I decided to ask the Lord to change me more into His likeness after a conversation with a friend recently. I don’t remember what we were talking about exactly, but I do remember the topic of our need to become more like Christ.
I inserted that prayer into my journal the next morning (because I did not want to forget it) and sincerely asked God to work on me more.
And then I had this conversation with myself later on in the day:
“What did I do? Did I just ask God for more situations that will sharpen me and mold me into His likeness? What was I thinking? I’m still exhausted from the last season of sharpening I walked through.”
But then I was gently reminded by the Lord of an experience I had years back.
This experience was a time of praying healing for a stranger in the hospital when my husband and I lived overseas. My faith in believing that God responds to our prayers for healing was being challenged and this specific hospital visit was in response to a leading of the Holy Spirit.
While my husband and a couple of local sisters and I prayed for this young woman with a blood disorder, in my mind I saw for a split second a bright vision of Jesus standing next to this bed ridden woman. However, He was standing in the same place I should have been standing in.
God was revealing to me something amazing.
Whenever we walk in obedience to whatever the Lord is asking us, we are literally allowing Him to minister to others through us.
I saw it that day in the hospital. When I had my eyes closed, I saw Jesus standing beside the hospital bed healing this individual. Our coming together in faith allowed Him to minister and heal this young lady.
That visual that He gave me still holds strong in my heart. I try to keep it at the forefront of my mind when serving others, when showing love to strangers and when responding to stressful situations and people.
I am not perfect. I still forget the instrument I could be for the Lord at times and sometimes I forget who I truly am in Him, but in asking the Lord to change me more into His likeness I am hoping to act in ways and treat others as He would.
This experience He reminded me of softened my heart to be willing to continue to be molded and shaped in His likeness, despite the pain and struggle that sometimes comes along with change.
However, we do not need to go through hard experiences alone to become more like Christ. We can make an effort to become like Him through studying Him more in the Word and seeking to know Him deeper in relationship. And the more we allow ourselves to fall in love with Him, the more we are willing to be made more like Him.
Becoming more like Jesus is also recognizing those moments where He kept Himself open to walk out what the Father had for him to do.
Jesus, God incarnate, came to demonstrate for us a life that we are supposed to be living. He not only brought salvation to us through His death and resurrection, but He also became life’s manual for each of us.
Can you imagine God hearing a weary soul on earth asking for instructions with how to live this life, and then deciding that He would just come to earth and literally show us Himself?
That’s what He did. He came, He lived, He died, He resurrected and it wasn’t for us to only observe a sinless man, fully man and fully God, walking the earth. His life here on earth was also meant for us to learn from.
He demonstrated for us how to live for Him when He was here. He became our manual that we should not take for granted. We should study His life and His nature and character. We should aim to be more like Him, and then others will experience the mystery of Him ministering to them through us.