“For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done for you. “Truly I tell you, a servant is not greater than his master, and a messenger is not greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.” John 13:15-17 CSB https://bible.com/bible/1713/jhn.13.15-17.CSB

The Church is the people of God, His children, adopted by Him, through the blood shed by Jesus, His First Born and Head of His Church, the Lord and Savior of His people. The goal of the Father is to transform His children into the image of His First Born Son, making us like Him in love, character, and commission. God came among us to live as one of us to become our Savior, model how we live as children, and rise from the dead to assure us of His eternal promise of eternal life. We are to live as Jesus did on earth, doing the Father’s will rather than our own. We lay down our lives so that others can live, not to become their Savior, but to help them experience and know in order to reconcile with the Savior. The mission of every Christian is the Great Commission, which seeks and saves the lost and teaches obedience to everything Jesus has commanded. This is why we take up our cross, for we die to the old reasons we lived and live to God’s purpose, which is the reconciliation of the world to Himself through Jesus the Lord. We have been left upon the earth to do God’s work, embracing God’s will as our own, recorded for us through the word of God and empowered by the Spirit of God, Who lives in all those who deny themselves and follow Jesus. We must come alive in 2025 to God and His work for us, putting an end to selfish living but focusing first and most, working with all of our effort to see God’s kingdom come upon the earth as it is in heaven.