We have looked at the meaning of Christmas, why Jesus came, and what it means to be born of the Spirit and to walk in the Spirit.

At this juncture, it may be helpful to understand all these from a theological point of view so that the gospel, the outworking of our individual Christian life, the goal and purpose of redemption, and God’s eternal purpose for believers and the Church can not only be understood, but also worked out wholesomely.

THE FALL
God is the Creator; the human person does not exist autonomously or independently, but as a creature of God (see Genesis; also realise that the essence of sin is man’s rebellion and desire to usurp God and to be god, spurred on by Satan, who also actually wants to be god with humans ‘under his wings’).
All created beings and all created things are totally dependent on God. It is also God who preserves all His creatures, including human beings – this means that all are dependent on Him for their continued existence.
Man is not only a creature; he is also a person. And to be a person means to have a kind of independence – not absolute but relative. To be a person also means to be able to make decisions, to set goals, and to move in the direction of those goals. It means to possess freedom – at least in the sense of being able to make one’s choices. The human being is not a robot whose course is totally determined by forces outside of him; he has the power of self-determination and self-direction. Hence, the human being is both a creature and a person; he or she is a created person; but he or she can be both a creature and a person at the same time (implying dependence and freedom to be present at the same time).

Man could fall into sin precisely because he was a person, able to make choices – even choices that would be contrary to the will of God. Even in sinning, the human being remains a creature, dependent on God; yet in sinning, man used God-given powers in the service of Satan. The fact that man is a creature implies that after he has fallen into sin (through his own fault), he can be redeemed from sin and redeemed from sin and rescued from his fallen state only through God’s sovereign intervention on his behalf (hence the need for God to initiate the redemption and salvation plan, executed by Christ, and effected by the Holy Spirit – note that the three Persons of the Triune God altogether involved).
Since man is only a creature, he can only be saved by grace – i.e. in utter dependence on the mercy of God. But the fact that man is also a person implies that he or she has an important part to play in the process of being redeemed. They must choose freely, in the strength of the Holy Spirit, to repent of sin and to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. They cannot be saved apart from such personal choices (though exceptions must be made for cases in which the individuals involved are not capable of making personal choices).

After a person has made such a choice, he or she must continue to live in fellowship with God and in the obedience of faith. The fact that we can live in this way only through God’s strength does not take away our responsibility to live such a life.
Since man is a creature, God must regenerate him – give him new spiritual life. Since man is a person, however, he or she must also believe – that is, in response to the gospel, he or she must make a conscious, personal choice to accept Christ and follow Him. Regeneration and faith must always be seen together – God must regenerate and man must believe: these two must always be kept together.

Sanctification may be defined as that operation of the Holy Spirit, involving man’s responsible participation, by which He renews man’s nature and enables him to live to the praise of God. Sanctification, therefore, is both the work of God and the task of man. Since human beings are creatures, God in the person of the Holy Spirit must sanctify them; since they are also persons, they must themselves be responsibly involved in their sanctification. “perfecting holiness out of reverence for God” (2 Cor. 7:1). Note Paul’s striking words in Philippians 2:12-13: “Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose.” “Work out your salvation,” therefore, means “cultivate” the salvation God has given you, ‘work out’ what God has “worked in”; apply the salvation you have received in every area of your lives – work, recreation, family life, culture, art, science and the like. In other words, Paul is telling believers to take an active part in the advancement of their sanctification. For, ” he goes on to say, “it is God who works in you to will and to act.” Willing and acting (or working) designate everything we think or do. It is God, therefore, who is continually working in us the entire process of sanctification: both the willing of it and the doing of it. The harder we work, the more sure we may be that God is working in us. In sanctifying us God deals with us both as persons and as creatures. The same holds for the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. Because we are creatures, God must preserve us or we shall surely fall. But because we are also persons, God preserves us by enabling us to persevere.
This is very important to understand lest we end up in two unhealthy extremes – being passive in our sanctification or being active and concluding that it all depends on us. Both are present – God preserves us; we are enabled to persevere.

THE FALL, REDEMPTION, SANCTIFICATION (B)
Before God’s people had come into existence, or before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4), God foreloved His chosen people – those He foreloved (or foreknew), He foreordained or predestined to be made like the image of His Son (Rom. 8:29). Since the Son is the perfect image of God the Father, we will not be wrong to interpret the expression “image of His Son” as being equivalent to “image of God”.
This image has apparently been corrupted or spoiled through man’s fall into sin that he needs once again to be conformed to that image. Conformity to the image of the Son – and therefore to the image of God – is described in Rom. 8:29 as the purpose or goal for which God has predestined His chosen people. This purpose is carried out here and now but will not be fully realised until the life to come, at which time we shall be perfectly like Christ (1 Cor. 15:49; Phil. 3:21; 1 John 3:2). Hence the expression ‘Already but not yet’ – this explains that there is no perfection on earth for believers, and Christians are in fact ‘pilgrims’ here on earth in their journey to their heavenly city; and this journey would be encountering ‘struggles’, suffering, and pain as they face the onslaught of the evil one nin spiritual warfare, as well as God using the circumstances and difficulties to transform and mould the Christians to be conformed increasingly to the image of His Son.
In Rom. 8:29 and 2 Corin. 3:18 we see that the goal of the redemption of God’s people is that they shall be fully conformed to the image of Christ, and transformation is the work of the Holy Spirit.

In Colossians 3:1-4, Paul refers to four major events in the saving ‘career’ of Jesus – His death, resurrection, exaltation, and Parousia. At the same time, Paul writes of these events not only as happening to Christ but also as being shared by us believers. Four times he uses the word “together with” (‘sun’ in Greek) – “you died with Christ (2:20), you have been raised with Christ (3:1), your life is hidden with Christ (3:3), and you will appear with Christ (3:4). These tell us what happens to us as a result of being united to Christ through faith inwardly and baptism outwardly. We are the same people with the same name, nationality and appearance, but we are new people (new creation 2 Cor. 5:17), enjoying a hidden life with Christ – indeed, Christ is our life (3:4).
But here in Colossians, Paul’s explanation of who we are as Christians now turn to the exhortation regarding how we should behave as Christians.
“Set your hearts on things above” (vs 1); “set your minds on things above, not on earthly things” (vs 2). By ‘earthly things’, Paul is not saying we should shirk our responsibilities at home. at work, in church and in the community. “Earthly things” refer to greed and immorality, slander, anger, malice and other sins – these we are to put to death. We must constantly remember who we are and then we can behave accordingly.

In Colssians 3:8-10, Paul refers to “taking off your old self with its practices’ and “putting on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
The ‘old self’ is what we are by nature, slaves to sin. But as believers, we have become one with Christ and we are no longer slaves to sin, for you have taken off the old man or old self that was enslaved to sin and have put on the new self or new man (the person in his unity ruled by the Holy Spirit). But even the new self is not yet perfect, for, it is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
What Paul is saying is that believers are those who have once and for all taken off or put off their own selves and have once and for all put on their new selves – new selves, however, that are being continually and progressively renewed. Christians should therefore see themselves as people who are genuinely new, though not yet totally new.
The Christian is a new person, but he or she still has a lot of growing to do; this renewal consists of a growing and ever-increasing likeness to God – the purpose of redemption is to restore the image of God in man.

To be sure, this renewal is primarily the work of God – He who sanctifies us through His Spirit. But renewal into greater conformity to God is also, at the same time, the responsibility of man. There are of course many ways in which we cannot be like God – such as in His omniscience, omnipresence, or omnipotence. But in other ways we can be like God, if not perfectly, at least in principle.
Similarly, we cannot be like Christ in every respect; but we can be like Him in His humiliation, in His willingness to humble Himself for the sake of His brothers and sisters. We must be ready and willing to imitate Christ, who is the perfect image of God. In Ephesians 4:32. Paul tells us that we should forgive one another “as in Christ God forgave” us, and “live a life of love, just as Christ loved us”(5:2) – the heart of the image of God is love.
So we see the biblical ‘support’ and the theological aspects in the understanding of the Fall, redemption and sanctification – a clear understanding of these would help us greatly in our individual Christian lives, and in the life of the church. We would also appreciate ‘why Christ has to come’, and how the Triune God is fully involved in the initiation of the salvation plan and redemption, with the indwelling Spirit working in the lives of believers from within and effecting transformation into the image of Christ (image of God).