I've just spent my summer holiday reading a redonkulous amount of theological literature, and I've learnt many, many things. The most important though, I think, is that of justification. Justification is the fact that all Christians have their sins forgiven the moment they become a Christian. I didn't know much more than that before the summer, (as C.S. Lewis says, you don't need to) but now I think I understand it better. So here goes!
So, before you become a Christian, you are not a Christian. (Boom.) You don't believe in the Christian God, and if you believe that Jesus existed, you don't believe he was the Son of God. So your heart is in one place, (preferably in your body somewhere) and Jesus is quite outside of that. So imagine your own heart, where it is now, and Jesus', which is a good two feet in front of you. The abstract intellectual concept of Jesus is floating around in your head, but your hearts are most definitely separated. And that's by a conscious will of your own: you might not necessarily hate God and push him away forcefully, but by no means have you opened any gates to let Him walk in.
But, this doesn't mean that you're entirely independent from God.
As humans, we were created in his image. This doesn't mean a physical image, mainly because God doesn't have one (you know, except that one time); though we tend to give God physical attributes, like listening to our prayers, or watching over us, to make it easier to understand.
When God made the human race, he gave them His most treasured parts of Himself, like; the ability to think, free will, the ability to love, a sense of justice, a sense of creativity (in varying degrees - my paintings suck) and so on and so forth.
So, when you're apart from God, you still have his image and all the fabby things that entails, BUT you are also born after the Fall. This means that you have also inherited, along with your gifts, the ability to sin: the concept of pride, spite, greed, etc etc. You know in yourself, personally, that you do things you don't want to do*, things that hurt yourself and others, by action or inaction.1 If you don't want to do it, why do you? Because sin lives in you, and breaks out quite a lot. Hence the 'I'm only human' excuse: it is a part of us, as humans, that we have sin inbuilt within us that we can't escape.
When Jesus moves into your heart and you merge, like Ron's ball of light in the seventh book, the whole dynamic changes. Once your hearts are united, a little bit of God comes to live in you, God takes a part of you in return. You do a wee swapsie.
By you coming together, you become part of God's death on the cross. That also means that part of you dies. The bit that dies is the bit that wanted you to live just for yourself; prodding you to put yourself over others, messing up most of your good intentions, and keeping those gates for God firmly closed. The death of that part inside you is the ENTIRE REASON Jesus went to the cross. Literally just to get that out of you. That's how much getting rid of it means to God.
Handily, you also then take part in God's resurrection. This means that the hidden bit inside of you that wants to live for God comes alive, though you didn't know it was there, and you start afresh, clean slate, the works. You might as well be a newborn baby for the amount of sin God sees in you. And not even just the day you and Jesus unite, but each and every day that your heart knows Him.
Then, the part of God that continues to live inside you. Generally called the Holy Spirit, He carries on pottering in your heart, drawing you on to better things. He fills you with the strength, power and motivation that you need to resist the sin in your life that used to hold you back.
Once the Holy Spirit has set up its cosy nest in your heart, it's kind of like growing a new immune system. It tries to kick out any sin that creeps in, and gets all those memory cells (A Level Biology win!) for the next time the same sin tries to come back. And that fight inside you continues, until God reclaims that part of Himself that He gave to you, and the whole of your soul that's entwined with it, up into Heaven.
Once the Holy Spirit has set up its cosy nest in your heart, it's kind of like growing a new immune system. It tries to kick out any sin that creeps in, and gets all those memory cells (A Level Biology win!) for the next time the same sin tries to come back. And that fight inside you continues, until God reclaims that part of Himself that He gave to you, and the whole of your soul that's entwined with it, up into Heaven.
And that's what I think justification is. The moment you and Jesus join, your past sins are dead, your future sins are dead, and you have eternal life waiting for you.
But, though the sinful part of your heart has gone, the flesh still remembers it, which is why you still feel drawn to sin despite knowing you've changed. However, the flesh will gradually forget. You won't ever be as perfect as Jesus, but you can learn, and grow, and learn some more, until the flesh starts to know your godly heart and reflects that instead. You get better at the whole 'living' thing, the way God meant it to be.
P.S., most of what is above is garnered from interpretations of Romans, maybe Corinthians and some C.S. Lewis, who is the most inspired Christian writer who ever lived, besides Paul, maybe. Next on my to do list is to read his whole back catalogue!
* Romans 7:15. Paul feels your pain.
But, though the sinful part of your heart has gone, the flesh still remembers it, which is why you still feel drawn to sin despite knowing you've changed. However, the flesh will gradually forget. You won't ever be as perfect as Jesus, but you can learn, and grow, and learn some more, until the flesh starts to know your godly heart and reflects that instead. You get better at the whole 'living' thing, the way God meant it to be.
P.S., most of what is above is garnered from interpretations of Romans, maybe Corinthians and some C.S. Lewis, who is the most inspired Christian writer who ever lived, besides Paul, maybe. Next on my to do list is to read his whole back catalogue!
* Romans 7:15. Paul feels your pain.
