Daily Devotions
Ears like Grandpa. Eyes like Dad. A chin like Mom’s. Families can spend hours looking at a newborn, tracing the baby’s features, figuring out who the baby resembles. It’s a game that never gets old.
Why? I think it has to do with love. If we love someone, we rejoice to see every tiny link between us—even if it’s something as silly and unimportant as a cowlick in the same spot, just above the right eye. The shared trait says “We belong together,” and love delights to see that statement, again and again and again.
But it isn’t just physical traits we trace. When it comes to God and His children, what we look for are similarities in the heart—in love; in patience; in kindness and respect. We look at other Christians and notice actions that remind us of Jesus—self-sacrifice; a patient willingness to listen; a humility that puts itself completely at the service of someone else the rest of the world considers unimportant. And we think to ourselves, “Yes! That person reminds me of Jesus. That person is acting like a child of God.”
Of course, it’s always easier to see these things in other Christians, not ourselves. For most of us, it’s our sins that we think of first—and we see the resemblance to God later, if at all. And that’s okay. Because it doesn’t matter so much what we see in ourselves; it matters what God sees in us. And God, who sees all things truly, has called us His children.
How can this be? Only through Jesus. Only through that newborn baby, come down from heaven into the human world of sin and loss. Only through that Man, fully grown, who lay down His life on the cross for all of us, so that everyone who believes in Him is born into eternal life. Because He lives forever, so do we; and when Jesus comes again, we will see Him as He is. And we will be like Him, to our everlasting joy.
WE PRAY: Lord Holy Spirit, make me more and more like Jesus. Amen.
This Daily Devotion was written by Dr. Kari Vo.
Reflection Questions:
1. Who do you resemble, either physically or through habits and actions?
2. How do we come to resemble Jesus more and more? What makes this happen?
3. Name one person who reminds you of Jesus. Specifically, how?