Prayer for a Worthy Walk, XI of ?

Prayer For A Worthy Walk

Colossians 1:9-10

"For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; That ye migh walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;"

The Believer’s Walk

‘That ye might walk worthy of the Lord.’ That is, of Christ the Lord (Luke 2:11), as is always the case except in two or three passages like Acts 4:29; Rev.11:15). ‘Walking’ is applied in Scripture to the conduct or behaviour of persons. It points to the active rather than the passive side of the Christian’s life. It expresses not only motion but voluntary motion in contrast to being carried or dragged. It imports progressive motion, going forward, advancing in holiness. It signifies fixing and holding a steady course in our journey also with aimless meandering. It is keeping to the way which God should be rendered? Certainly not meritoriously, for it is impossible for the creature to do anything to make God his debtor or entitle him to reward as a matter of justice: ‘When ye have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do’ (Luke 17:10). But no Christian ever did all that he was commanded, and even if he had, his efforts would have been imperfect and unacceptable to God were it not for the mediation of the Redeemer.

Worthy Is the Lamb

But we are told, ‘Worthy is the Lamb’ (Rev. 5:12). Is not that the same term? Yes, except that it is in its adjectival form. The Lamb is indeed worthy, infinitely worthy, but no mere creature is so, not even the holy angels, as this very same passage expressly declares. When the question was asked, ‘Who is worthy to open the book to loose the seals thereof?’ we are informed, ‘And no man in heaven or in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon. And I wept much because no one was found worthy to open and read the book.’ but there is a worthiness of fitness as well as a worthiness of deservingness, and it is the former which is here in view. To walk worthily of the Lord signifies to conduct ourselves as saints should, to act in accordance with the character of the One whose name we bear and whose followers we profess to be. To walk worthily of the Lord means to conduct ourselves suitably and agreeably to our relation and indebtedness to Him, to carry ourselves as those who are not their own. The same Greek word is rendered ‘as becometh’ in Romans 16:2 and Philippians 1:27.

‘As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to your former lusts in your ignorance: but as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation [or ‘conduct’]’ (1 Pet. 1:14-15). Let your daily lives make manifest your change of masters. Formerly you served your lusts, but that was in the days of your ignorance when you were strangers to God. Now that you have enlisted under the banner of the Lord Jesus and have ‘the knowledge of God’s will’, evince it in a practical way: walk becomingly of the Lord. How? ‘Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus’ (Phil. 2:5). And what was that? The mind of self-abnegation - veiling His glory and taking upon Him the form of a servant. The mind of self=-abasement - making Himself of ‘no reputation.’ the mind of voluntary subjection and unreserved surrender - ‘He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.’ How may we do all this? By the life of Christ being reproduced in us so far as our measure and capacity admit, that we may ‘grow up into him in all things’ (Eph. 4:15). How? By making Him our Exemplar. ‘Because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that ye should follow his steps’ (1 Pet. 2:21). Only in proportion as we do, shall we ‘walk worthy of the Lord’.