In Him: Like Him

                           May 17th, 1883
                                  by
                            C. H. SPURGEON
                               1834-1892
                  (Updated English by Tony Capoccia)

       "Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did." 
                             [1 John 2:6] 

He that "claims to live in Him"--that is exactly what every 
Christian claims.  A person cannot be a Christian unless this is true 
of him, and he cannot fully derive joy from his religion unless he 
knows assuredly that he is in Christ, and can boldly profess it. We 
must be in Christ, and steadfast in Christ, or else we are not saved 
by the Lord.  It is our union with the Christ that makes us 
Christians: by union with Him as our life we truly live--live in the 
favor of God--We are in Christ, dear brethren, as the person 
accused of murder was in the city of refuge: I hope that we can 
say we abide in Him as our sanctuary and shelter. We have fled for 
refuge to Him who is the hope set before us in the gospel; even as 
David and his men sheltered themselves in the eaves of Engedi, so 
we hide ourselves in Christ.  Each one of us sings, and our heart 
goes with the words--

                     "Rock of ages, cleft for me,
                     Let me hide myself in thee."

We have entered into Christ as into the shadow of a great rock in 
a weary land, as guest; into a banquet hall, as returning travelers 
into their home. And now we live--in Christ in this sense, that we 
are joined to Him : as the stone is, in the wall, as the wave is in 
the sea, as the branch is in the vine, so are we in Christ.  As the 
branch receives all its sap from the stem, so all the sap of 
spiritual life flows from Christ into us.  If we were separated 
from Him, we would be like branches cut off from the vine, only 
fit to be gathered up for the fire, and to be burned.  So we live in 
Christ as our shelter, our home, and our life.  Today we remain in 
Christ, and will forever remain in Him, as our Head.  Ours is no 
temporary union; while He lives as our Head we will remain His 
members. We are nothing apart from Him.  As a finger is nothing 
without the head, as the whole body is nothing without the head, 
so should we be nothing without our Lord Jesus Christ.  But we are 
in Him vitally, and therefore we dare ask the question, who, "will 
be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus 
our Lord."  [ROM 8:39]

Beloved, since we, then, are the people who say that we live in 
Him, it is on us that the responsibility of the text falls: we must 
walk even as He walked.  A Bible must have vital influence to a 
conscientious man.  Shouldn't it to be so?  Then it will be so, with 
God's help.  If we say the Bible is God's Word to us, then we must 
do what it says.  If we talk, we must walk, or it will, be mere talk.  
If we make the profession of living in Christ, we must prove it by 
our practice of walking with Christ.  If we say that we are in 
Christ and live in Him, we must be sure that our life and character 
are conformed to Christ, or else we will be making an empty boast. 
This is true of every man who says he is in Christ, for the text is 
put in the most general and absolute manner: whether the man is 
old or young, rich or poor, educated or uneducated, pastor or 
congregation, it is incumbent upon them to live like Christ if they 
profess to live in Christ.

The first thing about a Christian is initiation, initiation into 
Christ: the next thing is imitation, the imitation of Christ.  We 
cannot be Christians unless we are in Christ; and we are not truly in 
Christ unless we live in Him and move and have our being, and the life 
of Christ is lived over again by us according to our capacity. "Be 
imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children."  [EPH 5:1]  
It is the nature of children to imitate their parents.  Be imitators 
of Christ as good soldiers, who can't have a better model for their 
soldier's life than their Captain and Lord.  Shouldn't we be very 
grateful to Christ that He was willing to come to earth to be our 
example?  If He were not perfectly able to meet all our other 
wants, if He were a Savior and nothing else, we should glory in Him 
as our atoning sacrifice, for we always put that to the front, and 
magnify the virtue of His precious blood beyond everything: but at 
the same time we need an example, and it is delightful to find it 
where we find our forgiveness and justification.  They that are 
saved from the death of sin need to be guided in the life of 
holiness, and it is infinitely condescending on the part of Christ 
that He becomes an example to such poor creatures as we are. 

It is said to have been the distinguishing mark of Caesar as a 
soldier that he never said to his followers "Go!" but he always said 
"Come!" Of Alexander, also, it was noted that in weary marches he 
was sure to be on foot with his warriors, and in fierce attack's he 
always was in the front. The most persuasive sermon is the 
example which leads the way. This certainly is one trait in the 
Good Shepherd's character, "When He has brought out all his own, 
He goes on ahead of them." [JOH 10:4]  If Jesus commands us to 
do anything, He first does it himself.  He wants us to wash one 
another's feet; and this is the argument--"You call me 'Teacher' 
and 'Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am.  Now that I, your 
Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash 
one another's feet."  [JOH 13:13-14]  Shouldn't we who profess to 
follow Him do as He does?  He has left His footprints that we may 
place our feet in them.  Won't we joyfully put our feet on this 
royal road?

That is our theme at this time. Many of us say that we are "in 
Christ:" let us perceive how obliged we are by this to walk even as 
He walked.
 
Oh, Holy Spirit, let us feel the weight of the sacred obligation!

But I stop a minute. I know that there are some here who cannot 
say that they are in Christ. Then, if you are not in Christ, you are 
out of Christ; and out of Christ your position is dangerous, 
terrible, and damned. If we saw a man hanging over a deep pit, if 
we saw a man exposed to a sea of fire, and likely to perish in it, all 
our compassionate emotions would begin to flow, and we would pray 
in an agony of spirit, "Oh, God, save this man from danger!" My 
brethren, there are some among us tonight who are in the utmost 
danger; in a most emphatic sense they are lost already, for 
they are without God, and without Christ.  Oh, my people, how 
shall I speak of you without tears? Poor souls, living under the wrath 
of God! Poor souls! The mercy is that you are not past hope yet. There 
is an arm that can reach you: there is a voice that calls you--calls 
you even now; listen to it: "Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of 
the earth; for I am God, and there is no other."  [ISA 45:22]  Can't 
you even give one look to Him who died for you? Won't you turn the eye 
of faith that way, and trust Him who was nailed to the cross on your 
behalf? God grant that you may, and then I may include you also in the 
blessed instruction of the text. "Whoever claims to live in Him 
must walk as Jesus did."  [1JO 2:6]

            I.  CONSIDER HOW THIS RESPONSIBILITY IS PROVED

Let us spend a few minutes over the question, Why we must walk as 
Jesus did?

When we read the word "must," if we are honest, we begin to look 
around us and to ask questions as to the reason and the magnitude 
of this obligation. A "must" is a compulsion to a true heart. There 
is a "obligation" to every godly man that he should do what he 
must.

What, then, is the basis on which this "must" is fixed?

First, it is the design of God that those who are in Christ must 
walk as Christ walked. It is a part of the original covenant 
purpose; for "those God foreknew He also predestined to be 
conformed to the likeness of his Son." [ROM 8:29]  That is the 
drift of the plan of grace, the aim of the covenant.  Grace looks 
towards holiness, that there should be a people called out to whom 
Christ should be the elder brother, the firstborn among many 
brethren. You certainly have not had the purpose of God fulfilled 
in you, dear friend, unless you have been conformed to the image 
of His dear Son, "For He chose us in Him before the creation of the 
world to be holy and blameless in His sight." [EPH 1:4]  This is the 
aim of election; this is the object of redemption; this is the fruit 
of calling; this is the attendant of justification; this is the 
evidence of adoption; this is the precursor of glory; that we should 
be holy, even as Christ is holy, and in this respect should have the 
appearance of the Son of God. He has given his own Son to die for 
us, that we may die to sin; He has given Him to live that we may 
live like Him. In every one of us the Father desires to see Christ, 
so that Christ may be glorified in every one of us. Don't you feel 
this to be an inescapable requirement that is laid on you?  Would 
you have the Lord miss His purpose? You are chosen of God to this 
end, that you should be "a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people 
belonging to God," and what is this but that you should walk even 
as He walked? 

Observe, again, another point of this requirement: it is necessary 
to Christ that we should walk as He walked, for we are joined to 
the Lord Jesus in one body. Now, Christ cannot be made a monster 
that would be a blasphemous notion. And yet if any man had eyes, 
ears, hands, or other members that were not conformable to the 
head, he would be a strange being. The mouth of a lion, the eye of 
an ox, the feathers of a bird--these things would have no 
consistency with the head of a man. We read of the image in 
Nebuchadnezzar's dream, that it had a head of fine gold, 
but legs of iron, and feet part of iron and part of clay. Surely, 
Christ's spiritual body is not made up of such discordant elements. 
No, no. He must be all of one piece. The mystical body must be the 
most beautiful and precious production of God; for the church is 
Christ's body, "the fullness of Him who fills everything in every way" 
[EPH 1:23]. 

And shall that mysterious fullness be something defiled, 
deformed, full of sin, subject to Satan? God forbid! "As He who 
called you is holy, so be holy in all you do," [1PE 1:15] and as your 
HEAD is holy, so you be, as members of His body, holy too. 
Shouldn't it be that way? Does anybody raise a question? Doesn't 
every member of Christ, by the very fact that he is joined to Him 
by living union, immediately feel that he must walk just as Jesus 
walked?

And this, beloved, again, must all be the fruit of the one Spirit 
that is in Christ and in us. The Father anointed Christ with the 
same anointing, which rests on us in our measure. The Holy Spirit 
descended upon Him, and rested upon Him, and we have an 
anointing from the same Holy One. The Holy Spirit has anointed all 
the chosen of God who are regenerated, and He lives with them 
and in them. Now, the Holy Spirit in every case works to the same 
end. It cannot be supposed that the Holy Spirit in any case 
produces unholiness: the thought is blasphemy. The fruit of the 
Spirit is everything that is delightful, right, and good towards 
God, and generous towards man. The Holy Spirit, wherever He 
works, works according to the mind of God; and God is 
praised as "Holy, holy, holy," by those pure spirits who know Him 
best. He is altogether without spot or trace of sin, and so will we 
be when the Spirit's work is done. If, then, the Holy Spirit lives in 
you (and if it doesn't, you are not in Christ), it must work in you 
conformity to Christ that you must walk just as He walked.

Perhaps further argument is not needed; but I would have true 
Christians remember that this is one article of the agreement 
which we make with Christ when we become His disciples. It is 
taken for granted that when we enter the service of Jesus, we by 
that act and deed undertake by His help to follow His example. 
"Anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my 
disciple" [LUK 14:27]. "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, 
for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for 
your souls" [MAT 11:29]. You know, if any man loves Christ, he 
must follow Him:--" "If you love Me, you will obey what I 
command" [JOH 14:15].
 
When we took Christ's cross to be our salvation we took it also to 
be our heavenly burden. When we yielded ourselves up to Christ to 
be saved by Him, we in spirit renounced every sin. We felt that we 
had come out from under the yoke of Satan, and that we held 
nothing back for the lusts of the flesh that we might obey them, 
but bowed our necks to the yoke of the Lord Jesus. We put 
ourselves into Christ's hands unreservedly, and we said, "Lord, 
sanctify me, and then use me. Take my body and all its members; 
take my mind and all its faculties; take my spirit and all the new 
powers which you have bestowed on me with it; and let all these be 
Yours. Reign in me; rule me absolutely, sovereignly, always and 
alone. I do not ask to be my own, for I am not my own, I am bought 
with a price." 

After we have learned the grand truth that, "one died for all, and 
therefore all died," we infer that "Christ died for all, that those 
who live should no longer live for themselves but for Him who died 
for them and was raised again" [2CO 5:15]. Are we not, then, to be 
true to this blessed agreement? "I do remember my sins this day," 
says one. Yes, but also remember the vows that still obligate you. 
Don't desire to escape from the sacred bond. Today remember the 
Lord to whom you dedicated yourself in the days of your youth, 
perhaps long, years ago, and again beg Him to take full possession 
of the purchased possession, and protect it against all comers, 
forever. So it must be. He that claims, "to live in Him must walk as 
Jesus did" [1JO 2:6]. Obey the sacrifice of Jesus, yield 
yourselves as living sacrifices; by your hope of being saved by Him 
put your whole being into His hands to love and serve Him all your 
days.

For, once more, inasmuch as we are in Christ, we are now bound to 
live to Christ's glory, and this is a great way of glorifying Christ. 
What can we do to glorify Christ if we do not walk just as He 
walked? If I came and preached to you, and if I speak in the 
tongues of men and of angels, yet if I did not seek to do as my 
Master did, what benefit would all my words be? It is only a 
"resounding gong or a clanging cymbal." 

You know what men say to unholy preachers: they order them be 
silent or be consistent. Unholy ministers are a mockery, and a 
scorn. And so it is with unholy Christians, too. You may teach your 
children at home, or teach them in the Sunday-school class; but if 
they see your lives to be Christless, prayerless, godless, they will 
not learn any good from you. They will rather learn from what you 
do wrong, than from what you say that is right. Do you blame them 
that it is so? Are not actions far more forcible than words? Suppose 
you are dishonest in your profession; suppose that in your everyday 
conversation you are unclean; suppose that in your actions you are 
immoral or deceptive; what does the world say of your Christianity? 
Why, it becomes to them a thing of contempt. They hate the smell of 
it. It is just like dung and filth to them, and so it ought to be. In 
the early ages some of the worst opponents of Christianity used to 
shout aloud the inconsistencies of Christian professors, and they were 
wise in their generation. One of them said, "Where is that Christian 
holiness of which we have often heard so much about?" and 
another said, "We heard of these people that they love their 
Christ, and love other men so that they would even die for love of 
their brethren; but many of them do not love as well as the 
heathen whom they despise." I dare say there was a good deal of 
slander and scandal in what they said; but I am also afraid that, if 
it were said today, there would be a vast deal of sorrowful truth 
in it. Christian love is by no means as plentiful as it should be, nor 
holy living, either. Isn't this the thing that weakens the preaching 
of the gospel--the lack of living the gospel? If all the professed 
Christians who live in our city today really walked just as Christ 
walked, wouldn't the salt of their holy lives have more effect upon 
the corrupt mass than the stuff which is now called salt seems to 
have? We preach here in the pulpit; but what can we do, unless you 
preach at home? It is you preaching in your workplaces, in your 
kitchens, in your nurseries, in your living rooms, in the streets, 
which will impact the masses. This is the preaching--the best 
preaching in the world, for it is seen as well as heard. I heard one 
say he liked to see men preach with their feet; and this is it, 
"Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did." No 
testimony excels that which is borne in ordinary life. Christ ought 
to be glorified by us, and therefore we ought to be like Him, for if 
we are not, we cannot glorify Him, but must dishonor Him.

Now, that is my first point. Consider how this obligation is proved, 
and when you have weighed the argument pray the Holy Spirit will 
make you yield to its gentle pressure.

  II.  CONSIDER WHAT THIS WALKING WITH CHRIST AS HE WALKED CONSISTS. 

Here is a wide subject. I have a sea before me with as much 
sailing room as Noah in the ark. I can only just point out the 
direction in which you should sail if you would make a prosperous 
voyage.

First, brothers to put it all together in one word, the first thing 
that every Christian has to focus on is holiness. I will not try at 
any great length to explain what that word means, but it always 
sounds to me as if it explained itself. You know what wholeness is-
-a thing, without a crack, or flaw, or break; complete, entire, 
uninjured, whole. Well, that is the main meaning of holy. The 
character of God is perfectly holy; in it nothing is lacking; nothing 
is redundant. When a thing, is complete it is whole, and this 
applied to moral and spiritual things gives you the inner meaning of 
"holy." When a man is healthy, perfectly healthy, in spirit, soul, 
and body, then he is perfectly holy; for sin is a moral disorder, and 
righteousness is the right state of every faculty. The man whose 
spiritual health is altogether right is right towards God, right 
towards himself, right towards men, right towards time, right 
towards eternity. He is right towards the first table of the law, 
and right towards the second table. He is a whole man, a holy man. 
Truth is within him; truth is spoken by him; truth is acted by him. 
Righteousness is in him; he thinks the right thing, and chooses 
that which is according to the law of righteousness. There is justice 
in him; he hates that which is evil. There is goodness in him; he 
follows after that which will benefit his fellowmen. I cannot spare 
time to tell you all that the word "holy" means; but if you wish to 
see holiness, look at Christ. In Him you see a perfect character. He 
is the perfect one; be like Him in all holiness.

We must go a little into detail; so I say, next, one main point in 
which we ought to walk according to the walk of our great Model 
is obedience. Our Lord Jesus Christ took upon himself the form of 
a servant; and what service it was that He rendered! "He was a 
son, He learned obedience from what He suffered" [HEB 5:8]. And 
what obedience that dear Son of God rendered to the Father! He 
did not come to do His own will, but the will of Him that sent Him. 
He yielded Himself up to come under law to God, and to do the 
Fathers will. Now in this respect we ought also to walk just as He 
walked. We have not come into the world to do what we like, to 
possess what we choose, or to say, "That is my opinion, and 
therefore so shall it be." 

Sin promised freedom, and brought us bondage; grace now binds 
us, and ensures us liberty. Obedience is the law of every spiritual 
nature. It is the Lord's will that in His house His Word should be the 
supreme law, for so only can our fallen natures be restored to their 
original glory. Set the planets in their orbits, and rule them by the 
majestic sway of the sun, and then they will keep their happy estate, 
but no other way. Understanding, heart, life, lip, everything, is now 
to enter into the service of God the Father, and it is to be ours to 
say, "Lord, show me what You want me to do."  Surely, beyond any other 
quality, we see in the life of the Son of God the perfection of self-
denial. No man was ever so truly free as Jesus, and yet no man was so 
fully subservient to the heavenly will. These seas never saw a pilot 
so able to steer according to His own judgment, and never One so 
carefully follow the channel as marked down in the chart. His was 
the unique originality of absolute obedience. Dear friends, you see 
how it ought to be with you also. It is ours to walk in cheerful 
subservience to the mind of the Father, even as Jesus did. Does 
this strike you as something easy? It is child's work, certainly; 
but assuredly it is not child's play.

Such a life would necessarily be one of great activity, for the life 
of Jesus was intensely energetic. The life of Christ was as full as 
it could be. After He had been developed and disciplined by thirty 
years of seclusion, He showed himself among men as one moved to 
vehemence with love: "[He] wrapped himself in zeal as in a cloak" 
[ISA 59:17]. From the day of His baptism till His death He went 
about doing good. It is wonderful what was packed into about 
three years: each action had a world of meaning within its own 
self, and there were thousands of such acts; each sermon was a 
complete revelation, and every day heard Him pour forth such 
sermons. His biography is made up of the essence of life. Someone 
remarked that it is wonderful that He did not begin His active life 
when He was younger. We reply, that it is beautiful that He did 
not, because He was not called to it, and He was best obeying the 
Father by living in obscurity. Those thirty years at Nazareth were 
thirty wonderful years of obedience--obedience; tested by 
obscurity, patience, restraint, and perhaps dullness. Who among us 
would find such obedience easy? Would we not far rather rush in 
to be noticed and make ourselves a name? Some of us, perhaps, never 
learned the obedience of being quiet--but it is a wonderful one. 
Oh, for more of it! Do we know the obedience of being hidden 
when our light seems needed?--the obedience of going into the 
desert for forty years, like Moses, with nothing, to do but wait 
upon God till God shall put us in commission? There is a wonderful 
service in waiting till the order comes for us actively to be at it. 
Samuel said, "To obey is better than sacrifice;" it is in fact better 
than anything which we can possibly present to God. But when our Lord 
was at length loosed from his obscurity, with what force He sped along 
His life's work. How He spent himself! It was a candle burning not 
only at both ends, but completely. He not only had zeal burning at His 
heart, but, like a sheet of flame, it covered Him from head to foot. 
There is never an idle hour in the life of Christ. It is wonderful how 
He sustained the toil. Perhaps He measured out his zeal and His 
diligence by the fact that He was only to be for a short time here 
below. It might not be possible to others that they should do as much 
as He did in so short a space, because they are intended to live 
longer here, and must not destroy future usefulness by present 
indiscretion: but still, activity was the rule of our Master's 
existence. At it, always at it, altogether at it, spending and being 
spent for His Father; such was His mode of walking, among, men. Oh, 
friends, if we, indeed, claim to live in Him, we walk must as Jesus 
walked! Wake up, you lazy ones!

Next, we ought to walk as Christ did in the matter of self-denial. 
Of course, in this work of self-denial we are not called to imitate 
Christ in offering up ourselves as a atoning sacrifice. That would 
be a vain intrusion into things which are His peculiar domain. The 
self-denials which we practice should be such as He prescribes to 
us. There are self-denials which are practiced in the Roman 
Catholic Church which are absurd, and must, I think, be hateful in the 
sight of God rather than pleasing to him. Bernard was a man whom I 
admire to the last degree, and I count him to be one of the Lord's 
choice ones; yet in the early part of his life there is no doubt that 
he lessened his powers of usefulness to a large extent by the 
undernourishment which he endured, and the way in which he 
brought himself to death's door. At times he was incapable of activity 
by reason of the weakness which he had incurred through fasting, and 
colds and exposure, There is no need to inflict useless torture upon 
the body. When did the Savior behave this way? Point me to a single 
mortification of a needless kind. 

Enough self-denials come naturally in every Christian man's way to 
make him try whether he can deny himself in very deed for the Lord's 
sake. You are thus tested when you are put in positions where you 
might get gain by an unrighteous act, or win fame by withholding a 
truth, or earn love and honor by submitting to the passions of those 
about you. May you have grace enough to say, "No; it cannot be. I do 
not love myself, but my Lord. I do not seek myself, but Christ. I 
desire to disseminate nothing but His truth, and not my own 
ideas." Then you will have exhibited the self-denial of 
Jesus. These self-denials will sometimes be hard to flesh and 
blood. And then in the Church of God to be able to give all your 
substance, to devote all your time, to lay out all your ability--this 
is to walk as Jesus walked. When weary and worn, still to be busy; 
to deny, yourself things which may be allowable, but which if 
allowable to you would be dangerous to others--this also is like the 
Lord. Such self-denial as may be helpful to the weak you ought to 
practice. Think what Christ would do in such a case, and do it; and, 
whenever you can glorify Him by denying yourself, do it. So walk as He 
did who made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, and 
who, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, so that 
you through His poverty might become rich." Think of that.

Another point in which we ought to imitate Christ most certainly is 
that of lowliness. I wish that all Christians did this. When I see 
some Christian women dressed up--well, like women of the world, 
and when I see men so big that they cannot speak to poor people, 
as if they were made of something better than ordinary flesh and 
blood; when I notice a haughty, high, badgering disposition 
anywhere, it grates upon my feelings, and makes me wonder 
whether these blunderers hope to go to the heaven of the lowly. 
The Lord Jesus would never have been half as big as some of his 
followers are. What great folk some of His disciples are, as 
compared with Him! He was lowly, meek, gentle, a man who so loved 
the souls of others that He forgot Himself. You never detect in 
the Lord Jesus Christ any tendency towards pride or self-
exaltation. Quite the reverse: He is ever compassionate and 
condescending to men of low estate.

And then note again another point, and that is his great 
tenderness, and gentleness, and readiness to forgive. His dying 
words ought to ring in the ear of all who find it hard to pass by 
insults, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are 
doing" [LUK 23:34]. Did He not set us an example of bearing 
insults? "When they hurled their insults at Him, He did not 
retaliate; when He suffered, He made no threats. Instead, He 
entrusted Himself to Him who judges justly" [1PE 2:23]. For 
every curse He gave a blessing. You cannot be Christians if this 
spirit of love is foreign to you. "Oh," you say, "we believe the 
Bible." I do not care. You must love your enemies, or you will die 
with Bible verses in your throats. "Oh," say you, "we are regular in 
attendance at the church services, hearing the gospel." I do not 
care; you must forgive them that trespass against you, or you will 
go from your pews to the fires of Hell "Oh, but we have been 
baptized, and we come to the communion table." I do not care even 
about that; for unless you are made meek and lowly in heart you 
will not find rest for your souls. Pride goes not before salvation, 
but before destruction; and a haughty spirit is no prophecy of 
elevation, but the herald of a fall. Take care, take care, you that 
say that you are in Christ; for you must also walk in all the 
lowliness and in all the tenderness of Christ, or else at the end you 
will be discovered to be none of His. Hard, cruel, unrelenting, iron-
hearted professors will no more go to heaven than the hogs in the 
barnyard.

There is one little big word which tells us more than all this about 
how Christ walked, and that is the word "love." Jesus was 
incarnate love. "God is love," but God is a spirit, therefore if you 
wish to see love embodied, look at Christ. He loves the little 
children, and permits them to come to Him. He loves the widow, 
and He is tender to her, and raises her dead son. He loves the 
sinners, and they draw near to Him. He loves all sinful, tempted 
and tested ones, and therefore He comes to seek and to save. He 
loves the Father first, and then for the Father's sake He loves 
the myriads of men. Do you love anybody? Do you live within 
yourself? Are you wrapped up within your own ribs? Is self all your 
world? Then you will go to Hell. There is no hope for you if you 
don't change; for the place of unloving spirits is the bottomless 
pit. Only he that loves can live in heaven, for heaven is love: and 
you cannot go to glory unless you have learned to love, and to find 
it your very life to do good to those around you.

Let me add to all this, that he who says that Christ is in him ought 
also to live as Christ lived in secret. And how was this?

His life was spent in abounding devotion. Ah, me! I fear I shall 
condemn some here when I remind them of the hymn we just now 
sang--

                 "Cold mountains and the midnight air
                 Witnessed the fervor of his prayer."

If the perfect Christ could not live without prayer, how can such 
poor imperfect ones as we are live without it? He had no sin within 
Him, and yet He had need to pray. He was pure and holy, and yet 
He must wait upon God all day long, and often speak with his 
Father; and then when the night came, and others went to their 
beds, He withdrew himself into the wilderness and prayed. If the 
Lord Jesus be in you, you must walk as He walked in that matter.

And, then, think of his delight in God. How wonderful was Christ's 
delight in his God! I can never think of His life as an unhappy one. 
He was, it is true, "a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering," 
but still there was a deep spring of wondrous happiness in the 
midst of His heart, which made Him always blessed; for He said to 
his Father, "I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within 
my heart." He delighted in God. Many a sweet night He spent in 
those prayer-times of His in fellowship with the Father. Why, it 
was that which prepared Him for the agony of His bloody sweat, 
and for the "Why have You forsaken me?"

Those love-visits, those near and dear communings which His holy 
heart had with the Father were His secret food and drink. And 
you and I also must delight in God. This charming duty is far too 
much neglected. Strange that this honey should so seldom be in 
men's mouths! Listen to this text, "Delight yourself in the LORD 
and He will give you the desires of your heart" [PSA 37:4]. Many a 
man says, "I would like to have the desires of my heart" Brother, here 
is the royal road--the King's ascent to his treasury--"Delight 
yourself in the LORD." But, listen, it is very likely you would not 
obtain the desire that is now in your heart if you did that; for he 
that delights himself in God rises above the desires of the flesh and 
of the mind, and comes to desire that which God desires, and therefore 
it is that he wins the desire of his heart. But, oh, the pleasure, the 
joy, the bliss of delighting in God! How many times have I sung to 
myself that last dear stanza of the psalm, wherein the inspired 
poet sings--

                 "For I know I shall yet praise Him,
                        Who graciously to me,
                    The health of my countenance,
                      Yes, mine own God is He."

Oh, what a pleasure! "Mine own God is He." Rich men glory in 
wealth, famous men in valor, great men in honor, and I in "mine own 
God." There is nothing about God but what is delightful to a saint. 
The infinite God is infinitely delightful to His people. Once we 
really get to know God and to be like Him, and even His sternest 
attributes--His power, His justice, His indignation against sin--will 
come to be delightful to you. 

Those men who are finding fault at what God does, questioning 
what God has revealed, do not know Him, for to know Him is to 
adore Him. Oh, brethren, let us find our pleasure, our treasure, 
our heaven, our all, in the Lord our God, even as our Lord Jesus 
did. In this thing we must us walk even as He walked.

I am not quite done. Dear friends, we ought to walk in holy 
contentment. Jesus was perfectly content with his lot. When the 
foxes had holes and the birds of the air had nests, and He did not 
have a place where to lay His head, yet He never murmured, but 
found rest in pursuing his lifework. The cravings of covetousness 
and pinings of ambition never touched our Lord. Friends, if you do, 
indeed, claim to live in Him, I pray you be of the same contented 
spirit. "I have learned," said the apostle, as if it were a thing 
which had to be taught, "to be content whatever the circumstances" 
[PHI 4:11]

In a word, Christ lived above this world; let us walk as He walked. 
Christ lived for God, and for God alone; let us live after His 
fashion. And Christ persevered in such living; He never turned 
aside from it at all; but as He lived so He died, still serving His 
God, obedient to His Father's will, even unto death. May our lives 
be a mosaic of perfect obedience, and our deaths the completion 
of the perfect design. From our Bethlehem to our Gethsemane may 
our walk run parallel with the pathway of the Well-beloved! Oh, 
Holy Spirit, work us into this sacred pattern!

                  III. WHAT IS NEEDFUL TO ALL THIS.

I close now by saying, in the last place, consider, dear friends, 
first, it is needful to have a nature like that of Christ. You cannot 
give out sweet waters so long as the fountains are impure. "You 
must be born again." There is no walking with Jesus in newness of 
life unless we have a new heart and a right spirit. See to it, dear 
friends, that your nature is renewed--that the Holy Spirit has 
brought about in you a resurrection from among the dead; for, if 
not, your walk and conversation will carry the odor of death and 
corruption. A new creature is essential to likeness to Christ: it 
is not possible that the carnal mind could wear the image of Jesus.

That being done, the next thing that is necessary is a constant 
anointing of the Holy Spirit. Can any Christian here do without the 
Holy Spirit? Then I am afraid that he is not a Christian. But, as 
for us, we feel every day that we must cry for a fresh visitation 
of the Spirit, a renewed sense of indwelling, a fresh anointing 
from the Holy One of Israel, or else we cannot walk as Christ 
walked.

And then, again, there must be in us a strong resolve that we will 
walk as Christ walked; for our Lord Himself did not lead in that 
holy life without stern resolution. He set His face like a flint that 
He would do what was right; and He did what was right. Do not, I 
pray you, be led astray by thoughtlessly following your fellowmen: 
it is a poor, passive business, that "running in crowds." Dare to be 
singular, dare to stand alone. Stand firmly in the resolve that you 
will follow Christ. A Christian man in a discussion attempted to 
defend the truth, but his opponent grew angry, and cried out 
vehemently again and again, "Listen to me! Listen to me!" At last 
the good man answered, "No, I will not listen to you, nor will you 
listen to me; but let us both sit down and listen to the Word of 
the Lord." And that is the thing to do, brethren, to be listening to 
Christ and to be following Him; not that I will learn from you, nor 
you from me, but both learn from Christ: so shall we end all 
controversy in a blessed agreement at His feet. God help us to get 
there.

And so, once again, I add that if we want to walk as Christ walked, 
we must have much communion with Him. We cannot possibly get to 
be like Christ except by being with Him. I wish that we could rise 
to be so much like the Savior that we should resemble a certain 
ancient saint who died a martyr's death, to whom the world said, 
"What are you?" He said, "I am a Christian." They asked, "What 
trade do you follow?" And he said, "I am a Christian." They 
inquired, "What language do you speak?" And he said, "I am a 
Christian." "But what treasures do you have?" they said; and he 
replied, "I am a Christian." They asked him what friends he had, 
and he said, "I am a Christian;" for all he was, and all he had, and 
all he wished to be, and all he hoped to be, were all wrapped up in 
Christ. If you live with Christ you will be absorbed by Him, and He 
will embrace the whole of your existence: and, in consequence, 
your walk will be like His.

Take care that you do not in all things copy anyone but Christ; for 
if I set my watch by the watch of one of my friends, and be sets 
his watch by that of another friend, we may all be wrong together. 
If we shall, each one, take his time from the sun, we shall all be 
right. There is nothing like going to the fountainhead. Take your 
lessons in holiness, not from a poor erring disciple, but from the 
infallible Master. God help you to do so.

A person has written to me this morning to say that he has painted 
my portrait, but that he cannot finish it until he sees me. I should 
think not. Certainly you cannot paint a portrait of Christ in your 
own life unless you see Him--see Him clearly, see Him continually. 
You may have a general notion of what Christ is like, and you may 
put a good deal of color into your copy; but I am sure you will fail 
unless you see the grand original. You must commune with Jesus. 
You know what we did when we went to school. Our schoolteachers 
were not quite so wise then as schoolteachers are now. They wrote 
at the top of the page a certain line for us to follow, and a poor 
following it was. When I wrote my first line I copied the writing-
master's model, but when I wrote the next line I copied my copy 
of the top line; so that when I reached the bottom of the page I 
produced a copy of my copy of my copy of my copy of the top line. 
Thus my handwriting fed upon itself, and did not get better but 
rather grew worse. So one man copies Christ, perhaps; a friend 
who hears him preach copies him, and his wife at home copies the 
hearer, and somebody copies her; and so it goes on all down the 
line, till we all miss that glorious hand-writing which Jesus has come 
to teach us. Keep your eye on Christ, dear brother. Never mind me: 
never mind your friend: never mind the old doctor that you have 
been hearing so long. Look to Jesus, and to Him alone. We have had 
our sects and our divisions all through that copying of the lines of 
the boys, instead of looking to the top-line that the Master wrote. 
"Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did." May the 
Holy Spirit cause us to do it! Amen and Amen.

Updated and provided by:

Bible Bulletin Board
internet: www.biblebb.com
modem: 609-324-9187
Box 318			
Columbus, NJ 08022	
....online since 1986
Sysop/Webmaster: Tony Capoccia