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49 Question 1

I actually like it when people consider Christians different.  We should be different.  Romans 12:1-2 says, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”  We should not try to be like the world.  In fact, when we were saved, we became citizens of Heaven as we read in Philippians 3:20, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ.”  In His priestly prayer, the Lord Jesus said of the disciples in John 17:6, “I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.”  We are no longer under the dominion and influence of Satan who is the god of this world as we read in 2 Corinthians 4:3-4, “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.”  As believers on the Lord Jesus Christ we are the children of God.  John 1:12 teaches us, “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.”

My dear fellow Christian, it’s okay to be different.  It’s okay if the world looks at us as if we are strange.  1 Peter 2:9 tells us, “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.”  We are peculiar; we are a people who are God’s own possession.

Some Christians tend to think that they need to be like the world so that they can witness to the world.  That is just not scriptural.  With a deep concern for those who are lost, the Lord still wants us to be separate from the world.  As we read earlier in Romans 12:1-2, the Lord does not want us to conform to the world, rather He wants us to be, “transformed by the renewing of your mind.”  We read in Colossians 3:9-10, “Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds; And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him.”  Through study and obedience to the Word of God, we will be transformed to the image of the one who created us…the Lord Jesus Christ.

We sometimes use the expression that some people stick out like a sore thumb.  My friend, it’s okay for us to stick out; it’s okay to be different; it’s okay that the world thinks we are different because we are different.  We are children of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  Does this mean we are better than others?  Well we are certainly better off that the unbelievers, but our salvation is solely an act of the grace of God.  We have nothing to brag about.  Christians should be the most humble people in the world.  I wish that we were so different that it would be easy to spot the Christians in the world.  As we read in Matthew 5:16, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.”