Cornerstone Church

Jesus Our Image

Do you struggle with your identity or purpose in life? In this sermon, we explore what it means to be made in the image of God and how to move from a foggy reflection to a clear display of His jglory. We’ll dive into practical steps like focusing on Christ, fixating on His character, forming our hearts to His truth, following His example. Discover how aligning your life with Christ not only brings personal fulfillment, peace, and purpose but also allows you to reflect His light to the world.

Duration:: 47m
Broadcast on:: 05 Jan 2025
Audio Format:: other

The title of today's sermon is Jesus, Our Image. Jesus, Our Image. And as we've been reading through the Bible this year, we started in Genesis 1. And if you read through there, Genesis 1 is a summary of creation. It gets into some more detail starting in chapter 2, but it's a summary in chapter 1. And we get towards the end of chapter 1. And we have these words that come out in God's Word where it says we've been created in God's image. What a beautiful thing. What a beautiful thing to be created in God's image. And I don't know if you fully understand that, you believe that, you've experienced that in your life, but no first hand that you have and you are in God's image. You've been created in the image of God. What a profound thing to believe, to comprehend. And not just to know because the Word says it, but to know it in our hearts. And I want to bring an analogy to the table to talk about how the image, this perfect image that God created us in has become distorted or foggy. And I'll bring up a picture here on the screen of this foggy mirror in the bathroom. Have you ever gotten into the shower and you had a nice, long, hot, relaxing shower, which you forgot to turn on the fan or open a window? And you get out and you go to the mirror and suddenly you've disappeared. You can't see yourself because it's been fogged up. There's so much condensation on the mirror there. And you try to wipe it away, but it's so, the fog in there is, the steam in there is so thick that it just in two seconds comes back up. You ever tried to, ladies, put on makeup? Not being able to see yourself or get your hair done. A couple times I forgot to do this and I'm in a hurry. It's like, I can't get this, I can't get it unfogged. Ever tried the hair dryer method? I'm about to life tip for you guys. If that happens and you can't unfog it, just get the hair dryer on and just start drying. It's pretty quick. And when you're desperate, you come up with thoughts. But we live in a place where there is this image that we've been created in, that in life and our experience becomes foggy. It's distorted. We look in the mirror, so to speak, and we don't even see an image of God, much less make out what we truly look like. And there's a huge problem in that, a huge problem because when we walk around not knowing that we've been created in the image of God, not being able to see the image of Christ in our reflection, we're lost. We're disoriented. We can't figure things out in life, so to speak. There's confusion that happens, think of it this way as your image as your identity from God. Think of the image that you were created in as your purpose of God. And if that is fogged up, if that's blurry or obscured, we're walking around going, "Who am I? What am I supposed to do?" I mean, these are serious life issues for us. We can look at an example of this. Men, sometimes in their 40s, 50s, get in what we call midlife crisis state. And we kind of make fun of it, light of it, sometimes. It's a very serious thing, actually. And radical things happen, I mean, divorce happens. An idolatry happens, like going out and consuming an emptiness in the heart with so many things to purchase and buy, and there's something missing in that. There's a confusion about life. There's a disorientation. And what happens is there's a cloudiness, a fogginess on the identity of the man and the purpose of the man. And sadly, a lot of men who are going through this don't realize that's what it really is. And so we're just trying to fill the bucket, so to speak. We're trying to wipe off this mirror and see clearly with other things. We get into things like problems in a marriage, for example. And I'm not denying problems, I'm not denying that things like tension in finances or money or raising the children or the stresses of life don't play into a marriage that is struggling. But I can tell you this, at the root of all of that, there is a lack of identity. There's a lack of purpose that somebody is feeling in this relationship personally and it's coming out and it's manifesting in a relationship. And we try to fix things on the surface level. We try to rearrange things in our relationships and fix these really surface level things without realizing that there is something much deeper that somebody is going through, not knowing their purpose, not knowing their identity in God, not knowing that we've been created in this perfect image that's now distorted. And so we're trying to fix all these things in life and marriage and relationships without looking down to the real foundational thing. It comes down to this image, it comes down to identity, it comes down to purpose. So we have these things in life that they cloud everything up, they cloud everything up, but it wasn't always this way. It wasn't always this way because we go back to Genesis, we read chapter one and we know that God in creating the world, every single day, he would come to the end of it and he said it was good. And he comes to the end of the last day when he creates mankind and he says it's very good. And we've been created in this image. Let's go to Genesis chapter one for a moment. Genesis one, towards the end of it, God does this. We're going to look at verse 27. God says this in his word. So God created man in his own, somebody say own, just God's image. He created man in his own image. In the image of God, somebody say image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. God created us and he created us in his image. And this image serves a dual purpose. I've mentioned the words identity and purpose. It's both form and function. And we look at the image and we think, okay, if I've been created in the image of God, who is God? What is God like? What are his characteristics? What are his attributes? And we know through God's word that he's loving, that he's kind, that he's good, that he has justice, that he's full of grace and mercy. And so we think of ourselves in these attributes as being created in the image of God. And it's this identity, identity that I, like God is love, I am love. Like God is merciful, I'm merciful. Like God is kind, I'm to be kind. And this is the image, this is the identity that I can look in the mirror and I can see my reflection and go, I have joy, I have kindness, I have love. I have grace. Therefore, I look like I've been made in the image of God. Okay. But something happens along the way. Life comes, circumstances happen, tragedy for some of us takes place throughout life. And this identity becomes foggy. We no longer look in the mirror. We no longer see ourselves as someone worthy to be loved. We no longer see ourselves as kind. And so this twisting happens. It's a marred image of identity. But then we get into the other side of the same coin in the image and that's our purpose. Our purpose gets lost along the way. Now I have on the whiteboards here. Thank you, Christina, for putting these up. Genesis 1.26. This is the verse right before we just read. And it says, "God said, 'Let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over the, all the earth and over every creepy thing that creeps on the earth." There's a lot we can break down in this. But what I want to actually focus on is just one word in all of this. I've taught this out before, but it's just good to either hear it again or hear it for the first time. I want us to look at this little tiny word in, this preposition in. Because again, we think of the image of God as these attributes, these nouns. This simple preposition in the original language actually talks about a function. We think of it as a verb. If we get into Exodus chapter 20 where the 10 commandments are laid out, one of the 10 commandments is, "Do not take the Lord's name in vain." And we traditionally will think, "Well, don't use the Lord's name to cuss. Don't talk bad about him and that sort of thing." But to take means to bear. Do not bear the Lord's name in vain. It's an action, it's a verb. It's taking God's name and saying, "You know what? I've decided to be a follower of Jesus Christ. Therefore, I'm going to live out my life in a way that reflects his image. I'm going to bear the name of Christ. So when people see me, they see an image of Christ. But if we claim to be a Christ follower, yet we do not walk according to his word, we do live in righteousness. We are bearing the name of God in vain. We're bearing it falsely. We're saying, "I'm a Christian, but I'm still doing all this sin." And it doesn't look good on God. He's saying, "Don't bear my name in vain." And that same verb, that same language, that same word is this, to bear the image of God. It's a function. It is your purpose to live out. So not only do we have an image of God in us as an identity, but we have a purpose, a function to live out this identity. Yet the fog on the mirror has blurred everything. And we walk around as believers, not knowing who we are or what we're supposed to do. I mean, does this resonate with anybody this morning? Maybe you're in this place right now. Maybe you're learning about this. Maybe you've been there. But I hear and I read that I have been created in the image of God, yet I don't see it and I don't know how to live it out. There's a reason for that. There's a reason for that. And the one word answer for that is sin. Sin has distorted. It has ruined the image that God created us to be in in both identity and function. If you go a couple chapters later to chapter three of Genesis and in verse six, it'll state this, "When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was a delight to the eyes and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate and she also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate big deal. They ate some fruit. What's the big deal? Well, if we know the account and the background of this, this was the one tree that God said, "Do not eat from it." It is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Once you eat from it, your eyes are going to be opened. You're going to know what sin is. Sin is going to come into the world. Your disobedience brought sin into the world and we know according to Romans 3, 23 that all of us, because of that inheritance of sin that's been passed down, are sinners and that we fall short of this glory of God. We fall short of this image that we've been created in. It's blurry. It's all fogged up. It's messed up and there's a specific reason for that and before I get into how we can fix this in our life, I want to take a moment and tear back the lens that we usually see through and put your supernatural glasses on for a moment, because there you go, because there's something that we need to understand and see at the root of all of this and what we know as sin. It's this. Did you know that Adam, when he was created, was not created in the Garden of Eden? He was created outside of the Garden of Eden. Go read it. Chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis. God creates them and then he puts them in the garden and then in the garden, he gives him a task and then God sees that he's doing this task and he's doing what he's called him to do and purposed him to do his identity and he goes, "This guy needs some help. So I'm going to create a helper for him." So Eve, taken from the flesh of Adam, is created to help Adam fulfill identity and purpose. And they're in the Garden of Eden doing this. The Garden of Eden did not make up the whole world. It was a small portion of the world. God brings Adam into the Garden of Eden and gives him this task and the purpose of all of this is to bring Eden to all of the earth, make the entire earth like Eden. Be fruitful and multiply is a command given. You're going to have dominion of all of this. Why? Because God's abode where he lived on earth at that time was in the Garden of Eden and he's asking and tasking Adam and Eve expand this out so that I rule and reign over the entire earth. Now there's somebody who's not too happy with this. His name is Satan. There's a supernatural rebellion that started with Satan that's taken place and he goes, "I do not want God's creation to be like the Garden of Eden. I will have no place to rule. I will have no place to exalt myself like God." And so this is his plan. He's going to go in. He's going to deceive Eve. Adam isn't going to function in the role that he was created as the head and protector and he's going to fall as well. And it's like killing two birds with one stone because what Satan does in this moment by bringing a deception, he brings sin into the world, it fogs up both the identity. It fogs up the purpose. It drives them out of Eden. He goes, "Okay, their task, get this. This is so important to get. Their task with making the world like Eden." By the way, this is what the new kingdom heaven on earth is going to be. It's what God originally intended it to be. And he goes, "If I can get them out of the Garden, they can't do what they were supposed to do. The purpose of their life will be ruined. Their identity is going to be scarred." And so he does this and they're taken out of the Garden. And we could think, "Oh my goodness, wait a second, it's over. It's over. The plan that God had has been stopped, but no, it's not stopped. You know why it's not stopped? I'm going to give you a chance to guess just one word. Do you know why the plan of God was never stopped? It was never put on detour that God knew from the very beginning that all this would happen and his plan would not be for it to do you know why. It's one word. Do we know the word? Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. If you read later, just a few verses down in chapter 3, we see the first prophecy of Jesus that he's going to come and crush the head of Satan. God knew this was going to happen. He had a plan and placed the whole time to eventually bring us back to this place that we will be in eternity with God. This garden of Eden spread across the whole earth living with God in his presence continually. Yet in this moment, we don't have that. In this moment, it's blurry because we live in this world. We don't yet live in the eternal state with God and so here's the thing. Jesus comes on the scene. Why is Jesus able to fix everything that is blurry? Why is he able to defog everything so to speak? Because I'll tell you this, the moment that you accept Jesus Christ in your life and that he is your Savior and Lord, there is a supernatural cleansing of that mirror. It is no longer foggy. You see yourself in the image of God, both in identity and purpose. Now, it may take you a little while to make out the picture, but believe me, the moment that you receive Jesus Christ that that foggy mirror is crystal clear because Jesus wipes it all off. Every sin that has come into more that image has been wiped away. He's able to do this because of Colossians 1 and what it says there, we turn with me in Colossians chapter 1. We're going to spend the most of our time in Colossians so you can just hang there. Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians chapter 1. Now these are very well-known verses. If you've never heard these verses before, I want to encourage you, these are six verses, just memorize them this week. It'll be so good for your soul. This is what it says starting in verse 15, speaking of Jesus Christ. He is the image of the invisible God. God who we cannot see, we can see in Jesus, he is the image of God. Who were we created in? The image of God. The image of Jesus Christ is who we are. When we look in the mirror, we need to see Jesus Christ because this is the perfect image. It is the express image of God. He's the first born over all creation. What does that mean? Well, it explains it in verse 16, "For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, meaning the things that you can see, he created them." The things you can't see, he created them, visible and invisible. So whether the thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, this is speaking about the supernatural realm specifically, all things were created through him and for him. This is Jesus. And this is why he's able to wipe everything away. This is why because he is the perfect image. When we look in the mirror, we should see Jesus. He is before all things. Even him, all things hold together, there's nothing that's ever going to fall apart with Jesus. The image will always remain intact and he's ahead of the body of the church. He's the beginning. He's the first born from among the dead, meaning he's the first one to rise from the dead and we will follow him in that that in everything he might be preeminent. He's before all things. He's above all things. He's in all things he is in charge of all things because for in him, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through him, it's only Jesus, through him to reconcile to himself all things. That means you. That means your image that you were created and that means your identity. That means your purpose, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. Jesus is our image. When we look in the mirror, you could see yourself physically, but we should see Jesus. We should see the image of God. And like I said, when you come to Christ, that fog is lifted. Now if you're like me though, I look in the mirror some days and I go, "Wow, thank you God." I do look like Jesus today. I see who he is and I'm actually growing in that. I see kindness coming out of me. I see a love being displayed. I can see and in some days I look in the same mirror and I go, "What the heck just happened?" I'll tell you what happened, sin. We live in a fallen world. We are saved by God spiritually. We've been sanctified, but we still live in this world. We still live in the flesh. We're still working these things out. We're still going to stumble and fall. And so I look in the mirror and I'm like, "I don't look like Jesus today. Lord help me." We can get this explained in 1 John 2, 16. He says, "For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes and the pride of life, it is not from the Father, but from the world." We still live in the world. We're still going to have temptations. We're still going to stumble and fall. The thing is, when we pick ourselves back up and we look in the mirror, do we still have it looking foggy or can we see the image of Jesus reflected in us? And that's going to vary person by person and it's probably going to vary day by day. But can I tell you, there's hope that every single day you can wake up and you can look in that mirror and you can see the image of God inside of you. You can see the identity of God in you. You can see the purpose that God has placed you on this earth for by looking in that mirror every single day. But even if you have fallen short of the glory of God, you can still look in that mirror and not be looking at a foggy mess. It's a walk with Jesus that takes us on that journey to every day get up and see the image of God that I've been created in and not the mess that I think that I am. I don't have to be lost anymore, I don't have to be confused about who I am and what I'm supposed to be doing and here's how it works. It's all in Jesus, but you have to first have a focus on Jesus. Focus on Jesus. I ask you this morning, what do you focus on in your life? What is your life aimed towards? Think of it like a bullseye that you're aiming for. I mean, just gut level, honest, reflect for a moment and go, what am I aiming towards? What is my focus? And can I tell you that if it's not Jesus that you're going to look in that mirror and it's going to be foggy, that you're going to get up some days and you're going to be lost and confused because your focus is not on Jesus, it's on the things that you're after. You can go back to 1 John 2, 16, the pride of life, the lust of the eyes, the desires of the flesh. These things that take our focus off of Jesus and then when we have them and we receive them and they don't work out the way that we wanted them to work out, we're disappointed. Our left heart broke him. Can I tell you this morning that Jesus is never going to disappoint you? He's never going to break your heart that is, if you could put a focus on Jesus Christ, every time you look in the mirror, you don't see your mess. You see the glory of God shining through. In Colossians 3, Paul writes it and says it like this in verse 2. Put your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth. He's preceded this statement that if you've died in Christ, put your heart and mind on Him. If you've given your life over to Jesus Christ, we've got to set our minds on Him. We've got to put a focus on Him. So if you're wandering around life today and you're in this state of confusion, you feel lost, you feel empty, you do not feel, so to speak, connected with God, close to Him. If you're looking in the mirror and it looks blurry, it looks foggy. Can I say this morning that you can start with a focus on Jesus? This is a perfect year, perfect opportunity. Every day that you get up, put a focus on Jesus. Jesus, I'm after you today. Jesus, you are my aim today. I may have to go to work today, I may have things with the kids today, but you are my aim. And at the end of the day, let it be said of me that in my aim of focusing on you, I experienced your goodness, your love, your grace, goodness that chased after me all day because I was focusing on you and I saw it. They'll teach you in the philosophy on life and even in business, like what you focus on is what you get. It's a very real thing. I want to focus on Jesus this year, I want to focus on His presence, I want to focus on going after Him and to put Him in my frame, my view. So focus is so important, but did you know that there's a next thing that we should strive for and that's to fixate? Focus on the Lord and fixate on Jesus. Do you know the difference between focus and fixate? Because you could be wondering like, wait a minute, aren't they the same thing to focus to fixate? I'm going to give you a story and an analogy to kind of help understand this. The difference between focus and fixing. A couple months ago, Santiago, usually over there, Santiago, Noel and I went camping up in Mountain Center for an evening and so we were driving up there and going up 74 towards Mountain Center and we had to veer off onto this road, this dirt road, it was, I mean you had a four-by-four vehicle or Arcelia's truck with Santi at the helm bringing us through, spare of details. But it was night and I mean we just had the headlights, it was pitch black and so Santiago had to focus just a few feet in front of them at a time. To get us there safely, he had to keep his eyes on the road and God it was night, I don't do well when I can look over and see a cliff and Santi is a stud because not only did he get us through safety, he was, safely, he was talking about this testimony of how he's trying to get someone saved and I mean the whole time he's literally, I'm like how is he doing this, he's paying attention, he's getting us there and he's just blabbing the whole time like, so that was a focus, so we get up there, our purpose, our sole purpose was to go up there and wait on the Lord Saturday, it was awaiting on the Lord day, aside from a game of football, we just, we sat and we literally waited on the Lord, we sought to hear his voice to talk with him and this was a fixation, it was a fixation. The focus got us there, but then we sat and we just fixated, this was our view, as we sat and we just looked out and you can look at an image like this and you can go that is beautiful, if that exists 40 minutes from here, like wow and as we looked out our gaze was upon the Lord, when you focus on Jesus it will get you in a direction, when you fix when you fixate on the Lord you fall in love with Jesus, that doesn't happen by just focusing, it happens when you're intentionally stopping and you've fixed a gaze on Jesus Christ. I don't know the exact studies of this, but one time they did a study with several people where they took complete strangers and they sat them just a few feet apart and they were to stare at each other in the eyes for 10 minutes, just staring, like making faces not being funny about it, it was an experiment, a test, but to stare and they hooked up things to the brain and they saw scans of the brain and all this stuff and they determined that within six minutes of somebody staring at a complete stranger that the feelings of love begin to develop, an intimacy actually starts to take place in just six minutes with a complete stranger. When you fix your eyes on Jesus and you don't take your eyes off of him, you see a beauty, you see a love, you see an intimate relationship beginning to develop and this does not happen unless we were to fixate, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord, to behold him and to stay there. So would you consider if you want to look in this mirror and see the image of God, your identity, your purpose, will you focus on Jesus, will you fix your gaze on Jesus, not taking it off of him and allow who he is to permeate your very being because something happens after that, a form begins to take place. You were formed, made in the image of God. You don't see it sometimes, but when you focus on the Lord, when you fixate on him, something begins to change in sight of you and you don't even have to try. We think we have to do all of these things to get in God's good grace. I got to be a good person. I got to not sin today. Would you consider for just a moment focusing on Christ, fixating on him and that revelation of who he is, the love, the beauty, the grace come upon you and wash you and form you? This is the litmus test of our walk with God because if we claim to say, "I'm after Jesus, I'm focusing on him," if we claim to say that I'm beholding the Lord, something absolutely will 100% change in you. It is the litmus test. If there is no change in you, dare I say that you have not been focusing, that you have not been fixating because it is an impossibility doing these first two things to not be formed into the image of God's Son. Romans 8, 28 says, "We are predestined as believers to be conformed into the image of his Son." There's a formation that takes place, Colossians chapter 3. We're going to move to verse 5 and following. Let this sink in, let the understanding of the transformation through God's spirit in your life that he wants to do and is doing. In verse 5, it starts off and it says this, "Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you?" This speaks to a focus. That which you used to go after, that which you used to focus on before, fixating on Christ, put that to death. He names some things, sexual immorality and purity, passion, evil desire, covetousness, which is idolatry. He says, "On account of these things, the wrath of God is coming." In these you two once walked when you were living in them, there is a way that we used to look and walk and talk and it's this image that was blurred. It was marred. Now God says, through his word, put to death that image, get it off the board and whatever would cause you to see yourself not in the image of God, get rid of it. There's action steps we have to take here. He says in verse 8, "But now, because of your identity and Christ, you must put them all away." He lists more things, anger, wrath, malice, slander, obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another. Seeing that you have put off, there's the actionable step, put off the old self with his practices and have put on. There's another action step, the new self, which is being renewed in the knowledge after the image of his Creator. Your formation happens through Jesus Christ. You're renewed in him and him alone. I'm going to tell you right now, everything that you're after outside of Jesus that you think is going to fix your identity, that's going to give you a purpose in life. It is garbage. It is rubbish. It is a false pretense. It's going to seem really good at first. It's going to seem all shiny and bright and wonderful and then you're going to get trapped into it and then you're going to be disappointed into it. It's going to let you down eventually, but Jesus Christ will never let you down and when you let him form you after his image, my goodness, you're not going to have a foggy mirror. Are you guys excited for this this morning? I'm excited. Like I get the chance to go after, to focus on my Lord, to fixate on him and from that, I am changed into God's image. I don't have to go out and try to be perfect. I don't have to go out and try to save the world. No, Jesus already did that. I just have to look upon him. I have to let him have my way in me. So there's a form that takes place, a transformation, takes place by God's spirit inside of us. And this leads us to the final thing, which is eventually now we follow, we follow when you think of the word, follow, think of the word imitate. I imitate this image that I'm being renewed in. And these are great actionable steps because it's one thing when we focus, we fixate, we see the change, but can I be honest with you, a lot of the trappings that we find ourselves in, is once we begin to see the slightest change, we think we're good to go. We're like, whoa, look at me in the mirror now. It's clear. I can see identity. I can see purpose. I'm happy. And we take our foot off the pedal, so to speak. But if we would continue to follow, we never take our foot off the gas. That foot is on there. It is all the way down until I see Christ in glory. It is. I'm going to follow him, I'm going to imitate him because when I begin to do this more often than not, I'm going to look like Jesus. More often than not, when I do stumble and fall and I pick myself back up and I just get back to following him, I'm back in the saddle, so to speak. I am walking this out. I'm living this out. Paul writes in Ephesians 5 this because of putting off the old self in the context here of what he's talking to in Ephesians 4. He says in chapter 5, "Be imitators of God as beloved children." You are loved by God, loved by God. Walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrificed to God. Following him means imitating him. Can I challenge you today to look at your life and go, "It's what I'm doing, imitating Christ." If it's not imitating Christ, how can you focus, fixate and allow him to form you so it does imitate Christ and if in the process it still isn't going to imitate Christ, it probably needs to go from your life. We can look at it this way to sum up. You focus to look at Christ. You fixate to reflect on Christ. You're being formed to be shaped by Christ, you're following to live like Christ. And when you begin to do these things, when you look in the mirror, you're going to see the image of Jesus Christ. What do you see when you look in the mirror right now? Think about that. Can you just be honest before God? Can you be tender before Him? Because sometimes we look at it and we become so convicted or so ashamed that we don't even want to acknowledge what I see in the mirror. Or maybe you look in the mirror and you're a bit encouraged now because you've been walking with God, you've allowed Him to form you and you're starting to see the resemblance of Jesus Christ in your life, the image is becoming more clear. Whatever you're at, will you consider today Jesus Christ as the only option to unfold that mirror, to make it clear and will you focus on Him, will you fixate on Him, will you let Him form your life and will you follow Him intently? The Lord put this on my heart to close out like this. I'm going to read over you today and I'm going to read the first half of Colossians 3. And it's not going to be on the screen if you want to follow along in your Bible, that's great. If you just want to listen, listen and I'm going to read God's Word. The power of God is in His Word. And I'm trusting God that He is going to bring something in these moments that we hear the Word of God to be conformed to Jesus, to have our image in Him. So, starting in verse 1, it says this, "If you have been raised with Christ, if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God, set your mind on things that are above, not on things of the earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you. The immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these, the wrath of God is coming. In these, you too once walked when you were living in them, but now, but now, you must put them all away, anger, wrath, malice, slander, obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in the image after the, in the knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is no Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave-free, but Christ is all and in all. Put on, then, as God's chosen one, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, bearing with one another, and if any of you has a complaint against another forgiving each other, as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all, above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect unity, and let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, so which indeed you were called in one body and be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another, it always gives them singing songs and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God, and whatever you do, and word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. Whatever you do, whatever you do this year, would you do it in the name of Jesus? Would you do it with a focus on Him? Would you do it with a fixation? Would you do it in a way that allows Him to come in and form you? Would you do it in a way that you are following after Him every single day this year? I can't think of a better challenge to start off this brand new year because I will tell you this, every single one of you at the sound of my voice, if we were to put these things in practice, nobody, I repeat, nobody would be able to recognize anybody in 12 months. It is that radical of a change that God will do in your life. I am not joking with that. When you do these four things, watch out. It will change, it will transform. So Father, I thank you that your word is truth that has been presented today. I pray for all of our hearts that we would come to you to be consumed by you, Lord, that we would truly, truly surrender anything that has kept us from putting you first, that has kept us from not doing all things to bring you glory. Whatever we do in word or deed, we want to do it with a focus on you, with a fixation, Lord. Have your way in us this year, maybe just as a sign of surrender right now, if you truly want this in your life, maybe just raise your hands and sign a sign of surrender. Lord, that you would form in me the image of your son. That I would wake up every day knowing who I am in Christ, what I've been called to do. And Lord, I pray especially for those who are struggling in that right now, that they're going to be intentful about focusing and fixating on you, but the lens is still blurry. Lord I pray that you would give a revelation to them of the worthiness of the greatness that you think over them, and that they would begin to see themselves in this perfect image that they were created in. I declare right now in the name of Christ Jesus that no weapon forged against us this year shall prosper in Jesus' name. Amen.