Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me

Good morning. Now we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength and not just please ourselves. Yeah, right! I can see that happening. If we love our neighbors as ourselves… Each of us is to please his neighbor for his good, to his edification. We have our great example: for even Christ did not please Himself; but as it is written, “The reproaches of those who reproached You fell on Me “. If Christ, knowing that that would happen to Him came to do the will of the Father anyway, shouldn’t we take His name with us into the world, knowing that those reproaches will fall on us? In the following, Paul is talking about the old testament. Whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, so that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. We should do the same thing. Mostly we would read the New Testament, but we can even get some guidance from the old. We can see what hard times the early church went through, especially in the book of acts, and since they came through successfully, so can we. We can also read books about people in the modern world and how God brought them through safely, and receiving encouragement, apply it to ourselves. Father help us to look at others whether in the Bible or those in our generation, and see how You helped them, and realize that You will do the same for us.