Embrace Your True Self: Unleashing “You 2.0”
We are not our own handiwork. Only God knows what we are fully intended to be. Paul shares in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
God wants you to reach your full potential. He intends for you to become the best version of yourself, a “You 2.0.” It won't look like anybody else, yet it will be wonderful. God is more concerned with you reaching your full potential than even you are, and He is guiding that process every step of the way.
For many of us, there are two versions of ourselves: the one God created us to be and the one that currently exists. Have you noticed a gap between the two? Many people think they can close the gap if they just try hard enough.
Especially at the beginning of the year, people are determined to read their Bible more, listen better, work harder, be nicer, pray more—the list goes on and on. Then, when they fail at their chosen goals, they beat themselves up because they don’t feel heroic enough in their spiritual efforts. The guilt continues to increase, and they get tired. I don’t mean just physically tired; I mean soul-tired.
Jesus made staggering promises about His ability to transform human lives into this new kind of life in John 7:37-38. “On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to Me and drink. Whoever believes in Me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’” He is referring here to the Holy Spirit, whom those who believed in Him would receive.
Paul expressed his assurance of Jesus’ promise when he said he was “confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion,” Philippians 1:6. Paul added in Philippians 2:13, “for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill His good purpose.”
Lastly, 2 Corinthians 3:17 says that “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” Freedom! That means I am free and you are free. It is all about freedom. Verse 18 continues, “And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into His image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” We do not have to hide anymore. We are transformed into God’s likeness with an “ever-increasing glory.” This doesn’t come from me or from you, but “from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”
Will you let the rivers of living water Jesus promised flow through you right now? Instead of exhaustion from trying harder, how would it feel to let God’s Spirit transform you from within? I encourage you to embrace the freedom and let the true “You 2.0" come to life in 2025.
