Category: Devotion of the Day

Better Christians

Grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
II Peter 3:18

The First business of a Christian is to become a better Christian, to know Christ better, to decrease that He may increase. “That I may know him” was Paul’s supreme ambition.

It is possible to major on the negative side of this matter on separation alone or to stress solely the positive aspect in the victorious life, or Spirit-filled life, so that we develop a fad. The Christian life is Christ Himself. There is the positive, “Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ” and the negative, “Make not provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof,” and it is all simply more of Christ and less of self.

Here is a weak spot today. For all our religious wheels within wheels, we have no time for he cultivation of our souls, no time to know Christ better. How does He become more real? “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him” (Jno. 14:21). He makes Himself real to the obedient disciple. And the obedient disciple is daily a better Christian than he was the day before.

Three-Way Christians

And believers were the more added to the Lord.
Acts 5:14

If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed.
John 8:31

Ye shall be witnesses unto me.
Acts 1:8

What is a New Testament Christian? He is a heart-believer in a crucified and risen Saviour and Lord. But our churches are filled with believers who do not continue in His Word and so are poor disciples. Salvation is free – not cheap- and we have only to trust Christ to be believers. But discipleship calls for all we are and have.

We have unwittingly created an artificial distinction between trusting Christ as Saviour and obeying Him as Lord. The New Testament recognizes no such false compartments of experience. “Believe on the LORD Jesus Christ,” said Paul to the jailer. No man can be a Christian by knowingly and willfully taking Christ on the installment plan, as Saviour now, as Lord later.

And we are all His witnesses, witnesses unto Him (Acts 1:8) and witnesses to the truth about Him (Lk. 24:48). We are witnesses of His death and resurrection in our own experience and witnesses to Him in testimony. By life and lip we declare Him; we know Him and make Him known.