Matthew 26:71 When Peter had gone out to the gateway, another servant girl saw him and said to the people there, “This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.”
Hanging out with Jesus for 3 ½ years had changed the raspy, rough fisherman Peter into an eloquent and exegete speaker. Peter was trying to hide his identity as the disciple of Jesus and intermingled with the gossip gang that was sitting and watching Jesus being unjustly mistreated yet, Peter was singled out three times. If we walk through a perfume factory, we will come out smelling like the scent and not like fish! The boorish, uncultured and unpolished fisherman’s mind and mouth had been refined. He did not sound like the rest of the crowd. So, even though it was dark around the bonfire and he had wrapped himself in a shroud to cover his identity, the servant girl was able to call him out as a disciple of Jesus.
Jesus welcomes us ‘just-as-we-are’ but once we become His children we must grow into His likeness. This doesn’t mean just being regular to church or conventions. Sitting in a garage doesn’t make us a car and sitting in a church doesn’t make us a Christian! Being with Jesus must transform us to reflect Him. If we pray for hours but our habits and hobbies haven’t changed for years, then, we have not been praying. Our regular time in the prayer closet would give us a complete makeover. If we are the same as we were 5 years, 2 years and even a year ago, we have not been with Jesus. It took only 3 ½ years for an illiterate, impetuous and imprudent fisherman to be identified as a fervid disciple of Jesus. Peter had “made-in heaven” stamped all over his speech and soul.
We are divinely crafted handiwork of God:
1. Mind: Spending time with the Saviour will change our thinking. Mind must be renovated before our walk, talk and behaviour changes. Walking with Jesus will put a bristle over wild thinking. We will not engage in anger-tantrums, animosity or astringent. The love of Jesus will wash, quench and uproot envy and enraging thoughts. There will be a mind makeover.
2. Motive: Our motives will guide our actions. People-pleasing, perversion and pejorative comments will be uprooted from our minds. Giving, serving and speaking with wrong motives will be absent. When we do anything for the wrong reasons, all our actions are in vain. Don’t do your good deeds publicly, to be admired by others, for you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven (Matthew 6:1). Motives will be revolutionized.
3. Mouth: There will be an invisible mouth guard that stops derogatory and defamatory comments and criticisms. Good and bad, blessings and curses, excellent and foul comments cannot come out of the same mouth. If it does, then we have not allowed Christ to transform our tongue. Spend more time in His presence. Marinate your mind and your mouth in His Word.
Our mind, motives and mouth will have a complete makeover and be rebranded as ‘made-in heaven’.
Acts 17:6 These who have turned the world upside down have.
Prayer: Dearest Lord Jesus, may I emanate your love, compassion and godliness in my workplace and marketplace. Morph my mind, motives and mouth to become like yours. Amen
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