Being with Jesus

One of my good friends and ministry partner is Brandon. He and his beautiful wife are missionaries in Guatemala. In a comment he made yesterday on another post he said this,

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"Two friends of ours here, Dave and Helen Ekstrom, are 84 and 83 and when they drop in for a visit Jenny and I stop whatever we are doing and just chat with them. Someone needs to write their stories down. Anyway, when they leave, we are just amazed. We feel like we have been spending time with Jesus. As we thought about that, we realized that those two people are more like Christ than anyone we have ever met. Being with them feels very much like being with Jesus."

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"We feel like we have been spending time with Jesus." What an amazing commentary on a life. I have rarely heard this commentary used to describe anyone before, but it should be a regular commentary on the life of a believer walking with God. What is it that make Dave and Helen stand out? What have they done in their lives that have brought them to this "image bearer" life. I know the answers to these questions because I have asked men and women like Dave and Helen what their "secret" is. The answer is simple- you begin to look and act like the people you hang out with. They influence you, change you, and soon you begin to imitate them. It doesn't come easily or quickly, but over a life of walking with God we begin to look like the one we love. May this be our commentary, may this be our goal...to hang out with Jesus so that we begin to look like him. Oh for the day when someone says to us, "you know, you remind me of Jesus." Won't that be a glorious day!