Real and lasting change starts from within, from the very core of our existence - the spirit. Anything in the outside that we'll try to alter with our human effort is just temporary and fleeting.

Time and again, we want to have a fresh start. Begin a new life. But human as we are, as soon as we have finished writing down all our resolutions, no sooner do we begin to forget them and go back to our old ways. Because real and lasting change starts from within, from the very core of our existence - the spirit. Anything on the outside that we try to alter with our human effort is just temporary and fleeting.

This is the first thing we must understand: we need a new spirit or within a week, our new life will suddenly become old.

How do we acquire this new spirit? John 3:5 clearly says, "Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God ."

The new birth is not a ritual. It is not being religious either. It is beyond water baptism, although it is a requirement as emphasized by the verse above. But it does not stop there. One can be baptized in water without being born again in the spirit. This new birth happens inside; it is a willing surrender to the will of God through repentance. It is sincerely telling the Father: "I am tired of always desiring to change but never changing at all. I'm tired of my old ways, but I am powerless to do something about it. Now I know Father that You are the only One who has the power to take this serpent seed within me, and trade it with Your righteous seed. I am surrendering to You. From now on, not my will but Your will be done in my life."

Then John 1:12 will begin to take effect in your life: "But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become sons of God." And you will experience the new walk in the spirit. Then the fruits of the spirit will begin to dominate us.

Afterwards, look at how you will live. You will be able to assimilate the Kingdom culture and the horizon of the spirit will be opened up to you. A paradigm shift begins to happen. You will see the Father through His Son, Pastor Apollo C. Quiboloy, because the Son of God is the image of the unseen Father.

You cannot see the Father, so you can only see the life of the Father when it is manifested through the Son. The only reason we have a body is for it to manifest the life through the Spirit that is within us. The life of the Son is what pleases the Father and the example is the begotten Son, Jesus Christ .

Religion and denominations cannot change us. We must have a new walk, or the old one is the walk in the flesh.

Drive out the old administration of Satan, for he is the Father of the disobedience spirit that we inherited. We have to surrender that spirit so that the new spirit can enter.

The Son of God will be our example because he came from the same world as we. He faced the same devil as we. He will teach us about spiritual birth, spiritual growth, and spiritual maturity till we will become like the Son of God, pleasing to the Father - "Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Eph. 4:13).

With this, not only will our heart be new, our whole life will be made new. As 2 Corinthians 5;17 says, "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."

The Son of God will be our example because he came from the same world as we. He faced the devil as we. He will teach us about spiritual birth, spiritual growth, and spiritual maturity till we will become like the Son of God, pleasing to the Father.