Imitators!

(1Corinthians 11:1) “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.”

Possibly the reason Paul starts this chapter with the instruction to imitate him as to the extent in which he imitates Christ was to alleviate any further excuse (lie) which the believers at Corinth may have looked for in finding justification to continue in sin so that grace may abound. In other words, they ignored their conscience and nagging weakness of the flesh and submitted to its will where and when the need arose. When their need for love feasts presented itself, they obliged instead of finding grace to withstand the urge. I believe they had understood that they had been saved by grace through faith, which was a gift of God, so they had understood salvation was a free gift and they could do nothing to earn it. This is true! They like many other Christians (me included) had to be taught the truth behind the lesson of self denial in finding daily sanctification by putting the flesh to death on a daily basis. We all have been sanctified at salvation by the blood of the Lamb, if I belong to the Lord Jesus and I have received the spirit of adoption whereby I am privileged to call out Abba Father, then I am sanctified by the Lord Jesus, nothing I do will justify me in the sight of God outside of His Son, that is the beginning and the end of the story. When God the Father looks upon me and I call out in prayer to Him, He obviously recognises me for who I am but He only acknowledges my prayer request on the merit of His Son my Saviour. I am sanctified by the Lord Jesus, passed, present and future. Where this thought becomes difficult to process correctly, especially as a new believer struggling with the sin in their own life. A believer is told that he is righteous (and he is) because of the merits of the Lord’s work and not his own. This then causes doubt to raise its head and then when this lie gets its claws into the believers understanding, it results in a licence which runs riots in their minds, excusing the sin in their life as expectable. The conflict between the law of God (which is good) and their sinful nature in opposition to one another, with this constant conflict eating them up inside they erred on the side of sin. Instead of putting their body under, so that through suffering they may learn obedience. The church at Corinth were no doubt living like this, were they saved, absolutely! But was what they were doing acceptable? Absolutely not! I believe they had understood salvation and that the law was there to teach then that they could not keep it and that they were sinners and needed a Saviour. They had embraced this truth but they had not understood what the church at Rome had understood. “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?” (Romans 6:1-2)

They now needed to resist temptation when it presented itself and the purpose for us having to resist temptation is so that we can learn obedience. How will I learn obedience if I resist temptation? I learn obedience through suffering; “Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin,” (1Peter 4:1)

In other words through sufferings I will learn to deny my fleshly wants and I will stop sinning. This will be an ongoing process in every believer’s life until he gives up the ghost. I am not suggesting that we will eventually be perfect without any sin in our lives here on earth, but we must resolve our minds to achieve this goal.

What the church at Corinth had not understood, even as I battled to understand, if I was sanctified by the blood of the lamb and I was saved on the Lord Jesus’ merit, then regardless of what I did would change that truth. That is correct no matter what you do, it will never change what Christ achieved on that hill in Golgotha. It may hinder our testimony before others but it will never take away from Christ’s victory, it cannot!

But Paul gives them a yardstick in which to measure their own example here on earth as obedient children and therefore he suggest, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.” He enforcers the cautions against the abuse of liberty, by his own example: The important point Paul drives home is not that of a cultish mentality, he does not say follow me because I say so and I am your leader, he purposefully says copy me as much as I duplicate Christ’s example. Follow me as much as I follow Christ, and yet he could confidently give this instruction as his example in following his Saviour was a good illustration. We must never follow any leader further than he follows Christ.

What I find very refreshing, and maybe because I was also exposed to this form of discipline in my life. Correcting must come when we are in error; even discipline at times is the only liberating truth that will when it has run its course bring forth fruit in a believer’s life. If we have erred in this area of our understanding as a believer, if we once believed and may still believe that we can continue in sin that grace may abound, we are mistaken, we must understand that there is also an ongoing sanctification that needs to happen in our lives on a daily basis. We must look for grace to put aside the lust that drives us in disobedience against the will of God, our Father. Everything in our lives, both good and bad is to teach us to learn to obey God and to serve Him with a godly fear, in reverence.

My prayer is that we would learn to imitate Paul as he imitated Christ in every area of our lives, may we lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily distracts us from finding obedience to the glory of God our Father, in and through our Saviour, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Signing off

Tyrone