Come and See

Have you ever wondered why Christians talk so much about becoming better people if Jesus has already forgiven their sins?

If Jesus died for our sins, doesn’t that mean the problem has been taken care of? Why do Christians still need to work on their attitudes, behaviors, and choices? And if God accepts people through grace rather than their performance, isn’t becoming more like Jesus just another standard they’re expected to meet?

In the previous blog, we explored why our worth isn’t determined by our achievements and why we cannot earn God’s acceptance through our efforts. But that raises another question: If salvation is a gift, why does God still expect Christians to change?

Maybe you’ve heard Christians talk about becoming more Christlike, growing spiritually, or living a holy life. In the Bible, being holy means being set apart for God and learning to live according to His character. But if you’re still exploring Christianity, all of this might sound like another endless list of expectations.

So what’s the point of forgiveness if there’s still so much work to do?

Forgiveness isn’t the finish line. It’s the beginning of a restored relationship with God. Jesus doesn’t simply offer to forgive our sins; He also begins changing the way we live.

Let’s explore what that means.

Why Does God Want Us to Change?

The Bible teaches that every human being is created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26–27). This means our lives have dignity and value before we accomplish anything impressive.

But having value doesn’t mean everything we think, desire, or do is necessarily good.

Think about someone you deeply love. You can care about that person while recognizing that certain behaviors are harmful. A parent can love a child while correcting dishonesty. A friend can care about someone while confronting behavior that hurts others.

Love doesn’t require pretending that harmful actions are harmless.

In fact, sometimes love is precisely why we cannot ignore what is wrong.

The Bible describes sin as more than simply breaking religious rules. Sin involves turning away from God and living contrary to His character and purposes. It affects our thoughts, desires, attitudes, and actions, as well as our relationships with God and other people.

Sometimes sin is obvious, such as dishonesty, cruelty, or selfishness. Other times, it appears in less noticeable ways, such as pride, jealousy, bitterness, or the desire to control others.

God doesn’t call sin good simply because He loves us.

His love is part of why He doesn’t leave us in it.

Consider someone whose debt has been forgiven. The burden of what they owed has been removed, but they may still need to learn a different way of managing their finances. Forgiveness changes their situation, while learning to live differently changes how they move forward.

Of course, sin is more serious than financial debt, and our relationship with God is not simply a financial transaction. But the comparison helps us see why forgiveness and change are connected without being identical.

Christians believe that Jesus came to reconcile sinners to God through His death and resurrection. We cannot erase our sins or earn salvation through good behavior. Instead, forgiveness is offered through faith in Christ as a gift of God’s grace.

Grace means receiving from God what we could never earn for ourselves.

But God’s purpose doesn’t stop with forgiveness. He also begins restoring the lives of those who belong to Him.

Isn’t Becoming Like Jesus Just Another Goalpost?

This is a fair question, especially if you’ve spent much of your life trying to prove that you’re good enough.

Romans 8:29 teaches that God wants believers to become more like Jesus. Christians often call this process sanctification, which simply means growing in holiness and becoming more like Christ.

But isn’t that another impossible standard?

There is an important difference between trying to earn acceptance and learning to live because you’ve already received it.

Ephesians 2:8–10 teaches that salvation is God’s gift, not a reward for reaching a certain level of goodness.

That means Christians don’t become more like Jesus so that God will finally accept them. They pursue spiritual growth because, through faith in Christ, they have already been brought into a relationship with Him.

Think about how different those motivations are.

Someone who believes they must earn God’s acceptance may see every failure as proof that they aren’t good enough. But someone learning to live from grace can acknowledge failure, take responsibility, and continue growing without treating every mistake as the end of their relationship with God.

This doesn’t make obedience unimportant. It changes the reason behind it.

Good works are not the price of salvation. They are part of the new life that follows it.

What Happens When Christians Keep Sinning?

If someone becomes a Christian, shouldn’t they stop sinning?

Wouldn’t that be evidence that Jesus has changed their life?

The Bible is realistic about the ongoing struggle with sin. Becoming a Christian doesn’t mean someone immediately becomes patient, humble, generous, forgiving, or free from every unhealthy desire.

Old habits can remain. Selfishness can still surface. Pride, jealousy, anger, and bitterness don’t automatically disappear.

Christians are called to resist sinful desires and learn to live according to God’s will, but that doesn’t mean every failure places them back at the beginning, needing to earn salvation all over again.

In 1 John 1:9, the Bible teaches that when believers confess their sins, God is faithful and just to forgive them and cleanse them from unrighteousness.

Confession means honestly acknowledging sin before God rather than hiding it or making excuses. Repentance involves turning away from sin and seeking to live differently.

Sometimes that also means apologizing to someone we’ve hurt, repairing a damaged relationship where possible, or accepting the consequences of our actions.

Grace doesn’t excuse sin or remove our responsibility.

Instead, it gives believers a reason to confront sin honestly rather than hide behind shame or pretend they have everything together.

And here’s something important: Christianity doesn’t teach that every uncomfortable thought or difficult emotion is automatically sinful. Feeling angry, afraid, or tempted is not necessarily the same as choosing to embrace sinful attitudes or actions. Jesus Himself experienced temptation without sinning (Hebrews 4:15).

What we choose to nurture in our hearts matters, just as our outward actions matter.

The Christian life isn’t about pretending we’ve stopped struggling. It’s about learning to turn toward God even in the middle of our struggles.

Who Helps Us Change?

This brings us to someone Christians often mention but don’t always explain clearly: the Holy Spirit.

If you’re unfamiliar with Christianity, the Holy Spirit might sound like a mysterious force, an inner voice, or something similar to our conscience that helps us decide between right and wrong.

That’s an understandable way to picture Him, but the Bible describes the Holy Spirit as much more than that.

The Holy Spirit is God, not simply a feeling, a force, or our conscience.

One way to begin understanding Him is to look at what Jesus said.

Before His death, Jesus promised His disciples that the Holy Spirit would be with them (John 14:16–17). The Bible also teaches that the Holy Spirit lives within those who belong to Christ (Romans 8:9).

This doesn’t mean the Holy Spirit physically occupies a space inside someone’s body. It means God is personally present and actively working in the lives of believers.

Unlike our conscience, which is our human awareness of right and wrong and can sometimes be mistaken, the Holy Spirit is God Himself. He isn’t simply an inner voice telling Christians what to do or a special feeling they experience when making decisions.

So what does He actually do?

Think about the difference between knowing what is right and actually doing it.

We might know we should forgive someone but still struggle with bitterness. We might know we should be patient but find ourselves becoming angry over small things. We might genuinely want to change but keep falling into familiar patterns.

Christians believe the Holy Spirit works within them, helping them understand God’s truth, recognize sin, and gradually develop attitudes and behaviors that reflect Jesus’ character.

This doesn’t mean Christians suddenly become perfect or that change happens without effort. They still make choices, practice obedience, seek wisdom, and take responsibility for their actions.

But they believe they are not relying on their own strength alone.

Philippians 2:13 explains that God works within believers, shaping both their desires and their actions according to His purposes.

Spiritual growth involves our responsibility, but it is ultimately God’s work within us.

What Does Change Actually Look Like?

Sometimes we imagine spiritual growth as something dramatic.

Perhaps we expect someone to become completely different overnight. We might assume that a mature Christian never gets angry, never experiences jealousy, never struggles with fear, and always knows the right thing to do.

But the Bible often describes spiritual growth using a much more ordinary picture: fruit.

In Galatians 5:22–23, Paul describes the fruit of the Spirit as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

These qualities reflect the character God develops in believers as they grow in their relationship with Him.

And they often appear in ordinary situations.

Patience might mean choosing not to lash out when someone frustrates you. Kindness might mean showing compassion to someone who cannot offer anything in return. Self-control might mean resisting the temptation to respond harshly when you’re upset.

Gentleness might mean speaking the truth without humiliating someone. Faithfulness might mean keeping your commitments even when doing so is inconvenient. Love might mean choosing to care for someone even when doing so requires sacrifice.

These changes may not look impressive to the world. There may be no applause, recognition, or visible achievement.

But they matter because they reflect the character of Jesus.

Sometimes growth becomes visible only when we look back. Perhaps you still struggle with anger, but you recognize it sooner and apologize more readily. Perhaps you still experience jealousy, but you’re learning to celebrate another person’s success. Perhaps forgiveness remains difficult, but you’re beginning to let go of your desire for revenge.

You haven’t become perfect, but something is changing.

What If I Don’t See Much Progress?

Maybe you’ve been trying to change for years.

You keep struggling with the same attitudes, temptations, or habits. You pray about them, make progress for a while, and then find yourself facing the same difficulties again.

You might wonder whether you’re doing something wrong or whether God is disappointed with you.

Spiritual growth can be slow, and it isn’t always a straight line.

Sometimes change requires recognizing patterns we’ve ignored for years. Sometimes it involves seeking help, rebuilding trust, developing new habits, or learning to respond differently when familiar situations arise.

And sometimes the most meaningful change is not that a struggle has disappeared, but that we’re responding to it differently.

God also doesn’t intend Christians to grow entirely on their own. The Bible encourages believers to support, encourage, and help one another (Galatians 6:2). Trusted Christian friends, pastors, and church communities can provide wisdom, accountability, and encouragement along the way.

For some struggles, especially those involving addiction, persistent depression, overwhelming shame, or patterns of harmful behavior, additional support from a qualified counselor or healthcare professional may also be important. Seeking help isn’t a failure of faith.

None of this means Christians should become comfortable with sin or stop pursuing holiness. It means there is a difference between taking sin seriously and measuring our worth by how quickly we overcome it.

Philippians 1:6 reminds believers that God, who began a good work in them, will bring it to completion.

The promise isn’t that every Christian will achieve sinless perfection in this life. It’s that God’s work of redemption will not remain unfinished.

Come and See

If you’re still exploring Christianity, perhaps you’re wondering why any of this matters.

Maybe you simply want to become a better person, regardless of what you believe about God. Wanting to grow is a good thing. We can all recognize areas where we need greater patience, humility, honesty, or compassion.

But Christianity makes a claim that goes beyond self-improvement.

It teaches that our deepest problem isn’t simply that we need better habits or stronger determination. We need reconciliation with the God who created us.

And Jesus came to make that reconciliation possible.

The Christian life doesn’t begin with a demand to fix everything about yourself. It begins with an invitation to turn to Jesus, trust Him, and receive the grace you cannot earn.

Then, through the Holy Spirit, God begins transforming those who belong to Christ.

Perhaps you’ve spent much of your life trying to become a better version of yourself. You’ve made promises to change, set goals, developed habits, and tried to overcome weaknesses. Some efforts may have helped, while others left you discouraged.

Christianity doesn’t dismiss the importance of growth. But it offers a different foundation for it.

We don’t change to make ourselves worthy of God’s love. Through Jesus, we receive grace that we could never earn, and that grace leads us into a new way of living.

That’s one reason I love the invitation that inspired the name of this blog.

In John 1:46, when Nathanael questioned whether anything good could come from Nazareth, Philip invited him to meet Jesus for himself: “Come and see.”

He didn’t demand that Nathanael understand everything before approaching Jesus.

He invited him to discover who Jesus was.

And that invitation still speaks to us today.

If you’re wondering whether you’re good enough to come to God, remember that Jesus didn’t come to save people who had already made themselves perfect.

He came to save sinners.

And if you’re wondering whether God can change someone like you, the Christian message is that transformation doesn’t depend on your determination alone.

You don’t need to have everything figured out before you begin.

Come and see.

Take a Moment to Reflect

1. Have I ever treated becoming a better person as a way of proving my worth?
2. How might my motivation for change look different if I understood it as a response to grace rather than a way to earn acceptance?
3. What is one attitude or habit I’d like to grow in, and what might a small first step look like?
4. When I fail, do I tend to give up, hide in shame, or take responsibility and seek help?
5. Who are the people I can turn to for encouragement, wisdom, or accountability as I grow?

Read It for Yourself

Romans 8:1–4 — Notice what Paul says about condemnation for those who belong to Christ and how God has acted through Jesus.

John 14:16–17 — Read what Jesus says about the Holy Spirit. Consider why He describes the Spirit as someone who will be with His followers.

Galatians 5:16–26 — Read about the conflict between sinful desires and the Holy Spirit. Pay attention to the fruit of the Spirit and how these qualities might appear in everyday relationships.

Philippians 2:12–13 — Notice how Paul describes both our responsibility to live faithfully and God’s work within us.

As you read, consider:What does it mean to receive forgiveness through Jesus and then learn to live differently because of that grace?