Therefore, someone who is born of God has a new nature and the bent of this new nature is to walk in holiness and love for God and humanity. Though we have not been perfected in love and good works as Christ-followers, we do have a deep longing in our hearts to be so. That day when we will be perfected is soon to be ours as the Apostle John says, “We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is” (1 John 3:2). So to me this is the answer to the conundrum I had faced. We are saved by a gift of God’s grace that cannot be purchased, and because God’s Holy Spirit indwells us the new bent of our hearts is to love God and our neighbor’s, and our love is displayed through a life-style of good works. As the children of God we have been given a new nature like our Fathers, we have become “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4). Therefore, God by the power of His Spirit gives to His children the gift of perseverance in righteousness, and a love for God and our neighbors; that protects His secure kids from the fatal spirit of antinomian ism (Excuse for license to sin).

This Knowing that God is with us gives us the strength not to sin and the power to overcome sin. God’s children when they have the assurance that they are secure in Christ; are by this knowledge freed from the bondage of religion, and then they begin to serve God from pure motives; not to gain His love or to gain heaven through their merit, but because they are loved by Him, they have hearts full of joy and gratitude. For they know heaven is their home, their sins have all been forgiven, and that they have been adopted by the Father. Knowing these things produces hearts that will work hard for the Father not motivated by the fear of judgment, but because they love God and want to bring Him pleasure. 1 John 5: 11- 12,

11And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.