2.3 Jesus as Covenant Friend
© 2018 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
So, if God is determined that we would be just like Jesus, how do we become like Jesus?
Let me give you what might be the most important warning in this book. You CANNOT ever become like Jesus, and God will most certainly bring full and complete ruin to any effort on your part to “try” to become like something you do not know. This is humanity’s original sin. God said, “Man is just like Me.” The serpent said to Adam and Eve, “You can be like God if you try.” And humans have been “trying” ever since.
So if being just like Jesus is our “goal,” and “trying” to be like Jesus is rebellion, what is the answer?
Our Savior. ~ You and I NEED a Savoir. ~
Look carefully at that statement. The depths and the extent of its meaning in our lives will never end. This book is about knowing the closeness and reality of our Savior in our lives. You and I cannot become like Jesus of ourselves, but Jesus could and did become just like us.
Let’s start with some verses. And the Word [Jesus] became flesh [a human just like us] and dwelt among us and we looked upon His glory, glory as the One-Seed alongside of Father, full of grace [the Father in Him] and truth [honesty – I can do nothing of Myself] (John 1:14 – expanded). – For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all (1 Timothy 2:5-6).
Just Like Us. Therefore, since the children have shared blood and flesh, Jesus also in the same way actively partook of the same… He never took on [the form of] angels, but He took upon Himself [the form of] the seed of Abraham. Therefore, He ought to be made just exactly like His brothers [and sisters] in every possible way, that He might become a merciful and faithful High Priest towards [connecting us continuously with] God, into being the pardon for the sins of the people. Since He himself has suffered, having been tested, He is able actively to come to the help of [rescue] those who are being tested (Hebrews 2:14-18 – condensed and expanded).
We never think of Jesus as an angel of heaven or as anything like an angel of heaven. We think of Jesus only as a Man, a human just like ourselves.
A Life-Giving Spirit. Yet this human Jesus lives now inside your heart in Person and as all that He is. He is able to do that because He is also a life-giving Spirit. Paul, in talking about the resurrection of Jesus from the dead made this statement, calling Jesus “the last Adam.” The last Adam [Jesus] became a life-giving Spirit (1 Corinthians 15:45). Jesus remains human (I am the same yesterday, today, and forever), yet He lives in your heart as a life-giving Spirit.
I want to talk about three things this human Jesus, living in your heart, now is to you – first, your Savior, second your Friend, and third, your every connecting Bond with Father.
On Jesus’ Breast. Most of what we know about how Jesus lives in our hearts comes to us through Paul and John. Paul always brashly talked about himself, but John was a bit more modest. In fact, in writing his account of Jesus’ life, although John included his part among Jesus’ disciples, he liked to refer to Himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”
Here is how he put it. Now there was leaning on Jesus’ bosom one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved (John 13:23). No matter what God might ever teach me about Himself in me or about myself in Him, I will never ever leave this picture. Jesus, my Savior, the One upon whose breast I always lean my head.
He Cares for You. Cultivate this knowing of Jesus in your own mind and heart. This human Jesus, your precious Savior, living now in your heart, always with you. And, always needing Him as Savior, your Wisdom and your Strength, you live now in every moment with your own head leaned against His breast.
Peter said it this way: Cast all your care upon Him, for He cares for you (1 Peter 5:7). And Isaiah said it this way: Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows (Isaiah 53:4). Jesus always carries you, inside His heart, all the way through death and into life. Always see yourself carried by Jesus, always envision yourself leaning upon His breast.
Your Friend. Jesus is not just your Savior; He is also your Friend.
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you (John 15:13-15).
We can reduce what Jesus “commands us to do” down to three primary things. First and most important, we are to believe in Him. Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent” (John 6:29).
Obedience to Jesus. All through this book, I will show you how to believe in Jesus.
The second thing Jesus commands us is to love one another. Loving one another will come later in this discussion. And the third thing Jesus commands us to do is to accept the fulfillment of the law. We looked at Paul’s version of the beginning of our obedience to this command of Jesus. That every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God (Romans 3:19). The cross is our most wonderful guardian, for through the cross, we step into and live inside of all that Jesus is.
It is in our obedience to these three commandments that we are able to know Jesus as He is and thus to be just like Him.
Spending Time with You. Do not be concerned about your ability to “do” what Jesus says. I can assure you right now, you are entirely incapable of such a thing. Jesus Himself, alive inside your heart, is and does all that He speaks. And this Jesus IS your closest and dearest Friend.
Why is Jesus inside your heart? A very large part of the reason is that He LIKES to be with you. Jesus loves spending time with you; He likes doing everything together with you. He enjoys hearing you talk; He loves sharing His own self with you. Being with you as your dearest Friend is more important to Jesus than His own life.
Your Bond of Connection. Finally, you must know that Jesus Himself is your Covenant with God, that is, the fulfillment of all that God speaks in your life. Jesus is the Bond connecting you with Father God and Father with you.
You began this journey towards knowing Jesus as He is by embracing the wondrous reality that the Lord Jesus Christ, the Sustainer of everything, the One-Seed Son of God, lives inside your heart. Think, now, about this fact, one of the primary parts of our “believing in Jesus.” First – “You believe in God, believe also in Me” and then – “Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me” (John 14:1 & 11).
Your Continuous Connection. So, if Jesus lives in your heart in all that He is, and if the Father, that is, God the All-Carrying One, lives inside of Jesus, then – God Himself lives inside of you. The Father is in Jesus in you. Now that’s a big deal. – God is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29).
You see, we can know Jesus, for He is just like us, knowing fully our weakness. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15). That word “High Priest” means “go-between,” Connector, Mediator, the One who makes God and us able to live together – a merciful and faithful High Priest towards {connecting us continuously with} God.
Knowing Father. Only as you believe in and know Jesus living in your heart are you then able to know Father inside of Jesus. And knowing Father ourselves is the first purpose of our existence, with Father being known by others through us as the second purpose. Knowing Father is the life that Jesus gives us, springing up in us as fountains of Life.
So, it’s very simple, really. Jesus is just like you, Someone you can know; Jesus lives inside your heart. As you know Jesus as He is, so you know Father – the fullness of your Salvation. As you think about Jesus as He is, the One who lives in your heart, your Savior, your Friend, the One who is always connecting you with Father, then remember that Jesus is every Word God speaks as well.
Written on Your Heart. One more verse to think about. – It is fully made visible that you ARE a letter of Christ, with us under your service, having [already] been written, not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God – not on tablets of stone, but inside tablets of hearts of flesh (2 Corinthians 3:3).
In the Old Testament, God wrote His covenant on tablets of stone. This book you are reading is filled with words marked by ink. But this Personal Jesus alive in you is also every Word God speaks written with Spirit ink upon and all through the pathways of your heart.
Not a different heart – your very own heart of flesh made brand new by being filled with Jesus! – Every word in the Bible, speaking of Jesus, is a description of you.