As a children of God’s grace, our desire is to be imitators of the One who saved us in grace. In other words, we want to glorify God by loving Him and loving others, just like Jesus did. (Eph 4:1, 5:1)
Christian obedience is not about earning – it’s about imitation. We don’t obey God in the hopes that our obedience will cause God to accept us, we obey God from thankfulness because Jesus perfect obedience means God already accepts us! (Rom 3:21-26, Gal 3:1-6,5:1)
As followers of Jesus, we want our life to take the same shape as His. A “disciple” is a student whose goal is to imitate the teacher and live our their values. The Christian life then, is a life of love and service, marked by compassion for those in need. As those who call God “father”, we want to bear the family resemblance! The bible calls this family resemblance, “fruit”.
Therefore, the Christian life will increasingly look like love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. (Gal 5:22)