Standards=Principles of Christlikeness

It would seem to me that a saved person would want to please the Lord Jesus because He is his God and Saviour. I mean He saved us from Hell and from a low-life existence. In His precious Holy Word He happens to say in various ways in scores of passages “Be ye holy; for I am holy”. Read all of 1 Peter 1:14-16 and see that the context is the desire of God and decision and determination of the Believer to live a changed life, DIFFERENT from the world not like the world. The world, you should recall, is the unsaved crowd and system of anti-Bible anti-holiness philosophy of living.

What I am saying in this second installment is that not only should we grow in godliness as we are persuaded to pursue better things that accompany salvation (Hebrews 6:9), we should obey the Lord and be holy i.e. separated unto Him. We are to purposely have a vibrant, real, aware fellowship in our relationship with Jesus Christ with our life and service to Him reflecting such.

These principles of “holiness or Christ-likeness” are guides and guards that God has given us to assist in keeping ourselves from not being entangled with sinful things and or with weights that would either: a) hinder close fellowship with Christ or b) blight our testimony or c) weigh us down from our highest usefulness for God or d) cause another fellow Believer to stumble and mess up.

It is really dishonouring to the Lord and selfish not to use His precepts, principles or standards. By the way, to have some of these principles listed or spelled out in application to our culture as standards for Christian workers/leaders in the N.T. Church are not unfair requirements but simple wisdom for those that would be a godly influence as leaders/workers. Do we want lackadaisical, lukewarm nothing-to-reach-for types as examples?

We know some say, “Well your standards are just different.” Or is it really that some have principles that are “higher” and demand more of us in being less self-indulgent and applying more of what Jesus said in Luke 9:23-24. (Look it up). Would you rather your dentist have very high standards of hygiene or mediocre or low? “Here let me dig into your gums with this instrument I just used on the former patient without cleansing the tools.” He starts and mentions his previous patient had AIDS.

Or how about having a mechanic that doesn’t tighten the lug nuts on your vehicle’s wheels to the auto industry’s safety “standard”? Would that move you to change mechanics?

Scripture, logic, and common sense all stand on the side of principles viz. guides and guards to help us be a better Christian i.e. more like Christ-holy! Next time we’ll look at some precepts and principles to help us grow and go on to perfection being guided and guarded!