Be Jesus to others

When Jesus appeared to His disciples on the night of His resurrection He said to them, “As the Father has sent me, I also send you” (John 20:21 NKJV). Was Jesus telling his disciples what was their purpose. This was not the first time of God giving His purpose to man and His church. Since the foundation of time God has called upon man and His church to represent Him to all the world. In Genesis 1:28-30 God pronounces His blessing upon man, calls upon man to be fruitful and to multiply in numbers, and to have dominion over the earth. God created man with a purpose of being His representative on Earth. In Genesis 9, after the flooding of the earth, God blessed Noah and his sons and calls upon them to be fruitful and multiply, stating that all of creation was in their hands. Again the thought is that God’s purpose for man was that man would represent Him to all the earth. this same scenario is seen over and over again in the Bible, Abram in Genesis 12, Moses and the Israelites in Exodus, and Israel again through Isaiah.

When Jesus walked the earth, according to Luke 4:16-21, his was a mission of proclamation and liberation. Jesus’ final statement was that the day of the Lord was fulfilled. In essence Jesus was saying that His mission purpose was to be God on earth. God had sent Him to be him on earth. Jesus was God on earth doing a ministry of proclaiming the liberating message of forgiveness and restoration that drove him to die upon the cross.

As the risen Savior, Jesus gives His disciples the same purpose of being Him to others. Peter echos this purpose of the church in his statement, “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light”(1 Peter 2:9 NKJV). We are to be Jesus to all the world, living in such a way that others would see Jesus in our lives and declaring the liberating message of forgiveness, restoration and hope. It’s something to reflect upon.