I wanna be like ...

There are numerous people through the Bible that stand out as examples.  Many of them did things that made them failures, yet God’s grace made them winners in the end.  Did you catch that?  Even in bad decisions, in pain or in failure, God still loves us and has a plan.

The same is true about Abraham.  He was called the father of faith, and the Bible numerous times says that His faith was counted as righteousness.  At one paint he lied about Sarah being his wife.

Romans 4:17  NLT

That is what the Scriptures mean when God told him, “I have made you the father of many nations.” This happened because Abraham believed in the God who brings the dead back to life and who creates new things out of nothing.

David was anointed king at a strange time.  His family wasn’t right.  He was too young.  There was another man who was king, and he had sons how would naturally become king.  That wasn’t God’s plan.  He slept with a lady who wasn’t his wife, and then David had that lady’s husband killed.  It even gets deeper, but God loved and elevated David.

Acts 13:22  NLT

But God removed Saul and replaced him with David, a man about whom God said, ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart. He will do everything I want him to do.’

One of the most righteous people in the Bible was Job.  He has possessions and position, but his life went in an awful direction as he lost his children and almost all he had.  He even lost his health.  Job didn’t do anything wrong, but everyone around him caved.

Job 2:9-10  NLT

His wife said to him, “Are you still trying to maintain your integrity? Curse God and die.”  But Job replied, “You talk like a foolish woman. Should we accept only good things from the hand of God and never anything bad?” So in all this, Job said nothing wrong.

Peter was one of the first people to follow Jesus, and he was also in the closest group to Jesus all through the time of Jesus’ ministry.  He was the one preaching when the Holy Spirit came to earth, but Peter was also the man who denied Jesus three times before Jesus died.  He was also the only disciple Jesus directly called by the name Satan. 

Acts 2:40  NLT

Then Peter continued preaching for a long time, strongly urging all his listeners, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation!”

We have all kinds of people that we idolize.  Some of those are athletes while others are holiday actors or music business successes.  God desires for us to find people to follow who lead us to Him.

I heard a phrase yesterday that has stuck in my mind.  We are to be “arrows of light” that point the people around us, including ourselves, to the true light.  Who is it that you want to be like?