To Be Like Jesus

   I remember a chorus we used to sing at church, when I was growing up, called "To Be Like Jesus." It went like this, "To be like Jesus, to be like Jesus, all I ask is to be like Him. All through life's journey, from earth to glory, all I ask, is to be like Him."  Until recently, I only had one idea of what being "like Him" really meant. As Christians, we should strive to be like Jesus. I have heard many a message on this subject. We need to love like God love's. We need to have compassion like God has compassion. We need to live a righteous life, because we serve a righteous God. We need to be a shining example of our Lord, who loved us and gave Himself for us. We need to go out into the highways and the hedges and compel them to come in. We need to lead and win souls to Christ. ALL of these things are true, and we should do them! I could go on and on. I have heard many messages in my life time, but there is not that much space here, and sadly, my memory is not what it used to be, so I will not try to quote a line from each one. :-)

   I grew up in a Christian home, with godly parents, who were a shining example of true servants of Christ. It was not until I became an adult, with children of my own to raise for Christ, that I realized how much "like Jesus" they were (and still are) and how little I was "like Him." Oh, I am not saying I have not lived for Him, because I have tried my best to, and I am still trying. I am not saying I have not spent my life in service to Him, because I have(and failed,) and I am still serving as best I can. I love the Lord. I have been so blessed by Him that living a life without Him would be foreign to me. I am not bragging on me, I am bragging on HIM. I gave my heart to Jesus at age thirteen, and thank God, He has been my best friend and never left me. I am so underserving of His constant companionship, and undying love. I will never understand why God would give His most precious, for this faltering, failing servant, (I could spend the rest of this page just bragging on HIM! He is so good!) Yet, all these years I have strove to serve Him, to witness about Him, to worship Him, and yet I never fully grasped what it mean to be "like Him." 

   Serving Jesus is not just about singing praises, teaching sunday school, being in His house every time the doors are open, going door knocking week after week, living a righteous life, having Godly standards and principles, encouraging others to know Him or be faithful to Him, cleaning the church, working on the bus, teaching children's church, showing up at EVERYthing that the church schedules, carting bratty children and unthankful teenagers to camp, picnics, and amusements parks, giving to missions, playing the piano or organ, taking care of crying babies in the nursery, praying daily, and having devotions every day. All those things are wonderful places of service for Christ, and you are commended for having participated or taken part in any or all of the above, but...... where are your scars?

   When I look at my blessed parents, my gracious father & mother-in-law, my precious grandparents, and some very faithful servants of God that I have been privileged to know and learn from, I see scars. I see wounds. I see tears. I see broken hearts. I see lives that have done all those things I listed above, while fighting battles within the church or personal battles with their children or grandchildren. They continue on while being falsely accused of horrible things, by people who have yet to walk a mile for Jesus in their own life. They trudge forward while the darts are being thrown, and they hold their shield of faith high over the heads of some of the most unthankful, ungrateful people. All the while hoping that their faith will help others to see Jesus. They don't look for trophies, gratitude, men's applause or praise, they just look up, because that is what Jesus did. When in the midst of persecution, slander, suffering, heartache, and pain, Jesus looked to His Father. And even though He could have come down off that cross and proven to them that things they were saying were  untrue, and the punishment they were giving him was unjust, and undeserved, He didn't. "..and as sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth." (Is. 53:7) He bears in His body the marks, the wounds, and the scars. Where are your scars?

"But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world." (Gal.6:14)

"From henceforth let no man trouble me: for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." (Gal.6:17)