Good Morning Friends,
“Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and
dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness
and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have
against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these
virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.”
(Colossians 3:12-14)
People matter to God and how you get along with
them matters to Him, too. The characteristics Paul mentions in these few verses
are all relationship characteristics. Compassion, kindness, humility,
gentleness, patience, forgiveness, love: the development of these character
traits will make a huge impact on how we get along with other people.
Every one of these character traits is a
reflection of God’s own character and of His relationship with us. Take
forgiveness as an example. God calls us to be forgiving people, laying aside
the hurts that others have caused us. That’s very difficult to do. The natural
thing to do is to hold on to our hurts, to nurse them and make sure others are
aware of them, especially the one who caused them. But it doesn’t take a very
long look at how God responds to us to note that is not His pattern. There is a
pattern of forgiveness in the way God relates to us that He would have us
imitate. We are to forgive others “as the Lord forgave you.”
Humility provides another obvious example. If
any one ever had a right to put on airs, to let others know who He was, it was
Jesus. He knew power and position that we can’t even imagine. Yet, when He
entered the earth, He did so as a human being, and not even as a human with
power and position, but as a lowly human. He did that for us, to enable us to
approach Him and relate to Him. If He can do that, then we can follow His
example and steer clear of putting on airs before other people.
Move through the rest of the characteristics
listed and you will find each one clearly exemplified in the life of Jesus. He
came to show us what God was like and what we should be like as we relate to
those around us.
His, by Grace,
Steve
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