Separate

Yesterday I wrote a couple of midterm exams. One of the classes is an Educational Administration class. On the exam, there was a question where we had to address the issue of separate schools. Separate schools are publicly funded, but teach religious along with regular curriculum. These schools are distinct and different from regular public schools. On the exam, the professor let us know that we would lose marks if were wrong about separate.

In the Christian life, we should regard not being separate as failure. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, "Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord..." Paul is encouraging the Corinthian believers to look different from the world. The world looks at the Christian and tries to pick apart his life. We are continually under a microscope and need to focus on being separate from the world in our actions and attitudes. The way to win those not saved to Christ is not through showing them that you are just like them (this is the mistake the Corinthians made), but rather being different and satisfied in Christ.

Recently a friend and I were talking about being different from the world around us. They mentioned to me about their grandpa who was a missionary and how he had served in the same country as Jim Elliot. Jim Elliot was a missionary in Ecuador to the Auca Indians where he was unexpectedly martyred at the hands of the natives he went to reach with the gospel. My friend's grandpa said of Jim Elliot (though he only met him once), "Jim was different." Jim was different? A group of Christians and Jim was different? A group of missionaries and Jim was different? He lived this verse out to the fullest and was separate even from the Christian missionaries with him in Ecuador.

To apply it practically, we should find things in our lives that we can do or impove on in order to be separate from the world. It isn't enough to look separate, but we need to be separate. Where are our priorities? Where do we place reading the Bible in a list of important events? How about prayer? Do we daily pray for ourselves, others, our church members, leaders, elders, shepherds, those we need to interceed for, and those in need? People should be able to just look at us and say that we are different. Different, holy, set apart, sanctified, and separate. Let us model our lives in such a way that we are separate, just as our Lord Jesus Christ.

"For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens." Hebrews 7:26