BE LIKE CHRIST
If you are a Christian, then why are you not following Jesus Christ? Christians mean followers of Jesus Christ. If so, are we not supposed to be like Christ so that people will see our good works (our sweet fruits) and glorify our Father in heaven?
We can not be Christians and still immersed ourselves in the licentiousness and rapacity of the world. "What has God have in fellowship with Belial." We can live in this world but but not of this world.
We can not use other people as standards of spirituality. We will become vain or bitter because of that. If we have to compare ourselves, we have to compare ourselves with Christ. In any situation that we may face, especially if we are in doubt, let us ask ourselves this question. "If Christ were here, what would He have done in this situation?" Then we can be assured that our decision will be right and in accordance with His will.
Before He ascended to heaven, Jesus Christ promised His disciples the coming of the Holy Spirit and He indeed came and changed their lives forever. If we believe in Jesus Christ and are in filled by the Holy Spirit, we have been promised that we will be transformed from glory to glory until we reach the whole measure of the fullness of Jesus Christ.
How can we do this? The answer lies in Romans 12:2 which says, "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is- His good, pleasing and perfect will."
The will of God is for us to be holy like Him and to dissociate ourselves from the sinfulness and carnality of the world. We can not have our cake and eat it too. The verse above said that we are transformed by the renewing of our minds. That means, our minds must think only godly and sublime thoughts, thoughts that edify, thoughts of loving unconditionally, thoughts of selflessness, thoughts of hope and joy, and thoughts of peace.
Let us not run our races to win worldly prizes, they are like steel weights that chain our souls. Instead, let us run our races to win the heavenly prize- to be with the Lord forevermore.
You want to be a good Christian? Be like Christ and follow Him.
Posted by Mel Avila Alarilla
Philippines
Spiritual/Inspirational
30 comments:
hi Mel, i was just thinking this morning about the question--who is my hero? people always want to know "who is your hero?" well, the ONLY answer i could come up with this morning was Jesus Christ. i was thinking to many that would sound so superficial or whatever, but to me, it's the perfect answer because Jesus is the only perfect One.
people always admire and want to be like their hero, and i really don't have any human people i admire and want to be like. i strive for excellence and perfection--perfection not in the sense of doing everything exactly right, but in the sense of having a right attitude in everything i do, so to me Jesus is the Perfect Example of that plus more.
i'm finding there are people who say they're christians or "know God," but they're trying to do so apart from The Word of God. one simply can't have a relationship with God apart from His Word. if His Word is never read, how will people know how God wants them to be, or to act in certain situations, when trials come upon us, when we're being tested, etc., etc. we simply CANNOT know God except we read His Word and learn of Him, and develop a RELATIONSHIP with Him.
the Bible says, "you'll know a tree by the fruit it bears," yet many people aren't bearing God's fruit of the Spirit, but still saying they know God and/or are christians.
people say, "you can't judge a book by its cover;"however, if i'm getting ready to read Dr. Seuss and the cover reads Dr. Seuss, but the inside is Shakespeare, then there's a problem somewhere. good post Mel.
now, in relation to your comment on my blog, you know i actually still gargle with salt & warm water. had said i was going to do it this week, but never did, so on that note, i will be gargling with salt & warm water.
i remember when we were growing up, my dad always had a remedy, but it worked. my dr told me if i drank the TheraFlu, i would feel better, so i guess i won't be feeling better from that because i'm not drinking it. thanks for sharing about the home remedy. appreciate it!
Hi Mel, you know what? since you entered in my life I started to trasnform myself into an angerless, faithful and better person than before, 'cause I'm catholic, and catholics believe in Christ too.
Thnks a lot for leaving comments in my blog of Dreams and for your posts about Jesus Christ, they make me feel better.
Thanks for everything.
Big greetings and big hugs
Sweet Dreams, from the bottom of my Heart:
Arthur
And the deleted comment was mine, but I did a mistake, so I fixed it.
Big greetings and big hugs
Sweet Dreams, from the bottom of my Heart:
Arthur
Hi Heiresschild,
How is it that you bring tears to my eyes every time I read your comments? It is as if I am reading them straight from your heart. I wrote this post so long ago during the time when Jim of World United Bloggers was bludgeoning me with his disagreement with my stand about Christ. I was so shocked to find out that he was actually a Christian yet believed that Jesus is only human. He even threatened to expel me from World United Bloggers because of my articles that I also published there. He is a pseudo Christian and not a real follower of Christ. That is the rationale for this post. I feel that as a Christian you cannot bash Jesus Christ. Christian means followers of Jesus Christ and if you are one, then you will follow His words contained in the Bible. Catholics believed in Jesus Christ but they are noncommittal with regards to their relationship with Him. They think going to mass on Sundays is all it takes to placate God. But God does not need placating. We must follow Him by obeying His words. (I am sorry to my Catholic friends. I never meant to hurt your feelings nor criticize your faith.) I can plainly see that you are filled by the Holy Spirit by your comments. God bless
you more for your commitments to the Lord. I wish you will be well soon. Bye now my dear friend. Have a wonderful day always in the US.
Hi Arthur,
I'm so glad that I am having a positive effect on you but the credit goes to God. TO GOD BE THE GLORY. I'm so glad that you are able to control your temper and that you are no longer temperamental. Think twice before you do anything rashly. It is at the end when we suffer from wrong actions. They say it is so easy to go into trouble but triply hard to extricate away from it. I know you are a good lad and the Lord will take care of you always. I'm just apprehensive with the fact that I no longer see your name and that of Gusthav as moderators for Latin America. What happened? Did you developed any trouble with WUB? I hope you can fix whatever issues you may have with WUB. It pains me to see your names (you and Gustahv's)no longer mentioned as moderators. I hope everything is okay with WUB. Bye now my young friend. God bless you and your family. Have a wonderful and peaceful day always in Argentina.
Thanks for this post. It was so inspirational. Have a great weekend! God bless You!
There's no problem with WUB, that was just that since the Latina Moderator and the South america Moderator were the same, the the South America Moderator issue vanished, and since Gusthav and me have some trouble, technical problems with the Internet, we were visiting WUB less tah before.
And since we haven't thought something to post in the WUB, I think the south America Moderator disappeered.
But there's nothing wrong with that.
Big greetings and big hugs
Sweet Dreams, from the bottom of my Heart:
Arthur
Hi Mississippi Songbird,
How wonderful to see you visiting my blog. It's always a big pleasure to have you here. Thanks so much for your generous comments but, TO GOD BE THE GLORY. God bless you and your family. Have a wonderful and peaceful weekend in the US always.
Hi Arthur,
I thank God that you and Gusthav did not have any trouble with WUB. You are like my own children and I will feel awful if you develop any problem with WUB. I hope your technical problems with your computers are patched up and you can post again. Thanks for your wonderful friendship with each other. God bless both of you and your respected families. Have a wonderful and great time of your lives in Argentina always.
I am sure you must be a true follower of your faith my friend,being the righteous person you are.
Have a great weekend.Take care.God Bless You always.
Kuya Mel,
great post again I was thinking about this topic yesterday.
And one of my favorite bible verse is Romans 12:2. When I was growing up my mom always telling me this verse. That I can't conform in this world if my friend does something I can't copy them. Most of my friends knew about my beliefs and faith. They call me party pooper because i don't usually join what they do. God bless keep coming for more!
A great post again. A true source of inspiration.
Take Care. :)
Hi Sameera,
Thanks for your visit and your generous comments. I cannot consider myself righteous my friend. Only God is truly righteous. I also have my own frailties just like everybody else, but I love my God with my whole heart and I am striving always to do His will. Thanks for your visit. God bless you and your family. Have a great and peaceful day in Dubai always.
Hi Sarah,
Thanks for your visit my kid sister in Christ and for your meaningful comments. As Christians, we're supposed to live in this world but not of this world. Romans 12:2 has spelled out what we must do to obey the will of God regardless of what the world will say to us. We cannot be a closet Christian and imitate what the worldly people are doing. If we compromise with the world, then we lose the saltiness and the light of a true Christian. Thanks again for your visit. God bless you and your family. Have a wonderful and great day in the US always.
Hi Preetilata,
Thanks for your visit and for your meaningful comments. God bless you and your whole family. Have a nice and peaceful day always.
Hi MEL
Your post definitely inspiring to the followers and believers of your faith and I'm sure you do the right thing by following and obeying as stated in your religion, for that I respect you so much.
Take care Mel.May God bless you and family always.Have a gr8 w/end.
Where did you get this informations about Helen Keller? hmmmm, you've done a good research.
Hi Mel thanks for your comment. About my other blog, it's not actually a bible blog Mel. It's actually a personal oline diary which turned out to be an advertisement blog..lols.. I just post bible messages every sunday but it seems I am getting good traffics with the bible topics and few adsense clicks. I dont want to earn money through the words of God. Just experimenting.
here is the URL as you requested http://mydaysinmymind.blogspot.com
Buen día, Mel.
Como has estado?
Me quedé pensando en tu comentario,
" your thoughts and not you as a person. I wish you will reveal your own personal self to your readers"...
Ayudame a comprender mejor.
Yo creo que estoy mostrando mi persona a lo largo de cada post. Qué me aconsejás?
Un abrazo y gracias por tu ayuda.
Bro.Mel,
Nice post you got here. Following God is not always easy, it requires a submissive heart that is willing to trust God with everything. As Christians, we also struggle with the ways of the world and still managing to be the "light" of the world but I guess, if you have God in your heart and you are committed in His ways, everything will be just fine.
God bless you always, Bro.Mel.
Happy Sunday (tom)
Hi Noushy,
Thanks for your respect for my faith. I really respect you a lot for your courage to comment in this particular post. I would have understood if you refrained from commenting but you did, and I really admire you more for it. Now I know that we are real friends and our individual faiths will not stand in the way of our friendship. Thank you so much my wonderful friend. God bless you and your loved ones. Have a great and warm day in London always.
Hi Walk Through My Online Journal,
I got the materials for Helen Keller at Wikipedia. They got information about anything under the sun. You just have to master the art of splicing information and links because they give voluminous information that is too wordy for a blog post. Next time, I will just be using your name because it's so hard to recall your pen name, it's kilometric, he, he, he, *lol* I'm glad that you have already adjusted
to the ways and climate of Canada. Thanks for your visit and your generous comments. God bless you and your family. Have a great and wonderful day in Canada always.
Hi Feripula,
Thanks for your visit. The Babel Fish Translator is very faulty. I could not make sense of its translations that is why I could not visit your blog as often as I want. Anyway, what I meant by my comment is that I want to know more about you as a person. I know you are a teacher. Probably, it's just a case of me not being able to read all your posts as frequently as I would want to because of the language problem. I know your English is better than my Spanish.
Well anyway, I am translating this comment via the Babel Fish translator and see how faulty the translation is. Thanks anyway. God bless you and your family. Have a great and cozy day in sunny Argentina always.
Hi Feripula, gracias por su visita. El traductor de los pescados de Babel es muy culpable. No podría tener sentido de sus traducciones que es porqué no podría visitar su blog tan a menudo como deseo. De todas formas, qué signifiqué por mi comentario es que deseo saber más sobre usted como persona. Sé que usted es profesor. Probablemente, it's apenas un caso de mí que no puede leer todos sus postes tan con frecuencia como desearía debido a al problema de la lengua. Sé que su inglés es mejor que mi español. Pozo de todos modos, estoy traduciendo este comentario vía el traductor de los pescados de Babel y veo cómo es culpable es la traducción. Gracias de todos modos. El dios bendice a le y a su familia. Tenga un día grande y acogedor en la Argentina asoleada siempre.
Hi sis Emmyrose,
Thanks for your visit and your generous comments. I know how hard it is to stand by our Christian principles because they are diametrically opposed to what the world advocates. But we must be Christian first and citizens of the world secondly. It will be very hard to explain to the Lord at the end of the day that we compromised our Christian ways just because we want to be in good standing with the world. The best thing is, to live in this world but not of this world. Thanks again for your visit. God bless you and your family. Have a great and perfect day always.
HI MEL
You know my latest entry on 'tomorrow is not yours' is actually inspired by your writing.
I'm glad that we could be good friends regardless our faith yea. That's gonna be always like that, coz of the respect towards each other.Thank you Mel.
Have a gr8 day and may God bless you and family always.
Hi Noushy,
Yes, thanks for your friendship. It means so much to me. I will be reading your post as soon as I post my latest article. Thanks so much for your visit. God bless you and your loved ones. Have the best day of your life in the UK always.
I have been falling short of my calling for a while now. I have been a Christian since I asked Jesus into my heart when I was 9 years old (a long time) I know that I know the salvation message is true and that the Bible is the inerrant word of God. I know. i have experienced true healing miracle. I have experienced divine intervention.
Yet...i am not living to the best of my ability for God who loves me so much that he died for me. I KNOW better and yet i have distanced. maybe i really am not a Christian? and maybe I am not really saved? because knowing what I know...how could I distance if I know better? Can a Christian lose there salvation? I know there are different scholarly thoughts on this. hal Lindsay says...once saved always saved...BUT...if a Christian continues on a sinful destructive path then he will take that Christian out earlier than he originally planned so that he doesn't lose his salvation. I think Billy Graham says you are saved!
Other people have said that if you do sin intentionally indefinitely then you are not saved...that you really didn't make the commitment.
And there seem to be scriptures (Hebrews maybe?) that say it would be better to have never known the Lord than to have known him if you turn away from him, indicating you could lose your salvation.
i pretty much always believed once saved always saved. that when a person sincerely asks Jesus into their heart that they are saved and their name is in the book of life.
As far as sin...Romans 3:23 "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God." I always thought we won't lose out salvation but we will reap what we sow and that is not a good thing if we have been perpetually living in sin. Also that while we may not lose our salvation...we will miss out on God's best for our lives. And that is a sad thing because God knows exactly what we were created for and knows exactly what will bring us joy, peace and true happiness. sometimes though we just chase the wind and i know i have been guilty of that. And really, how can someone who knows god...opt to chase the wind? i am curious for your opinions on these questions or anyones opinion.
SeaSpray :)
P.S. Sorry so long and sorry about capital letters. :)
Hi Snowlite,
First things first, if salvation is indeed a permanent thing and we can never ever lose it, why would the devil still bother with us? The Bible said, the devil is like a roaring lion seeking whom to devour. And what he seeks are Christians. Sometimes, I am appalled at American Christians. They profess Christianity and yet you will not see the fruit of their being Christians. The Bible said, by the fruit, you will know the tree. Is your fruit sweet for the Lord or is your fruit sour for the world. The Bible also said, continue to work out your salvation. If we are already permanently saved and we could not ever lose our salvation, why did Paul admonish Christians to work out their salvation. Salvation is a gift of grace from God but we have to treasure it less we lose it just like Saul and Solomon. Saul started out with the anointing from the Lord. He lost it and in the process also lost his kingdom and later on, his life as well. Same thing with Solomon, after He was conferred with wisdom and wealth unparalleled in the history of man, he deserted the Lord for foreign gods and he lost his anointing and his kingdom too. All gifts from God must be cherished and nurtured otherwise God will take it away from us. Backsliding is a grievous sin against the Lord since the one who does that has already known God's grace and salvation. Do you think man can trample God's sacred things and still be saved? What "once saved always saved" means that God will give us the chance to repent of our recalcitrant ways even up to the last hour of our life. But if in the end, we will not repent of our sins, do you think we can still go to heaven? That's a foolish and dangerous doctrine. We're supposed to be changed by the Holy Spirit from glory to glory until we reach the whole measure of the fullness of Jesus Christ. If we are living in blatant sin after we obtained our salvation, what glory do we bring to the Lord? Our fruit definitely is a very sour one. We cannot live apart from God because God is the vine and we are the branches. The Bible said, apart from Him we can do nothing. Those who separates from Him die a spiritual death and are burned up as fuel. I hope you will come back to the Lord through a genuine spiritual revival and be counted with the saved. Thanks for your visit. God bless you and your family always.
Define blatant sin. Is all sin not sin in God's eyes and therefore not acceptable to him who is perfect but through the blood of his son we are made righteous?
And what sin is too much? How long? I think there are basics and then I think the boundaries are different individually.
At what point are we fearing needlessly over legalism? Think of man made rules that God has no part of. I think God is probably easier on us than we are on each other...yet...he does call us to be Holy as he is holy. That is a tall order that can only be attained through Jesus.
It scares me to read your words...where you say you hope i will come back to the Lord. I scared myself when I read the words i wrote here last night...questioning if i was still a Christian. I have never wondered that before? I believe I am but have been backsliding. I don't do bad things but I have distanced and focused more on the worldly things.
There was a time when I hardly watched secular tv or listened to secular music. I never was a strong church goer and yet I know we Christians need the body and the body needs us. I know I am missing out on God's best. I also didn't get our sons into church although they were taught the heart knowledge and personal relationship with Jesus and his healing power on a daily basis. Some people go to church all the time but are as dead men's bones inside. That is not why I didn't go. I didn't go because I worked 3-11s and also got in the habit of not going. I haven't worked in 2 years and and had been sick and didn't go even though I needed God all the more and had the time. Sometimes I have said God understands and he does but he still appreciates obedience which is ultimately for our own good.
People have always thought I was the religious one. One doctor at worked told me I talked about God a lot.. When the kids were little one neighbor's little daughter asked me why I always talked about God. I always tried to turn things into lesson. I was never obnoxious and i have always had all kinds of friends- people that believed in God and those that don't. I think tv and secular music are fine depending on content. i was never a holier than thou person I just chose to look at other things. I think balance is important.
The scripture where it says that Jesus will return at a certain time because if he didn't even the very elect would be deceived confused me. I told a woman that my faith was so strong that I could never be deceived. She said don't ever say that! I don't believe anything would cause me to stop believing in god and the resurrection message. That is as much a part of me as breathing. I know it is real. I believe my name is in the book of life. But I have been backsliding. And you know what? It's sad because even if I am saved...because I am not living at my best for God...then...i am NOT being the salt and light for God helping to point the way for my loved ones and those who meet me. So while I am not bad...I have grown complacent and don't read the word or pray like I used to. In my family...i am the only one who points the way to God. The best chance they have of going to church is if I go...then in time they will. My little 6 yr old granddaughter asked me if she could go to church with me when she was 5. I said yes but then never went. She is so precious. I KNOW better. I am missing the mark in so many things right now. Her mom is not a believer and my older son doesn't live for God now either. I don't think he disbelieves but more worldly now too. I am the key person of faith in my family. They are not anti God at all but I am the one who would encourage them to follow God, etc.
Don't know why I told you and the world all this personal stuff but if you don't mind say a prayer that i will be able to bring my granddaughter to church and that her mom will let her go.
When I hear the word of the Lord or read your blog, etc it is as a soothing balm to my spirit. My Christian antanae go up and I odentify with and hone in on it. I guess God is wooing me back closer to him. :)
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