A Compelling Testimony: Maintaining a Disciplined Walk, Christlike Character, and Godly Relationships as God's Servant

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A Compe l l i ng Tes t imony

a. The promise of God for a new heart, Ezek. 11.19-20 – And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, [20] that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God (cf. Heb. 8.10; 10.16). b. Not external rule keeping, but the law of God written upon our very hearts, Jer. 31.31-34 – “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, [32] not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband,” declares the Lord. [33] “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord: “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. [34] And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the Lord. “For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (cf. Heb. 8.10; 10.16). c. That law has now been written upon our hearts by the Spirit, 2 Cor. 3.3 – And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. d. The fruit of the Spirit cannot be condemned by the law; it fulfills it, Gal. 5.22-23 – But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, [23] gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.