A Full Life to Set an Example

Christ is our model above all others. There is no other. Throughout the ages there have been godly men and women who lived lives of consecration and visible integrity, but not one of them, either in their relationship with the Lord or in their relationship with their neighbor, has proved spotless and beyond reproach. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the model and the example.

The mercies of the Most High God have been shown for centuries to the church founded by His Son on that glorious Pentecost of the first century, which set the course for a new chapter in the history of God’s people. The coming of the Holy Spirit and the manifestation of spiritual gifts in believers brought, alongside the most beautiful blessings God bestowed on His children, a headlong rush by some toward counterfeiting and misinterpreting God’s infallible Word.

No human merit is sufficient, nor are any works adequate and conclusive enough to satisfy the Lord’s desires. The Lord wants only obedience and abiding in Him, so that He may fulfill His promises of blessing. He declared us holy, set apart for Him, from the very moment we surrendered to Him by acknowledging Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross and believing that He is the Savior of the world, the only Redeemer who paid for our sins, died in our place, and rose from the dead. No one has the right to usurp God’s exclusive right to be worshiped and exalted among humankind. Christ is the example to follow: “To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, giving you an example so that you might follow in His steps. (1 Pet. 2:21).

The apostle Paul suggested in some of his letters that the brothers and sisters imitate him, but made clear that it was Christ whom they should imitate: “Be imitators of me, as I also am of Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1). Christ is the one to imitate and the source of inspiration; never, under any circumstances, a human being. Likewise, while encouraging his coworker Timothy to show humble and exemplary conduct before his fellow servants, he gave thanks to God for the infinite mercies shown to him: though he had been a persecutor and mocker of the church (…the worst of sinners, as he described himself), he found grace before God to be His messenger and apostle to many nations, and called on those who believed in Jesus for eternal life to imitate him. The focus of that imitation was not Paul, but Christ.

Jesus said to imitate the Father. Let us examine the following statements:

Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in Me? The words I speak to you I do not speak on My own; rather, it is the Father, who is in Me, who does His works. (John 14:10)

“I do nothing on My own, but speak just as the Father taught Me” (John 8:28d)

Christ alone is worthy of praise and worship. The Lord of lords, exalted by the Father. On whom are you fixing your eyes to imitate? Who is shaping your life to transform it from the depths of your being?

My prayer is that you will fix your eyes on Jesus, the slain Lamb, the suffering servant who endured suffering to present us to the Father holy, without guilt and without blemish, because we were chosen by Him before the foundation of the world. (Ephesians 1:4). You may believe it or not, but what the Word says is that, having believed in Jesus and in the work He accomplished by the will and design of the Father, He—not human beings—has declared us HOLY, not because of our own merits but because of Christ’s, set apart to give Him honor and glory.

A full life is lived from this conviction. Anything else is to turn the precious gospel of the One who lives so that we may have life, full and abundant, into poetry and to sugarcoat it.

God bless you!