Thought of the Day: He Lived for You

Greetings in Christ Jesus, Fellow Soldiers.

We often talk about Jesus Christ dying for us, but how often do we talk of Him living for us?

Paul tells us in 2 Cor. 5:21 that "He made Him who knew no sin to become sin for us, so we might be the righteousness of God."

From his birth in an animal latrine to his death forsaken by man and by God, Jesus Christ underwent every temptation and suffering that could come our way. In fact, he underwent much more in this life, for He fully knew what it was and meant to be forsaken by God in His hour of need. Yet, He did not sin.

Why did He do this? To give us a good example of how to live or provide us a model of what man could do if he really put his mind to it? No, He lived that perfect life, not primarily for our emulation, but for our sake. His perfect life was lived in place of our rebel lives.

When you are in financial debt, you not only need your debt to be paid in order to live, but also need to have money credited to your account. In the same way, Jesus' death paid for our debt, but we needed more to earn the favor of God than being brought back to zero. We needed Christ's righteousness credited to our account. We need His perfect life put into our account, so that when God sees us, He sees us cloaked in the righteousness of His Son.

Jesus not only died for us, He lived for us. We are not only forgiven, but accepted, approved, and beloved for Christ's sake.