We don't have to do life alone. Our lives are a work in progress. We progress towards becoming more like Christ. Like the child learning to walk. When the child takes his first step and falls, the parent doesn't say, "That's terrible, can't you do better!" No, the parent picks the child up, pats him, says good job and let's try again. Our Father is much like this. He is patient, kind and loving. He sees our attempts. He knows our sorrows and pain. He lived as us once.
Imitators Of God
Likewise the child doesn't think, "Well I will not try to walk, because my Father can walk perfectly and I will never be able to do that." The child tries to walk, why? For one reason to please the Father because he loves Him so much. We try to walk our Christian walk because we love our Father. Not because we think we can be perfect, but we want to try to be as much like Him as we can be.
We are His body in this world, sent out to show His love, to show His grace, and to show His kindness to others. Of course sometimes we fail so miserably, but He forgives and tells us to keep trying because, guess what? We aren't alone. He is there to help us. His Spirit encourages us and reminds us we are loved and we belong to Him. Galatians 2: 20 says in part, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. "
Solid Food
To continue the analogy a little further. If I had a 5 year old who was unable to walk and could only crawl that would be a very scary, troubling thing. Especially if the 5 year old had never even tried to walk. Yet we have Christians who say things like, "Well I have only been a Christian for 5 years so I don't know much about the Bible." Why do we think that is acceptable? Shouldn't we be striving from day one to live more like Christ?
We need to rid ourselves of strife and jealousy so that we can be ready for "solid food", not just the milk that an infant would drink. We have learned our simple Bible stories about Noah, and Adam and Eve, and Jesus feeding the 500; but now we need to dig deeper into the stories. Dig beyond the simple obvious message and dig into the deeper meanings of the Bible.
"But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?" I Corinthians 3: 1-3 (ESV)
We Need To Work
We live today in a world that says even church must be entertaining, all about feelings, to the point where sometimes it is difficult to know if you're at a rock concert or a service worshipping the Holy God. Too often people only want to hear feel good sermons, uplifting messages and more about God's love. We need to hear this, but we also need to hear about sin, sanctification, repentance and judgment.
Studying the word takes work, time, thoughtfulness, prayer and dedication. It takes diligence. We thank God and we praise Him for His great love towards us. But to better grasp that love we should be learning everything we can about Him. To become more Christ like ourselves we definitely need to be in church regularly, we need to read the Bible, read good quality Christian books, listen to quality sermons and try to get in a small group with others where we can share the blessings that Christ has blessed us with. We need to grow in obedience.
Spiritual Growth
We need to see growth in our lives. We need to see more fruits of the spirit being displayed. For some of us it can be a very slow process, but the Lord doesn't leave us dangling alone just hoping we can get closer to Him, no! He gives us the Holy Spirit to help us, to be our strength when we have none.
"Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children." Ephesians 5: 1
Wow! Think about that statement, "imitators of God"! Overwhelming, isn't it? But what else does he say? As beloved children! As children who imitate a father who loves them with an everlasting love. And as we begin to imitate Him, so we will become more like Him. Our walk will be more like His, our thoughts more like His, and our words more like His.
Thank you, Father, for letting us be your beloved children.
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