Living the Life of Christ

There are times when it seems that the life of most people is considered to be cheap when we hear reports of terrorists, or suicide bombers, or religious persecution, or ethnic cleansing, or abortion. The taking of life through these violent actions saddens our hearts and causes us to wonder how things could have gotten so out of control in our world. Yet there are other ways we display the cheapness of life as we “kill” one another with hatred, bullying, selfish arguments, demeaning words and empty relationships. These actions are just as lethal to the soul and spirit of a person. They allow depression, discouragement, anxiety, etc. to wreak havoc on the inner life, and push most of us to despondency or apathy.

You might encounter women who have been abused to the point that they feel worthless; men battered about by circumstances until they think they can never get ahead; children left to fend for themselves and make their own misguided choices to the point that they turn to each other for blind misdirection; and a society that has come to call evil good because real life has dried up in all of its institutions and places of power. The sad fact is that people wander empty and aimless through their world, never knowing just how serious their condition is because they’ve never known real life.

The good news is that Jesus came, not only to show us what real life looks like but to give us that life as a free gift and remedy for what the world has killed in us. Living the life of Christ begins when we yield our will to God and ask Jesus to forgive and live inside us. The Holy Spirit brings into our hearts a new point of reference as we learn personally from Him what life is really like!

God takes His word and teaches us the character and power of Jesus. At the same time His Spirit gives us the experience of His life that begins to shine in our hearts like the dawning of day, which brings us real hope. The result is that we begin to live a new life, even while the rest of the world continues in its downward spiral of death. This is the fulfillment of the words in the Bible, “He who has the Son (Jesus) has life!” (1 John 5:12)!

How exciting to be His people,

Pastor David Vanderpool