Becoming more Christ-like?

[abigya]

Becoming more Christ-like?

Becoming more like Christ is the desire of every believer, and it is encouraging to know that God has the same desire for us. In fact, the Bible says that God “predestined [believers] to be conformed to the likeness of his Son” (Romans 8:29). Making us Christ-like is God’s work, and He will see it through to the end (Philippians 1:6).

However, the fact that God will transform us into Christ-likeness doesn’t mean we can sit back and be carried to heaven “on flow’ry beds of ease.” The process demands our willing cooperation with the Holy Spirit. Becoming more Christ-like requires both divine power and the fulfillment of human responsibility.

There are three things which contribute to our being more Christ-like: our surrender to God, our freedom from sin, and our spiritual growth.

1) Becoming more Christ-like is the result of surrender to God. Romans 12:1-2 says that worship involves a total self-dedication to God. We volunteer our bodies as “living sacrifices,” and our minds are renewed and transformed.

When Jesus said, “Follow me,” Levi left his money tables immediately (Mark 2:14); so do we freely surrender all we have for the sake of following the Lord. As John the Baptist said, “He must become greater; I must become less” (John 3:30), so we focus more and more on Jesus and His glory, losing ourselves in His will.

2) Becoming more Christ-like is the result of freedom from sin. Since Jesus lived a sinless life, the more we consider ourselves “dead to sin” (Romans 6:11) and live a life of purity, the more like Jesus we will be. As we offer ourselves to God, sin is no longer our master, and we are more clearly identified with Christ (Romans 6:1-14).

Jesus invites us to follow Him, and we have His example of obedience (John 15:10), sacrificial love (John 15:12-13), and patient suffering (1 Peter 2:19-23). We also have the example of the apostles, who modeled Christ (1 Corinthians 11:1).

When it comes to restraining sin in our lives, we have divine help: praise the Lord for the Word of God (Psalm 119:11), the intercession of Christ (Romans 8:34; Hebrews 7:25), and the power of the Spirit who indwells us (Romans 8:4; Galatians 5:16)!

3) Becoming more Christ-like is the result of Christian growth. When we are first saved, we are immature in wisdom and knowledge, and inexperienced in grace and love. But then we grow. In each of these things, our charge is to become stronger—and more Christ-like. “Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18). “May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else” (1 Thessalonians 3:12).

Right now, God works in us: “We, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord” (2 Corinthians 3:18). One day, however, the process will be complete: “When he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). The promise of being fully Christ-like in the future is in itself motivation for becoming more Christ-like now: “Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure” (1 John 3:3).


from GotQuestions.org

 

[Lioness]

Thank you soooo much for this post:

I am being especially challenged by the followng at the moment:

1) Becoming more Christ-like is the result of surrender to God. Romans 12:1-2 says that worship involves a total self-dedication to God. We volunteer our bodies as “living sacrifices,” and our minds are renewed and transformed.

When Jesus said, “Follow me,” Levi left his money tables immediately (Mark 2:14); so do we freely surrender all we have for the sake of following the Lord. As John the Baptist said, “He must become greater; I must become less” (John 3:30), so we focus more and more on Jesus and His glory, losing ourselves in His will.

My longing to be totally surrendered to Christ is constantly set against my love of myself as in 'the flesh'. It's a daily battle....and, let's face it, if I was totally surrendered to Christ sin would no longer be an issue because my desire would be to obey Him and not my flesh.

Conequently, my favourite passage of scripture is Philippians 3: 7-11 i.e. "...whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ..." (v. 7) In other words, I need to remind myself that this is just a temporary home. By contrast, my relationship with my Saviour and Lord will last for all eternity.

Moreover, before I start 'beating myself up too much' about the fact that I do fail, I read on to verse 12: "Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me."

That's what I'm going to seek to do every day 'press on'... I guess if we're all cheering each other on, encouraging our brothers and sisters on the way, we will cross that finishing line....

 

[SpiritLedEd]

".....you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of your Creator." (Col 3:9b-10)

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast." (Eph 2:8-9)

We cannot make ourselves Christlike. Our job is to position ourselves before Almighty God daily to listen to Him and receive His grace. When we do that, He moves into our hearts and begins to change us and make us Christlike.

SLE

 

[jiggyfly]

".....you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of your Creator." (Col 3:9b-10)

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast." (Eph 2:8-9)

We cannot make ourselves Christlike. Our job is to position ourselves before Almighty God daily to listen to Him and receive His grace. When we do that, He moves into our hearts and begins to change us and make us Christlike.

SLE

Good post SLE, When we abide in the Vine we will bare His fruit. It is so simple and Paul said it very clearly numerous times throughout the new testament scriptures, Jesus did everything necessary to make us righteous, holy, acceptable and pleasing to Father.

Colossians 1:18-23
18*Christ is the head of the church, which is his body. He is the first of all who will rise from the dead,* so he is first in everything. 19 For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ, 20*and by him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of his blood on the cross. 21*This includes you who were once so far away from God. You were his enemies, separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions, 22*yet now he has brought you back as his friends. He has done this through his death on the cross in his own human body. As a result, he has brought you into the very presence of God, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault. 23*But you must continue to believe this truth and stand in it firmly. Don’t drift away from the assurance you received when you heard the Good News. The Good News has been preached all over the world, and I, Paul, have been appointed by God to proclaim it.

When we completely trust in what Christ has done for us on the cross, we will cease from our own works of righteousness. For many the Christian religion today is nothing more carnal learned behavior, deceiving many. Now I won't say that it has no value but I will say it has no spiritual value. As long as one toils to produce good works and attempts to please Father outside of what Jesus did on the cross then carnal self is still in control. This futile, the scriptures tell us that the flesh is hostile towards God, so there's no hope of ever changing that, but if we will just yield and accept that God is already at peace with us through His Son's death on the cross then we can be at peace with God.

 

[Lioness]

I whole-heartedly agree SpiritLed and Jiggyfly
I guess the crux of the issue, and certainly the challenge for me personally is that I don't always seek to 'remain in the vine', cos something else grabs my attention..... It might be something on t.v. that I suddenly have an overwhelming desire to watch when the Lord is asking me to take time to pray... or it might be a simple question of wrestling over a 'problem' and seeking to solve it myself instead of trusting Him with it!!!! :embarasse

God's grace needs to be called upon to help us make difficult choices in order to stay 'on the narrow way' as my best mate's oldest daughter would call it!!! (Matthew 7: 13 and 14).

I was really challenged listening to a talk on John Ch 6 this morning: The preacher was looking at verse 35 where Jesus says: "...I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst...." He stated that what Jesus is actually saying is: "Without Me you will die!"
This is sooo true. I know that if I do not seek Jesus', wait on Him.... REMAIN in Him, I will die......He is the life giver!!!

Wow!!!! What a challenge and motivation that is don't you think?

 

[Brother Mike]

Well;.

We do have a choice to take Heed on what we hear, and what measure we measure it will be measured back to us. Mark 4.

We have a part to play in this.

When I mess up (OK, I'll call it right) When I sin against God, and what I know to be truth but choose to obey darkness. I remember Phil 1:6

Php 1:6 Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ:

God is not going to give up on you. He will continue to perform his work in you. You became his Child. God already knew what he was going to have to deal with concerning you. So, cheer up. He has a plan.

God does not love you just the way you are, He loves you in spite of who you are.

 

[Lioness]

Thanks Brother for your encouraging words......
That is what I love about this forum.... the sense that we're all in this together.

 

[Mr.Paul]

My Prayer

I pray that we all find that only a complete surrender of our lives is not to much to ask. Our Lord and Savior gave His life for ours. Now for us to be His is all He wants.