Christians can pursue godliness by being passionate about Christ, by being ambassadors of Christ where Christ has placed them, and by pursuing God’s righteousness. Let the article explain.

Source: The Evangelical Presbyterian, 2005. 2 pages.

Pursuing Personal Godliness

A man’s character is the outward expression of what controls him inwardly. If God controls your heart, his divine influence will be evident in your daily life. Faith is active not passive! Men of faith are known by the godly quality of their lives. True Christian character is demonstrated in God glorifying conduct. (James 2:20) It is only as Christians diligently pursue personal godliness that others see the imprint and impact of their King.

Passionate about Christ🔗

Christians must demonstrate that they are knowledgeable and passionate about Christ, the Gospel, the love of God, his kingdom and his Word. Christians must be ready, willing and able to share these priceless gems with others. When unbelievers meet us they must be left in no doubt about what we are and whose we are. As time passes, our growing godliness must become increasingly obvious even to those who recognise the ongoing changes in us but cannot understand what lies behind them.

Jesus’ call echoes Leviticus 11:44: “I am the Lord your God; ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and ye shall be holy; for I am holy”. Because of who God is (what he has done, is doing and will do), his people must dedicate themselves unreservedly to him and endeavour to become increasingly like him. God is holy and He wants His people to be holy too! Christians are justified by grace and called to become increasingly sanctified – to die increasingly unto self and sin and to live increasingly unto Christ and righteousness.

Making a Difference🔗

Despite our high calling Christians are often seen as insignificant; relics from the past; a dying, almost extinct breed with a redundant message no one wants or needs to hear; standing out like the proverbial sore thumb; a blot on the modern, godless, Christ rejecting landscape. Why? Because we still:

  • believe in the Almighty Creator God who made the world in six days out of nothing
  • believe in his fully inspired, infallible, inerrant and totally sufficient Word and in the reality of heaven and hell
  • preach with total conviction and passion Christ crucified as the sinner’s only hope and plea
  • believe in a personal devil and Saviour and hold tenaciously to the doctrines of grace

All true believers are called to be personal ambassadors of Christ. We have a very high calling but face many obstacles as we seek to fulfil it. Nevertheless, we are divinely called to make a difference. Yet given the adverse conditions under which we must work: lack of size, influence, interest, commitment, finance and so on. How are we going to do so? This is a major challenge for the contemporary church and one to which we must prayerfully and practically rise.

The Vital Difference🔗

Unbelievers will not sit up and take notice until they see the vital difference Christ makes vividly displayed in his people, until they see us accurately setting and zealously pursuing Biblical goals. If unbelievers cannot see any authentic grace-wrought positive changes in us they are very unlikely to accept our message that Christ has something better to offer them.

The philosopher Nietzsche who believed “God is dead” once said of Christians: “If you want me to believe in your redeemer; you are going to have to look more redeemed”. His insight is profound and we who are saved need to respond appropriately to its challenge. Christian, how redeemed are you really – a little, a lot or not at all? How different are you from the unredeemed masses on the narrow road to hell? Are you really all that different from what you were before your conversion? You should be but are you really?

Pursuing the Righteousness of God🔗

One genuine hallmark of a true believer is that he wants to be more godly and so increasingly hungers and thirsts after righteousness – it becomes his staple spiritual diet – his daily spiritual food and drink. If you are a believer you must long to know and do God’s holy will in the same way a starving man craves food and a parched man a refreshing drink of cold water.

Such righteousness has one source – the Lord God Almighty. The godly actively pursue it in the certain knowledge that he is not interested in the filthy rags of human self-righteousness. Philippians 3:9 reveals how the righteousness that comes from God (the product of saving union with Christ) must increasingly be the desire of the godly. There is no possibility of finding, let alone growing in godliness, outside of Christ. Righteousness, like salvation, is a divine gift that must be given before it can be enjoyed. Jesus came to earth to make this possible. He lived and died that favoured sinners could be given “the righteousness of God”. Paul made this very plain when writing to the believers in Corinth: “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God”. (2 Cor 5:21)

All true believers must yearn for an ever increasing measure of this divinely derived righteousness and must display it in practical ways. This involves living in such a way that we would not be embarrassed if Christ was to come or call sooner than we might expect.

If, like Jesus, you are always about your Heavenly Father’s business and therefore actively pursuing “his righteousness” this cannot happen. You are called to increasingly display this derived righteousness in all your dealings with believers, family members and the world at large. Are you actually doing so?

Add new comment

(If you're a human, don't change the following field)
Your first name.
(If you're a human, don't change the following field)
Your first name.

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.