I was troubled this week by a quote I read from a Hindu philosopher, he wrote, “Christians are ordinary people making extraordinary claims.”  On the one hand, that’s true!  We are ordinary people but our faith is extraordinary.  We believe that the second Person of the Eternal Godhead became flesh, died for our sins to give us life and then rose from the dead!  We believe He ascended to the right hand of the Father and that He is returning to establish a new Heavens and a new earth!  Wow!  But, that is not what the professor meant.  He meant that our claims about transformation are extraordinary.  In other words, he meant he doesn’t see “Christ-likeness” in the Christians he has known.  The same author that quoted that Hindu professor also noted that the lack of Christ-likeness among Christians was Gandhi’s major objection to the gospel.  While it’s true that people like that need to look beyond Christians to Christ, many of these objections about His followers are sadly true!  There are people who claim to be Christian that are not very good representatives of Christ.  Of course, this is not a new problem.  Paul prayed for the Colossians, “that you may walk worthy of the Lord.”  It’s a lot easier to talk about Christ than it is to live for Him but that doesn’t mean we can stop trying.  We have the Holy Spirit to empower us and the Word of God to guide us.  We have the “church” to mediate God’s loving assistance and we have the example of Jesus Christ as our model with His invitation to come and learn how to live His way!  We have everything we need to get on with God’s good purposes for us.  He didn’t simply save us “from” something (hell), He saved us “to” something, His likeness.  Let’s do our best to walk worthy of our calling and reveal the goodness of Jesus to the world around us by lip and by living.