Becoming Like Him

IN the Jesus Calling Devotional this morning the writer had me turn to I Peter 2: 22-24:
“He committed no sin,
and no deceit was found in his mouth.”
When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.”

Jesus didn't retaliate. He didn't make threats. He didn't blubber to friends about how wrongfully he'd been treated. He didn't take it into His own hands but He gave the responsibility over to God the Father who judges fairly.

As I read this today my mind went to specific places where I've been deeply hurt in the past 20 years. I also thought of the verse that for many years now has been one of my life verses Philippians 3:10: I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,

It's a slow learning process...a lifelong one to my way of thinking...this becoming like Him. I've suffered things at the hands of others who misunderstood, who gossiped, who never checked their perceptions with me. Much of my reaction in this suffering has not been like Christ's was. But I also see how the LORD honors my prayer when I ask Him to continue to teach me, to continue to change my heart in this area. Sometimes it's hard to pray that prayer because I KNOW that He will then set up a situation in which I learn in a deeper way what this life verse means. Sometimes it takes a long time for me to be willing to pray it...

But, even before seeing this verse today, I'd been praying for relational healing during this Daniel Fast...and He has set up a situation...