God purposes that we should be increasingly like the Lord Jesus Christ in character, attitude, word, deed and relationship to others. He also purposes that we recognize our utter dependence on Him if the holy process is to be successfully fulfilled.
"We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is" (I John 3:2).
God's process of conforming believers to the spiritual and moral image of Christ presents two primary truths to our hearts. First, the Lord Jesus is so different than we are that we cannot never make ourselves like Him. He is God, whom we never can become, and He is also a man such as no other man can independently be. An accurate Scriptural view of our Savior therefore ushers us to the holy ground whereupon we remove our shoes because our feet can never make the journey to Christ-likeness. "We shall be like Him," but we shall not make ourselves like Him. "We are His workmanship" (Ephesians 2:10).
We also recognize that our Heavenly Father is relentless in His determination to conform us to the likeness of His Son. "He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ" (Philippians 1:6). In fact, when the Apostle Paul declared that "all things work for good to the that love God," the "good" He referenced was conformity to the image of Christ (Romans 8:28-29). Our Father is working to "bring many sons unto glory" because He is so pleased with the one Son who has so blessed Him throughout eternity (Hebrews 2:10). In this day and in all to come, therefore, we can be sure that God is determining, allowing, ordering and coordinating every moment and happening to bless us with the glory of being more like the Lord Jesus. And He will not stop until He is finished. "Faithful is He who calleth you, who also will do it" (I Thessalonians 5:24).
Our Father could not more highly honor us. Nor can any thought more thoroughly humble us. He could give no greater gift and no more undeserved gift than to make us like the Son of His love. Recognizing this truth brings us to a place of heart-rest like few other Biblical revelations. We cease from our own labors because even a cursory glimpse of the Christ of Scripture tells us that we cannot make ourselves like Him (Hebrews 4:10). We then arise to trust and submit ourselves to the God who promises that the work He has begun is the work He will finish. Such confidence and humility leads to the power of the Holy Spirit effecting the changes whereby our reflection more and more reveals "not I, but Christ" (II Corinthians 3:18; Galatians 2:20). How dear we must be to our Father that He would so grace us, and how faithful we will discover Him to be as we submit ourselves to the holy process of being conformed to the image of Christ.
"Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do His will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen."
(Hebrews 13:20-21)
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