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Is Yeshua our Example for Today?

Today we have many people who are role models for our children. We also as adults have people who set an example for us. But is it only for worldly purposes? This is what God’s Word has to say about His people setting an example for other believers.

Hebrews 13:7 says, “Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.”  We look at the lives of our pastors and deacons and Sunday School teachers and we have to ask ourselves, “Are these godly people who I want to emulate?”  In Philippians 4:9 Paul asks this question, “ What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”

Could your pastor or teacher say the same? How about your congregation, could they say this to a new member?  

Philippians 3:17 says, “Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us.”

And are they setting the right example for your youth and for others?

1 Timothy 4:12 tells us, “Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.”

If you look closely and honestly maybe you may say that there is a lot of worldliness going around in your church, like people on their phones during service, and people you know who are watching worldly movies and tv shows, and people who do not live up to godly standards. 

Titus 1:7 says, “For an overseer, as God’s steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, he must be hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined. He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.”

Mathew 3:1-3 says this, “Now in those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, saying,  ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’  For this is the one referred to by Isaiah the prophet when he said, “The voice of one calling out in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make His paths straight!’”

So we see in Matthew 3 Yeshua being baptized by John. We must remember that John’s baptism was a “Baptism of Repentance.” Yeshua was without sin, but as an example to the people He was baptized. 

Now in Matthew 4:17 we see this,  “From that time Yeshua began to preach and say, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”’

The Messiah was following John’s example. Yeshua says this about John in Matthew 11, “Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist!”

So the first thing we must do is repent. Repent means in its true meaning to return to living by God’s Word. Sin is missing the mark of God’s Word, as in archery, and repenting is coming back and hitting a bull’s eye. 

We see that Yeshua went about doing good.

 Acts 10:38 tells us,  “You know of Yeshua of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.”

We, too, must go about doing good works. Yeshua went about preaching the Word of God. Paul tells us this in Colossians 4: 5-6, “Conduct yourselves with wisdom toward outsiders, making the most of the opportunity.  Your speech must always be with grace, as though seasoned with salt, so that you will know how you should respond to each person.”

We can not call ourselves Christians if we are not following in Yeshua’s footsteps.

But everything has a foundation and so does our walk with our Messiah.

Matthew 16:24-26 tells us this, “Then Yeshua told His disciples, “If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.  For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.  For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?”

Galatians 5:24 says, “Those who belong to Messiah Yeshua have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”

We must not only pick up our cross, but we must actually die to ourselves, just like Yeshua who said, “Not My will be done, but Yours.”  John the Baptist told us that Yeshua was the perfect Lamb of God,  and Paul tells us He was our Passover Lamb, John 1:29, 1 Corinthians 5:7.

We are to be living sacrifices.  Romans 12:1-2, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.  Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

If we do not die to ourselves, then how can we be born again? We have to die first, then we can be reborn in newness of life. Paul says this in Romans 6:1-11, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?  Far from it! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Messiah Yeshua have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Messiah  was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life.  For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection,  knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin;  for the one who has died is freed from sin.  Now if we have died with Messiah, we believe that we shall also live with Him,  knowing that Messiah, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.  For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all time; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.  So you too, consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Messiah Yeshua.”

How about you? 

What kind of an example are you setting for your family, friends, relatives, neighbors, co-workers and church family? Do you look like the Messiah, or do you look like the world? Maybe Christian is not the word for you. 

Too many people are living out a picture of the wrong Messiah.