First Things

You’re a new Christian. Now what?

What do I do? How do I live? Not only that, but how do I know what to do and how do I
know how to live?

It’s a new day. You’ve just been “birthed” into the Kingdom of God. Jesus called it
being “born again.” The Bible also calls it “coming to life”, “new life” and a “new
heart.”

The Bible is our sole rule of faith and practice. The Bible alone has priority in showing
us what to believe and how to live. Other things like tradition, spiritual revelation,
insight, or experience can be valuable in hearing from God and in showing us how to
live, but only in as much as they are in agreement with Scripture. Scripture, the Holy
Bible, the Word of God takes priority. We need to read the Bible on a regular basis; daily
if possible.

We are Christians, followers of Christ. A very important thing to understand here is that
we are followers of a person, Jesus Christ. This is our first and foremost requirement in
understanding and living the Christian life, as well as in being Christ like in knowledge,
character and service. We follow Jesus first, not a system of thought, not a list of do’s
and don’ts. We follow Jesus first, not the Ten Commandments, not our denominations
Statement of Faith. We have become participants in a relationship, not a religion.

So, back to the questions of “how do I live?”, “how do I know how to live?” And if the
answer is “following Jesus”; then how do I do that? The solution is the Bible, the word
of God. We follow Jesus in seeing His life portrayed in the Bible and modeling ours
accordingly. We see His character, His attitudes, His relationships, His service, and we
see His ministry. When we learn any particular doctrine, we must learn it in light of
Jesus. Jesus is perfect theology. Anything that we learn or beliefs we hold that is
contrary to what we see in Jesus is incorrect and needs adjusting. So then, as followers of
Jesus it will be most helpful to study the person, life, character, etc. of Jesus before we
study other finer points of the Christian faith. And then those other finer points are best
understood when examined against the life of Jesus.

Ok, all that being said; what do I do today? I just got saved; what do I do?
There are some big picture things that would be helpful to understand here. First is that
already stated issue of being a follower of Jesus by looking to Him and His life for our
understanding of how to life. Remember, we’re “born again” and have entered a new
kingdom. As citizens of a new kingdom we need to know how to live in this kingdom.
We want to do as this King Jesus wants us to live. We want to know His plan and
purpose for us and how He wants us to live. Something helpful to understand is that
there are certain things we need to quit doing and certain things we need to start doing.
We need to put off all sin; we need to put on the fruits of righteousness. For example; we
need to quit lying, stealing, committing adultery and murdering. We need to start loving
God with all of our hearts, and loving our neighbor as God loved us. We need to take on
the character of Christ including holiness, love and compassion. We need to honor Him
and express our love to Him (worship). We need to build a relationship with God by
talking to Him (prayer). We need to get together with others of God’s family (church
fellowship). We need to understand His word and will for us (Bible study). We need to
do the things He did (service/ministry). So, quit doing ungodly things, start doing godly
things(right actions), read the Bible, talk to God and spend time with Him(pray), and
attend church fellowship.

Now we can’t really successfully live the Christian life without God’s help. He has given
us His Holy Spirit. God doesn’t want you saved just so you “hang on” and go to heaven
one day. He wants your to know Him in this life and He has a plan for you and that
includes being used by Him to help build the kingdom of God. When you became born
again, or saved, God, the Holy Spirit came and moved into your spirit. He now lives in
you. He, the Holy Spirit, is our teacher, our comforter, and our guide. He is God with us
and in us. Some behaviors and characteristics that we mentioned we must stop and some
we must begin. In the Book of Galatians God gives a good run down of some of these:

Galatians 5:17-25 GNB

:17 For what our human nature wants is opposed to what the Spirit wants, and
what the Spirit wants is opposed to what our human nature wants. These two
are enemies, and this means that you cannot do what you want to do.
:18 If the Spirit leads you, then you are not subject to the Law.
:19 What human nature does is quite plain. It shows itself in immoral, filthy,
and indecent actions;
:20 in worship of idols and witchcraft. People become enemies and they fight;
they become jealous, angry, and ambitious. They separate into parties and
groups;
:21 they are envious, get drunk, have orgies, and do other things like these. I
warn you now as I have before: those who do these things will not possess the
Kingdom of God.
:22 But the Spirit produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness,
:23 humility, and self-control. There is no law against such things as these.
:24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have put to death their human
nature with all its passions and desires.
:25 The Spirit has given us life; he must also control our lives.

Notice that in verse 17 that what our old human nature produces is ungodly, but in verse
22 it’s the Spirit that produces Godly characteristics. We do it by submitting to Jesus and
letting Him have control of our lives. That’s called Lordship. Now some Godly
characteristics and behaviors we just know down deep in us to do. And we will make an
effort at these and make some improvement, But there is no way to take on the character
of Jesus Christ, some of which is described above, without His help. He does this by the
Holy Spirit that He sent to live in us at the moment we became born again. So now let’s
get started on building a relationship with Jesus. We’ll do that by talking with Him,
worshipping Him, and reading about and studying His life, teachings and actions in the
Bible, and by joining Him in what He’s doing.
We will look at several brief studies that we will help us learn who God is, who we are
and what we’re supposed to do. In unit 1 we will learn some basics about Jesus and who
we are as Christians. In unit 2 we will learn what we are to believe. We will use a
Statement of Faith to help us with that. Unit 3 will mostly cover the basics of the
disciplines of the Christian life, the “what we are to do” kind of stuff. Unit 4 is the “Who
series”, it will cover more in depth of who God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are. Also
covered will be the subjects of “Who I am” and “Who is the church”. In Unit 5 the topics
will be various doctrines or teaching about significant subjects in the Bible. These will
include, sin, the devil, a breakdown of aspects of salvation, like justification, adoption,
etc. Holy Spirit baptism will be covered in this unit. Out last unit, unit 6, will look at
various disciplines in more detail such as prayer, worship, fasting, evangelism and others.

We trust that if you study this material with a mind yielding to God and a heart open to
His Spirit that you will have a good and profitable beginning understanding of God and
your life with Him.

Don’t become discouraged. If some things are not clear to you then go over the material
again. Seek outside help in understanding a subject if need be. Our mental knowledge
and understanding of God and His word is a significant part of being a disciple of Jesus.
However, it’s not everything; you need to be involved in a local church where your gifts
and efforts can be put to use for the kingdom of God. You are on the way to becoming a
disciple of Jesus Christ that knows God and makes a godly difference in your world!

Quotations for the Bible are taken from various translations. We will note from which
translation each text is taken from. Abbreviations are as follows:
NKJV – New King James Version
NLT – New Living Translation
GNB – Good News Bible
MSG – The Message
NIV – New International Version
KJV – King James Version