Romans 6:4
Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

Before we come to know Jesus as our Savior, we’ve lived a life, a certain amount of time.  Some come to Him early in life and are spared years of sin and poor choices.  Others come to Him later in life, having lived worldly lives without the influence of His love and His Spirit.  But no matter how long we live before we become His children, we have a past that must be overcome.  The glorious truth is that when we bow our heads and make that decision to trust in Him, we become like a newborn baby.  A baby has the freshest kind of life, untainted by the world and its trials, so full of promise and opportunity, with so much yet to come.  We can experience that newness of life.  We are declared innocent, as if all that past we regret never happened, and we face a future so full of promise and hope.

Jesus lived a sinless life on Earth, then died and was buried.  But He rose again, and He was not the same as He was before He did.  The same can be true for us as we die to sin and rise up to a new life where we can never be the same again.  The second chance we crave for can be ours as we start walking with the Lord and making right choices and going in the right direction.  Sin’s power over us is defeated by His Spirit in us, and we are able to step out of its grips and finally be free.

As we walk in that newness, let’s not go back to our old ways.  We’re starting over again, and none of that past has to plague us anymore or affect us anymore or control us anymore.  None of what we’ve done before has to matter now because we get a whole separate life starting from the moment we accept Jesus as our Savior.  That’s our starting point to make the right decisions and seek out the right opportunities, and it’s all led by the Holy Spirit Himself, so we don’t have to try to fumble along and hope we get something right.

We can all appreciate a fresh start.  We all like new things, and often we try to keep them like new for as long as possible.  So let’s handle our new lives with care, seeking to keep them untainted by the world and by sin and by darkness.  And let’s keep the newness alive by continually seeking to grow in our relationship with the Lord, thankful for a new life and for a new beginning each day to serve Him and live for Him.