How Should We Then Live?

For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.

Romans 8:29

 Once the certainty of the resurrection of Christ is established in your mind and you have called on the name of the Lord: if you confess with your mouth “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved (Romans 10:9,13)—how then do you live?

It all began in Eden where God created man to be conformed to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. If we look like Christ, more and more of our friends will come to saving faith—their gain and our gain and heaven’s gain.  

How am I, how are you conformed to the image of Christ? The fact that God is love (1John 4:16) permeates His word and ways from creation to forever. Hence, whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him (1John 4:16-17).

Way back in Exodus 20:2-17 the first four of the Ten Commandments began with loving God; the following six continued with loving others. And therein lies the basis for conforming to the image of Jesus as He would later confirm: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40).

Scripture is liberally sprinkled with seeds of love, these perhaps my favorite: Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God (Ephesians 5:1-2).

May our lives be as fragrant as the lilacs in the Royal Botanical Gardens in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada in May.  

Nancy P

All Scripture quotations are from the NIV Translation 1973, 1978, 1984, unless otherwise noted.