Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children.
– Ephesians 5:1
What a great verse and maybe just memorize that today, even right now. Just maybe say it with me, Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children. Let’s say it a couple more times. Try to say it out loud with me. Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children. Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children. One more time. Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children.
Ephesians 5:1 Is a command to imitate God.
Like father, like son, right? That’s the picture here. When somebody says that, it’s like, “Wow, I see your dad in you. Like Father, like son,” or “I see you in your child.” This is God’s design that we would walk so closely with him that we would resemble him as the men and women, as the children who are made in his image. And so just think about this verse, “Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children.”
How is your life going to resemble God today? What a calling to resemble God in your interactions with others and in what you do when you’re entirely alone. Think about how that changes the way you think. What you desire changes what you say or what you write or what you send. Changes how you relate to others. Changes every facet of our lives.
When we say “I’m a child of God, I want to reflect my Father today. I want to resemble him. I want to imitate God,” which is obviously only possible by the power of his Spirit in us. So we pray, God, help us to imitate you today. We want to be imitators of you as beloved children, and we praise you for that reality, that we are your beloved children. We praise you that we are your sons and daughters, that we know you as our Father.
Ephesians 5:1 Challenges us to embrace the call to imitate.
Oh, the wonder of it, oh God, that you are our father and we are your children now and forever. So we say today, “Yes, we want to imitate you.” God, we pray that our thoughts would resemble you, that our desires would reflect your desires. God, we pray that our words would be a reflection of your Word and your character.
God, we pray that our actions, everything we do today, would be a reflection of who you are and how you love and how you care for people. A reflection of your wisdom and your justice. Oh God, help us in all the things we do today to reflect all the wonder of who you are and how you’ve called us to live as your children and not just called us, but enabled us by your Spirit in us to live. Holy Spirit help us to be imitators of God today as beloved children.
Help us to do it all and communion with you as your children, you with us in us, and oh God, we pray that you would help us to bring others into the family. God, we pray that you would use our lives today to lead someone else, to become a son or daughter of yours.
Prayer for the Chara People
Help us to be faithful to share the gospel with people around us today and people around the world who’ve never heard the gospel. God for the Chara people of Ethiopia, 24,000 of them.
God, we pray for this people group remote part of Ethiopia that has little to no knowledge of the gospel. God, we pray that you would raise up someone, churches in Ethiopia, churches from outside Ethiopia to go to the Chara people and to imitate you among them, to proclaim your love for them, that they might become your beloved children. Oh God, please bring it about. We pray all according to your Word in Ephesians 5:1. We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
