Total Transformation

“For God may speak in one way, or in another,
Yet man does not perceive it.”
Job 33:14

God speaks in so many ways.

Through His Word.

Through music.

Through prayer.

Through people.

Through places.

Through preaching.

Through situations.

There are so many ways that He speaks. Do we perceive it? Are we sharp enough to hear that ‘still small voice’ or even through ‘roaring thunder’. God spoke and God still speaks. God is consistently speaking to His people. Again, are we listening? He wants the total transformation in us, so in order for that to happen, He has to speak a lot.

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become so much better than the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.
Hebrews 1:1-4

He has always spoken at various times and in various ways. Not only by the mouths of prophets, but there are several ways for Him to get a clear cut message across to us.  God even spoke through an animal in Numbers 22 in an effort to get his attention.

My friend recently sent me pictures of a crack she got on her front windshield of her car. She tells me to zoom in on the crack because it is shaped in a butterfly! How crazy is that? But in the process of watching the fix happen. The thought arose of a “Total Transformation.” We have flaws in us, cracks in us, some mess, something not perfect, something lacking, something broken… But God sends a fixer (Holy Spirit) and then we are all brand new. In the process to be new there is a total transformation. The car looks like it is being ripped apart by the “fixer”. But all to do something GOOD for it and all to place something new, improved and better.

This is the same way with us. See there has to be a change! A total transformation to take place!

If indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.
Ephesians 4:21-24 (NKJV)

My assumption is that you have paid careful attention to him, been well instructed in the truth precisely as we have it in Jesus. Since, then, we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything—and I do mean everything—connected with that old way of life has to go. It’s rotten through and through. Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you.
Ephesians 4:21-24 (MSG)

He wants a God-fashioned life from the inside out. For us to get rid of everything that is a mess in our lives and for all those things that are rotten and cause decay to be removed. For God–everything is about LIFE and LIFE ABUNDANTLY.  An abundant way of living in the things of His word. Those things are NOT easy to do…that is why we NEED a fixer! The fixer is the Father that sent the Son that sent his Spirit that is HOLY and ready to abide in us. All we need to do now is entrust our lives over to Him and allow Him to do all that internal fixing for our windshield to become brand new. That we are transparent before Him allowing Him to do the work. Don’t resist it. Allow it. Embrace it. Accept it and live by it!

You see when that glass was shattered – the crack looked like a butterfly. God was sending a direct message to this individual. He spoke in a various way through this situation. A butterfly goes through stages before it is such. There is a total transformation for the butterfly and for us there is a total transformation for the man or woman of God. When all that is said and done…it is going to look sparkling clear! It is going to look all brand new. People will not recognize you! The change will be evidence enough that it was not just a partial transformation but a complete one!

A total transformation IS possible in the hands of God. For Acts 9 records the conversion of Saul. After that encounter with Jesus –he was never the same again! He went from a murderer to a missionary. From a pharisee to an apostle. From religion to relationship. From the law to grace.  Saul became Paul…who wrote 13 of the 27 books in the New Testament. That is how much he yielded his life to be the vessel that God could use.

Imagine what God could do with you in a TOTAL transformation!