If—then conditionals.
BQ: Satan LOVES to keep you down. Not kidding. Doesn't matter if you're a new Christian, an old one, he wants to trip you up and then pin you down in your fallen position. 2 Cor 5:17 is perhaps my favorite verse in the Bible. It says freeingly, "Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." Do you see that? Amazing. But look closely, because this is a conditional statement. See that word in there? "If."
Q: If we are in Christ, then we are new, then the old is gone, then the new has come. How are we in Christ, then?
A: "Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin." (Rom 6:3-7) Notice that there is that remark on being united again, and also on being new. Coincidence? No!
"For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." (Gal 3:27)
God's gift is free, but it's also conditional. We don't have to go and die on a cross, but think about about this: I've offered you a free set of tickets to a concert. All you have to do is show up at my house before the concert and I'll hand them over, no charge. You don't bother showing up. It's a free gift. It's right there. And you missed out.
(PN119)