"14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being,17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
20 Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen."
Ephesians 3:14-21
This work of the Spirit of God producing inner conformity to the divine will serves to remind us that it is never merely a question of the adjustment of outward behaviour (although outward behaviour will certainly change). There is a real danger of forgetting this in Christian life today which can easily degenerate into conformity to a set pattern of behaviour. We must beware of putting patches of new cloth onto old garments. It is much easier to conform to an outward pattern than to maintain a living, inward experience, but we must resist the temptation to do so, for this always produces a stilted and unreal caricature of Christian life. When the heart is right, outward expressions will tend to look after themselves, it is in the deeper reaches that the work of rehabilitation needs to be achieved, for it is there, far more than on the surface, that the human personality has been breached by sin and brought into disharmony, and it is there that new harmonies must be set, in which we learn to come to terms with ourselves, so that all the conflicting forces of personality might be unified into one whole man. Furthermore, when this work - surety 'all-round' in its essence, in the sense that every part of the personality is addressed and renewed - becomes more and more a reality in our lives, we will find that we have an answer to particular temptations. It is the 'all-round' strengthening that safeguards against the wiles of the devil in any particular approach he may make. In physical life it is when our general condition is low that particular germs find access to the system; and it is so also in the spiritual life. The way of deliverance from a besetting sin is not to concentrate on it, either in thought or in prayer - for that simply brings it to the forefront of the mind and encourages it - but to look away from it to what we are in Christ, recognising that in His victory we are victorious in the whole of life. Reflecting on our position in Christ improves our general condition, and this is the best deterrent to particular sins.