christianity reading old covenant passages with the wrong reading glasses on. And so we take passages like Jeremiah 17, right? This says the heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. And we build this like whole distorted theology around it. I mean, never mind that that passage is actually directed to people living under an old covenant without Christ living in their hearts, and contextually is calling them to depend on God for rescue. That's like what the passage is about. It's the Jews being called to depend on God for rescue. So neither our reality nor our relationship with the Lord is the same as the Jews that Jeremiah was writing to. Instead, we have Galatians 4 6. And Galatians 4 6 says, Because you are sons, children, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying Abba Father. Okay, so before Christ, Jeremiah's right, the heart is wicked. Because it was full of only our dead humanness, independent of God. But now but now we are united with Christ and his perfect goodness. So in order for our hearts to be deceitful and beyond cure, in order for Jeremiah 17 to be true about us as believers, we would have to say that Christ is deceitful and beyond cure because he occupies our heart. That's what Galatians says. The Spirit of His Son has come into our hearts. In order for our hearts to be deceitful and beyond cure, he would have to be deceitful and beyond cure. No. We are new and holy creatures because we are in Christ, and Christ is in us. In fact, Romans chapter 6, verse 17 says that we have become obedient from where? The heart. Hebrews 10 says that he's written goodness on our hearts and inscribed them on our minds. We have goodness native to us now. That sounds like super fancy and special, right? But what does it actually mean? I asked this question recently because I love 2 Peter chapter 1. And I was like, huh, what is that? What does that actually mean? So let's break it down together because I did a deep dive for us. The Greek word here for partakers means a participant who mutually belongs. A participant who mutually belongs. The word for nature means the underlying constitution or makeup of someone. So if we are partakers of the divine nature, we are a participant who mutually belongs to the core makeup of the divine. In other words, I now belong to God's inner being. Let's take a look at another verse that shows us this. 2 Corinthians 5 21. God made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we would become the righteousness of God. We have become the righteousness of God. The righteousness of God. Not human righteousness, not law righteousness, not earned righteousness, the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Do you know that you're righteous? No, I didn't say becoming righteous, not progressively getting more righteous, not up in heaven someday righteous. We are not positionally sinners in Adam. So how can we believe that we are only positionally righteous in Christ? Think about that. We don't argue that we're positionally sinners in Adam. Just up in heaven, God sees us as sinners. No, we don't argue that. We're not positionally sinners in Adam. We're not positionally righteous in Christ. Is Christ's choice not more powerful than Adam's? Are you saying that Adam's choice was enough to affect us all, but Christ's choice isn't enough? Christ's choice isn't enough to change our nature. Adam's choice was enough to change our nature, but Christ's choice isn't enough to change our nature. No. Before Christ, under that old way, you know, the one where we measured right and wrong by our behavior, the law way, under that way, no one was righteous, not even one. That's what Romans 3 says. No one was righteous, not even one. But now, but now we have the righteousness of God. Through Christ. Today, right now, you're righteous. Your identity is holiness. And maybe we don't know, maybe we don't understand that because we don't know fully what it means to be righteous. Yeah, I get it. Righteousness is one of those big church words, and we tend to like toss it around in our religious huddles, but we don't actually like take the time, you know, to think about it, talk about it. What does it mean? The Greek word for righteous, in the simplest sense, can be translated as innocent or faultless, guiltless, perfectly right. The ancient Jews would have seen righteousness as something they could gain through keeping and obeying, you know, the law. However, Jesus, when he enters the scene, he teaches that the reality of righteousness is not simply doing righteous things, but rather having a heart of righteousness. In fact, Jesus goes as far to define righteousness for us as that which is in conformity to God's own being. God's perfection. That's what he says in Matthew chapter 5. Be perfect like God. That's what righteousness is. It's all or nothing. You are dead in Adam, or you are alive in Christ. You're not half dead, half alive. You are dead in Adam, or you are alive in Christ. You are a sinner in Adam, or you are righteous in Christ. You can't be in Christ and be a sinner. You can't be in Adam and be righteous. You're a sinner in Adam, or you're righteous in Christ. Righteousness does not come in stages. Righteousness is perfection. Unrighteousness is imperfection. There are no degrees, no stages of righteousness. You're either a righteous being or an unrighteous being. This is true even under the law. Righteousness was measured by complete and full adherence to all requirements, not just some. We saw this in our covenants episode. We talked about this. Galatians and James talk about it's you abide by one part, you got to abide by it all. You're obligated to it all. All or nothing. The idea of a progressive righteousness or an ongoing gradual righteousness is not found in scripture. Not even under old covenants. Even under the old covenant, righteousness was not progressive. Why do we think the new covenant got worse? No, it's not how it works. You have righteousness that is dependent on Christ's faithfulness. Paul tells us that in Philippians chapter 3. Righteousness that is dependent on Christ's faithfulness. Not your faithfulness, Christ's faithfulness. You're owned by righteousness, Romans 6. You are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Today, right now. That is your new nature. John says, 1 John 4, 1 John chapter 4, he says, just as Jesus is, so also are we in this world. Catch that? Just as Jesus is, so also are we in this world. Not in heaven someday in this world. So then it's not just that God sets our past identity as sinners aside through forgiveness. But even more than that, we get credit for Jesus' perfection. This is the great exchange, right? My death for Christ's life, my law-breaking for his law-keeping, my unrighteousness for his perfect rightness, my old sin nature for his completely holy nature. What then should we do with this new identity of righteousness? Would it make any sense for us to behave unrighteously? Of course not. May it never be, as Paul would say. It's silly. Instead, we get to live out who we are from our new hearts. The enemy would have you live a fake identity of dirty, rotten sinner. He would love that. Why? Well, because then he can keep you focused on your behavior and not on Christ. If he can convince you that you're dead inside, then it's much easier to tempt you with dead things like sin. Don't fall for it. Don't fall for it. The truth is, you are resurrected with Christ. Righteousness is full of life. Live like you're alive. Goodness is your new default state. I realize that this concept of goodness being our natural state is sadly considered by most to be radical and wild and maybe even a little heretical. The church seems to have this like really deep and passionate commitment to the belief that we're all just sinners saved by grace. And listen, I absolutely 100% agree that we were sinners saved by grace. Where I disagree is on carrying that label into our new life after salvation. That's a divergence from the truth. Have you ever noticed how obsessed the church is with sin, by the way? I mean, really think about it. When was the last time you heard a sermon that didn't talk about some sin or another? How often do we pray, begging God to forgive us again, quietly wondering if he's getting tired of hearing the same confession on repeat? We measure sin, we rank sin, we label people by spit sin, especially the ones we think are worse than ours. We talk about it, sing about it, preach about it, pray about it, write about it. A lot of ways we've made it the main thing in Christianity. And the result? Well, we end up living one of two ways: either hating ourselves or judging everyone else. All because we've tied our identity to a label that Jesus already removed. I want to be clear here, okay? So listen when I say this: sin exists, okay? We participate in and create, struggle, hurt. We intentionally or unintentionally wound other people. However, sin is not native to us anymore. It is a parasite, an external invading entity that tries to take over our minds and our emotions and our will. This bad doctrine we have of Christians' innate sinfulness is built largely on this misunderstanding that's due to actually translation issues of some Bible versions. So the term sinful nature, it used to appear in older, outdated now versions of the NIV. I actually I caught recently, it's also still in the New Living Translation in some verses. It still uses this bad translation, which is to translate the Greek word sarx, which literally means flesh. They translate it as sinful nature, which is not accurate. It means flesh. And this has led to a lot of confusion throughout the church, making some people believe that we as Christians have a sinful nature. However, we have seen already that the Bible repeatedly teaches that believers are new creations, that we're united with Christ, and that we have a new righteous nature. Multiple places throughout Scripture teach this. Romans 6 says, Romans 6.6, it says, we we know that our old man was crucified with him. Okay, so old, old us was crucified, so that the body of sin would no longer dominate us, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. We're not slaves to sin anymore. In fact, as God's kids, what do we know about what happened to our sin? How about Colossians chapter one? Even though you were dead, dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he nevertheless made you alive with him, having forgiven all your transgressions. He's destroyed what was against us, a certificate of indebtedness expressed in decrees opposed to us, he has taken it away by nailing it to the cross. According to this verse, Christ has forgiven all of your sins, and he destroyed what was against us. That means the DNA evidence that the prosecuting attorney used to convict us no longer exists. And here's what's cool. Here's what's cool about New Life in Christ. Even if it did, even if the DNA evidence existed, our DNA would no longer match it. New spiritual genetics, remember? That means that shame no longer has any business being in your life because you are no longer guilty. Sin has no business being in your life because you're no longer dead. The struggle we face as believers is not with this default sinful nature. It's with this entity, the flesh, Sarks, the flesh, which actually we learn in Galatians and Romans, refers to old patterns of thinking and acting independently of Christ. It's connected to our humanity, sure, and influenced by sin, but it is not us. It's connected to us, but it's not us. This is why Paul calls us in Romans 12 to renew our minds. Because it's bad thinking. That's what the flesh is. Old patterns of thinking and acting independently of Christ. So Paul's solution is renew your mind. Renew your mind to believe the truth. As Christians, we're no longer slaves to sin. We're ruled by righteousness and are obedient from the heart. Romans 8, verse 9 reminds us. You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit. Do you catch that? You are not in the flesh, you are in the spirit. The flesh is not our true identity. Our true identity is found in Christ. Our sins no longer define us. This label, sinner, that we use, it's not ours to carry. We are saints. Yes, we're saints who sometimes fall for the temptation of the flesh and behave sinfully. But it's our behavior, our behavior that carries that label, not our hearts. I know you might be thinking, Jess, why does this matter? Isn't it just semantics? It matters because if we believe that our identity is dirty, rotten sinner, then we will treat ourselves and our fellow believers like dirty, rotten sinners. If you don't understand this, that you will make grace about heaven someday and neglect enjoying the fullness of grace for your everyday. We will live our lives trying desperately to draw near to God, to beg for forgiveness and closeness and cleansing. And in doing so, we will neglect enjoying his true rest that is found only in receiving the work that Christ has already done. This is the reality, okay? This is the reality of our new covenant with him. Goodness is our new default nature because we have been fully forgiven, united with Christ, and given a new holy heart. If these things are true, if it's really true that Jesus is really one with us and lives in our hearts, then only goodness can come out of our hearts because Jesus is only good. If Jesus occupies our heart, only goodness lives there. We have a new identity, a new natural state that is holy, blameless, and without blemish. That's what it says in Colossians chapter 1. It says you were once strangers and enemies in your mind. But now he's reconciled to you through his physical body, through death, to present you as holy, without blemish, and blameless before him. Isn't it such a clever trick by darkness? You know, it's a clever trick of the enemy. Because if the enemy were to say to us, hey, hey, Christian, I want you to focus on sin. Just like keep your mind fixed on sin. We'd be like, no way, man. We know better. I'm smarter than that, right? I'm not gonna fall for that one. So he doesn't say that. Instead, this is what he says: just focus on holiness. Yeah. Just focus on how much you need to be more righteous. Focus. Just focus here. Focus focus on getting more forgiveness. Over and over and over. It sounds godly, doesn't it? It sounds Christian. But what do those things actually make you do? They make you focus on sin. Oh, but it sounds godly. But it keeps you focused on your sin. It has the appearance of wisdom, Paul would say to the Colossians, the appearance of wisdom, but holds no true value. There's a great temptation for us in our humanity to settle for a doctrine that is driven by fear. Fear of falling short, fear of being distant, fear of disappointing God, fear of punishment or suffering from Him as a result of whatever, disobedience. The premise of all of these is that we're victims of sin, driven by a desire innately to sin, wicked at our core. Don't fall for it. God does not speak the language of sin and shame. So if you're living in a state of shame, are you listening to God's voice or the enemy's? Because God doesn't speak the language of shame. You are righteous, not shameful. You are forgiven, not guilty. You are holy and dearly loved. So how about today you choose to agree with God on this one? How about you choose to agree with God on this one and not the enemy? Okay. Look, I I know this isn't easy stuff. It's simple, right? The gospel is simple. Christ in us and us in Christ. That's it. That's the gospel. Christ in us, the assurance of glory, Paul says to the Colossians. It's simple, but it's not always easy to believe. It's hard for me, too. I spent, gosh, a lifetime being trained by my religion to hate myself. Being trained to hate me, to hide, to make myself small, beat myself up. A lifetime I spent doing that. So for Christ to come and say, hey, I think you're pretty rad exactly as you are, man, that's that's hard to receive. That's hard to receive when you have a whole lifetime of being told who you are is not very rad. So I'm learning still every single day to believe the truth of who he says I am. It's okay to struggle with it. It's okay to have doubts. He's he's pretty big. He can handle it. Just keep searching for the truth. Keep letting him lead you from your heart. You could trust him to leave you, lead you. Keep trusting that he has goodness for you, even when you struggle to believe it. Okay. I I think that does it for this episode. So if you want to keep up with me in between episodes, you can check out my website, renegadegrace.com. I have lots of stuff on there. You can also email me from there if you want. You can reach out to me via email at Jess at Renegadegrace.com or follow my Instagram at RenegadePastor. There is a link in the show notes if you're interested in buying any of my books. I teach a lot on this in my book. I do more exposition on the whole deny, take up your cross, deny yourself, and follow me in my book, Uncommon Gospel. So if you want more on that, you can read it there. Also, there's a list of verses that were referenced in today's teaching and the Greek words and listener discussion questions if you want them. All right. Thanks for listening to Renegade Grace. Tune in for our next episode. We're going to continue relearning the greatness of the gospel and discover just how close God really is to us. So that's next time. Until then, remember Grace already did the work. You just get to live from it. Okay. Love you. Bye.