The person who goes through life without Christ, not being changed into God's image, not seeking to abide in Him, not becoming one with the members of Christ's Body, not being fruitful in the imparting of the Life of Christ to others, and not learning to overcome the world, Satan, and his own lusts and self-will, has not received the best the present world has to offer.

No matter how great his achievements in the world may prove to be, if one of God's elect does not follow the Master, Christ, in the fulfillment of the Divine declaration concerning man, coming under the discipline and instruction of the Lord, his or her life has not accomplished its purpose. The individual may be saved in the narrow sense but he has made little progress toward God's plan for his life.

The Image of God

Each member of God's elect has been predestined to be changed into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is the image of God.

The image of God is the fruit of the Spirit, not of the Christian but of the Spirit. It is only as the believer lives in the Spirit that the image of God appears in his personality.

Love. This is not the human love espoused by the philosophers of the world. It is the love of God—powerful, unconquerable, eternal. The spiritual love of God that is developed in us by the Spirit of God enables us to do good and show mercy to those who are kind to us and to those who are not kind to us. Human love, the love emphasized by the teachers of our day, falls apart when subjected to stress.

Hatred is the image of Satan. The kingdom of Satan is horrible beyond our mind's ability to imagine because there is no love in it. To dwell among creatures who possess no love, no mercy, no compassion, scarcely can be envisioned by human beings so accustomed to being treated with at least some mercy. But there is no love, no mercy, in Hell.

To be forced to dwell among the inhabitants of Hell is a fate frightful beyond words. Yet, some believers in Christ are heading in that direction because they are not allowing the Holy Spirit to create God's image of love in them.

They are filled with bitterness and the spirit of revenge. They are spiteful and malicious. They gossip, backbite, and malign. They are not Christ's servants no matter what church they attend. They are of Satan because they reveal in themselves the image of Satan, their father.

Joy. People today are lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. This is true also among Christians. Being spiritual babies we do not know the true joy of the Lord. Our "joy" is the same joy as the peoples of the world. They seek fun and we seek fun—like so many children.

The image of the Father is joy. Christ, who always reveals the Father's image in Himself, is a Man of joy. He gives His joy to us. The Spirit-filled saint becomes increasingly joyous even though his afflictions are numerous. The elect are accounted as sheep for the slaughter, but they experience more joy in their imprisonments than do the worldly in the height of their prosperity.

Satan is filled with misery. Hell is filled with misery. The Christian who is walking in the flesh rather than in the Spirit is filled with misery because the fires of Hell are burning in his personality. The way of the backslider is hard and he demonstrates this in his life. The servant of the Lord proceeds from joy to joy as he makes his pilgrimage to Mount Zion.

To be continued.