Like GOD
Be like God (imitate Him) because you are His loved children. [Ephesians 5]
We feel more comfortable with Christ-likeness than seriously being like God. Being like God sounds like what Lucifer had in mind in Isaiah 14--occupying God's throne. But genuine Christ-likeness is really being like God in the most serious manner. Drink this slowly deep in your spirit--be like God. Drink it. Swallow it. Digest it to become part of you. You cannot remain thinking or living like a mere human being and still be like God. Of course, you are NOT God, but definitely you're neither just human now that you have become God's child through Christ.
Photo by Courtney Cook on Unsplash.
God's Children
Lucifer was different. He wanted to be "like God" in his own strength and effort. He wanted to surpass God. "I will raise my throne above the stars of God." It was plain rebelliousness. And anyway, being like God is exclusively for humans with Jesus living in them, not for angels. If you're born from above, you are really solidly of heaven, not earth. You're an alien here. Like Jesus, we should have the mindset that, "My kingdom is not of this world." It's God's topmost will for his sons and daughters in Christ--to be like HIM. Angels may merely "look into these things" but not be like God as HIS children. Probably why Lucifer had other ideas.
"I will make myself like the Most High." [Isaiah 14.14]
You see Jesus? He is God's Son so he is not just human. He is perfectly God and perfectly man. God cannot have a non-God offspring. "What is born of Spirit is spirit," says Jesus. You can't be born of the Spirit and just remain of the flesh. It's impossible, as impossible as Christ being just human. If you were born from God, you cannot stay being mere human. You cannot remain living, thinking and behaving like mere man if God is your Father. Human excuses for sinning and bad behavior, for instance, should no longer be found in you. Inability to do miracles and supernatural acts should not be identified with you.
Created to be Like God
Because, "(Our new self in Christ) is created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness," [Eph.4.24].
Like God in righteousness and holiness. That's God's design for us. It's not an option you can do without. It's a must. Paul said, "Put on the new self." It's not suggesting that you may put it on if you want to. Or if your denominational doctrine approves it. And the new self is created to be like God. You cannot change that. If you claim you have a new self in Christ, then that "self" is designed to be like God. All believers should believe this doctrine.
Are you like God?
Like God in Supernatural Power
Jesus also confirms that anyone who has faith in him will do the (same) things he did, and greater works will a believer do because Jesus is now with the Father interceding for him. Everything necessary is provided so that God's children should no longer live as mere humans but like God--as God their Father does. We're not just humans; we're also born of God.
The proper attitude is to imitate God, not make doctrines or theologies that justify or insist on our frailty or susceptibility to sin as humans, or our inability to perform signs and wonders. Christ has conquered our weakness through his death so that now we can be more than conquerors, not helpless victims of sin again even after we have received Jesus 100 percent into our lives. Imagine God being in you daily 100 percent! How can sin and the devil win anymore against us?
The proper attitude is to imitate God, not make doctrines or theologies that justify or insist on our frailty or susceptibility to sin as humans, or our inability to perform signs and wonders. Christ has conquered our weakness through his death so that now we can be more than conquerors, not helpless victims of sin again even after we have received Jesus 100 percent into our lives. Imagine God being in you daily 100 percent! How can sin and the devil win anymore against us?
Religion Keeps Us Mere Human
The problem with religion is that it has been magnifying our inability to live above sin and do miracles as Jesus did. All man's theology does is tell us how to justify abusing God's grace because we are just humans (and anyway, God understands). Grace has been misused for so long because of this faulty religious thinking. Grace enabled us to be loved by God even while we were yet sinners and sustains us against sin IF (a big if) we stumble now and then even after becoming believers. Grace keeps us going with God.
But grace is not like maintenance medicine we abuse so we can continue eating unhealthy food we know is bad for us. Initially, maintenance meds help us eat bad foods without suffering side effects. But later, it won't work anymore and may even complicate things like wrecking body organs. Like this guy I know who divorced his wife and married another while his wife was still living. He reasoned that God in his grace would understand. But his second marriage turned sour so he had to marry another again, believing that God's grace would again make everything safe.
The problem with religion is that it has been magnifying our inability to live above sin and do miracles as Jesus did. All man's theology does is tell us how to justify abusing God's grace because we are just humans (and anyway, God understands). Grace has been misused for so long because of this faulty religious thinking. Grace enabled us to be loved by God even while we were yet sinners and sustains us against sin IF (a big if) we stumble now and then even after becoming believers. Grace keeps us going with God.
But grace is not like maintenance medicine we abuse so we can continue eating unhealthy food we know is bad for us. Initially, maintenance meds help us eat bad foods without suffering side effects. But later, it won't work anymore and may even complicate things like wrecking body organs. Like this guy I know who divorced his wife and married another while his wife was still living. He reasoned that God in his grace would understand. But his second marriage turned sour so he had to marry another again, believing that God's grace would again make everything safe.
That's living and reasoning like a mere human. True believers are like God. You won't catch God doing anything like that (or imagine him that way) because HE IS GOD. And we are supposed to be like God.
What Grace is For
Truth is, grace is really for enabling us to "say 'No' to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age," [Titus 2.12]. But take note--very few (if any) is interested about this or discusses this full length in church. All they talk about is how grace can ensure or guaranty their salvation even if they live in sin.
Holiness churches don't preach on eternal security (the idea of eternal security is actually in the bible), yet they teach about how we cannot be perfect, that God accepts us as we are because God understands our weakness. He does, but he also wants us to be like HIM. In fact, Jesus commands us, "Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect." It would be another form of grace being abused and a big lie altogether if we belittle these teachings. Jesus teaches we ought to be like God.
God wants his children to be like HIM. And we should press on toward this goal, not looking back as Lot's wife did and died. Like Paul, we do not claim we have already accomplished this--but we should press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of us.
In fact, we have already been made perfect by God in Christ. We must believe this.
"By one sacrifice, (Jesus) made perfect forever those who are being made holy," [Heb. 10.14]
Here is the mystery: by his death on the cross we have been made perfect (past tense) forever even while we are still in the process of being made holy. Being like God, we should understand that we have been made perfect already by God's grace. We may be full of flaws and imperfections in the eyes of the world, but if we live like God in Christ, we are perfect in God's eyes. And anyway, we are under God's continuous honing process to make us holy. We are finished products, at the same time we're still in progress.
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