"Whoever claims to live in (God) must walk as Jesus did."
I will promise you that we will have no taller order in our lives than the order that we have in our text. I do like to think how much better my life would have been if I had always followed this text. (This could probably also be applied to your life.) In any case, what would we have to do in order to walk as Jesus did? Here is what I thought of today. Of course no list would be complete in this matter. Jesus walked in love. He loved people that other would not dare to love. (I'm thinking of lepers.) Jesus loved the "down and out" and the "up and out." He even loved the hated tax collector Zacchaeus, and changed his life for the better. He loved lepers who were shunned by other people. He loved the "rich young ruler" who came to him to ask about eternal life. I could add to this list, but you probably get the point by now: that we need to love all people. (I said that this is a tall order.) Jesus walked in purity. In fact, he never sinned in His whole life. Yes, I think that he was pure when he was a child and an adolescent. After all, Jesus knew that He would have to die for our sins, and this sacrifice would be ineffective if he had sinned. Jesus was human, but He was also Emmanuel: "God with us." Jesus knows that we cannot achieve this perfect life. I have heard some people say that they were perfect. I had one man tell me that he was perfect. I told him I knew that he was not perfect. He said, how do you know? I said "because you just lied." (We parted friends.) We will not be perfect, but we can still walk in purity as we watch our thoughts and actions. This leads me to one final point: Jesus walked in forgiveness There is no better illustration of this than in His prayer as He faced the cross: "Father forgive them for they know not what they do." You and I were included in that prayer of forgiveness. Jesus forgives us on a daily basis, as we ask for His forgiveness in our daily prayers.. The main question here is do we forgive other people who wrong us? I have to admit that this is a real challenge for me, and it is probably a real challenge for you. (I repeat, this is a tall order.) In order to forgive we have to love people, and to we need to walk in purity, for unforgiveness is a sin. (ouch) (By the way, the hardest person for me to forgive is myself.) I have not touched "the hem of the garment" in this article, but the three points that I have shared with you, gives all of us a challenge to "walk as Jesus did." Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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September 2021
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