I did not grow up in the same household together with all my nine siblings.   Nor was I raised by my birth mother.    My adopted mom is about a foot shorter than I.   In her younger days her natural hair color was a dark shade of brown.   Her own daughter, Sandy, and one of my brothers and I were raised by her.  That brother, Tom, and I have red hair.   When we three kids were all in grade school mom decided to dye her hair a beautiful shade of red somewhere between Tom's fire engine red color and my own more blonde red.   Then we all just looked at each other and smiled when people would comment how much Tom and I were the spittin'   image of her. They had no idea that Bernadine was not our birth mom.

How many times have you parents or especially you grandparents said to children and grandchildren, "You are the spittin' image of your father - or mother - when they were your same age"?   You and I know that genetics plays are large part for us being the spittin' image of our relatives.  We are also aware that some of this is because we watch, learn and imitate - no matter our family makeup -- adopted, step, blended, blood or spiritual.

The new believers in the church at Thessalonica have become the spiritual spittin' image of Paul and the others.  The Thessalonians imitate because they watch, learn, hear and claim the gospel message of Jesus Christ for their own.   Their spiritual genetics is because of the mark, or impression, left by Jesus Christ...that is, Christ's blood.

And now Paul affirms the Thessalonians' choice in following the way of Jesus Christ, that is in imitating Jesus.  The news of their faith, love and hope is spreads.  These believers and their faith are now becoming quite famous - or at least gaining quite a good reputation.  And it all started because they become imitators...yes, of Paul and the others, but, of course imitators of Jesus Christ.  Their Christian reputation spreads throughout the Roman provinces of Macedonia and Achaia.  This was almost the whole of modern Greece.  Wow!  Now the new believers at Thessalonica are themselves, models of the Christian faith and life.  Their faith is now to be imitated. The fact that they work side by side, helping and loving each other and those outside the new church is to be imitated.  The fact they spread the news of God, and protect one another is to be imitated.  Their joy in Christ, no matter the circumstance, is to be imitated.

This imitation of faith does not come with ease and certainly not without a little pain.  The profound change that comes into their lives begins immediately.   However, there is quite a contrast between their inward and outward condition.    At the same time these people are becoming more Christ-like, they are being persecuted by the non-believing Jews. These Jews become so enraged they cause a riot.  They force the fact that Paul needs to be smuggled out of town, under cover of darkness, in fear of his life.  The person with whom Paul and the others had been staying was forced to pay a large bail.  Other forms of persecution of that day continue in full force after Paul leaves.  Places of business are boycotted.   There is verbal taunting and abuse.  Friends of the Christians are arrested. Government officials become more and more uneasy.   All this often leads to physical beatings and even death.

That was then, yet in some part of the world things like that continue to happen.  And I think there seems to be a mistaken belief that the Christian life goes hand-in-hand with "the good life."   With that belief, is an underlying assumption that "the good life" consists of no hardship, pain, and suffering.   You know, the fact of the gospel is just the opposite.   The gospel begins by facing the fact that life is difficult. All human experience is tied somehow to the Fall of humanity - sin.   We tend to say this is the story of Adam and Eve.  But this story of Adam and Eve is our story.  It is the story of rebellion against God and our stubborn insistence on doing things our way, instead of God's way.   Suffering is unavoidable in this fallen world.   The way to a life of meaning is to learn to handle suffering creatively and redemptively.   That is - how we go through life's sufferings and struggles.   Jesus is the model for that redemptive life at its abundant best.

The Holy Spirit gives us the ability to receive the full message and model of Jesus Christ and to follow Him - even while life, at its most horrible, presses in on all sides.  It is the Holy Spirit who is the source of all joy in the midst of our suffering.   I didn't say happiness.  Paul speaks of joy.  You see, one of the keys in these verses is:  "with the joy given - or inspiration - by the Holy Spirit."  This is the same Spirit Who gave power and conviction to Paul and the others who preached God's gospel to begin with.  This is the same Spirit Who today gives conviction and changes hearts of the speaker and those who hear and receive that message. It is the same Spirit Who gives you and me Christ's profound peace and joy in the midst of whatever suffering or difficulty we are experiencing.  This means that the Spirit equips us to rejoice in God - in spite of, even because of, hardship, pain and suffering.

And so great is the Thessalonians' Christ-like behavior; so great is their rejoicing, that their faith is talked about and heard about all over the region.  Their faith example and their walk with Christ sounded forth or rang out like a trumpet.   The Greek word for "rang out" occurs nowhere else in the New Testament.  It comes to us from eechos – echo, or noise.  In the Greek translation of the Old Testament it is used to describe the sound from bells, zithers, trumpets and other loud noises.   In this, I think there is something tremendous about the sheer defiance and determination of early Christianity.  When all prudence;  when all good and smart think would dictate living a way of life that would escape notice, and therefore, avoid danger and persecution, these Christians boldly go forth in their faith.  They are never ashamed to show whose they are and whom they seek to serve.   Their spiritual transformation is that complete.  Their faith influence is reaching beyond their familiar borders.   Their faith influence grows the network of God's kingdom.   As Paul says, their "faith in God has become known everywhere."

Indeed, by virtue of these people's response to hearing God's word, their growing faith, the work of the Holy Spirit, Paul's letters to them, and their inclusion in what we know as the Bible - the work of God is reaching and influencing people throughout the ages, everywhere.   God truly does have a plan.

And if you and I are supposed to be the spittin' image of Jesus, how do others know that?  How will the world around us know we are Christians?   One way is, that as believers, working alongside Christ, you and I also have the fellowship, love, companionship, encouragement and support which come from participating in a local church.  This is God's design.   As believers, struggling, growing, yet faithful followers, we are to bind ourselves to one another in a community of worship and service.  As we share our lives together, the church becomes an example of God's kingdom before a watching world.   Not every person who goes to a church, or comes to this particular church is a believer.  And that is alright - and wonderful.  So we are examples to them as we come to worship together.  We also encourage other Christians gathering in and beyond our own neighborhoods.

As I have just said - there is a watching world out there.  Yes, we are being watched right here on the MPC facility, of course.  As Sunday School teachers, TNT helpers, Youth leaders and helpers, Movie night watchers, at Youth breakfasts, and other Youth events, scouts and scout leaders, Marketplace participants and leaders and shopkeepers, MOPS, (Marketplace and MOPS really do reach beyond our own borders)...we are being watched.   Volunteers in the office, deacons, elders...we are all being watched.  What will be imitated?   That we care for each other? You bet. That we are One in God, yes!  That we pray and work together - absolutely. Do we have room to grow to do this better, yes!  But we are to keep doing it.   But it's easy to be watched here. Or is it?

We are also being watched in the schools - both secular and Christian, as teachers, students, administrators, and staffers.  We are being watched at the gyms, the grocery stores, the restaurants in which we eat - do you pray before you eat in public?    Do you know the name or something about the last wait person who served your meal in a restaurant? Do they know the most important thing about you - that is Whom you imitate? For those who don't eat out, what do you know about the checker at Von's, Target, or Kohl's?   We are watched in our neighborhoods.  We are watched where we work.  You know, we are watched on those freeways as we drive to and from all those different places.  What is being imitated as we are watched?

You see, you and I are the church.  We are MPC - God's church. And we cannot communicate God's message of faith, love and hope unless we have been changed.   No church can spread the gospel with any degree of integrity, let alone credibility, unless we, the individuals are visibly changed by the gospel we preach, teach, hear and live.  We need to look like what we are talking about.   It is not enough to receive the gospel. We must embrace it in our everyday life, every part of our life, as well as our common life of faith.  What is our message we give?   Is our message worry, concern, confusion, fear, darkness in our eyes, dark words from our voices? Or is our message joy, inspired by the Holy Spirit?  I pray our message is faith, love and hope, in spite of, and as, we walk through the crises and darknesses that we are sure to go through?  And I know that some of you today are walking in the midst of those crises situations right now.  God is truly with you.   I would like you to know that this entire congregation is prayed for each week at the Tuesday, 6:15 prayer meeting.  This past week one of the pray-ers prayed and this is part of that prayer: Wherever this congregation places their foot, that the Lord be known and honored.

That is exactly what the Marketplace Kids learned this week and the Marketplace Singers sang about. This is the way we each will be the salt and the light in the world as God wants us to be.   This way others will see we are the spittin' image of Christ, and we imitate Him.

You know, there is an old hymn that I used to sing in the Baptist church I went to as a child. It was in our old hymnal but not in this one.  But I found it.  It is called "They'll Know We Are Christians by Our Love."   The four verses state something special and specific about our Christian walk - and sort of summarizes this passage:   (1) We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord, and we pray that all unity may one day be restored.... (2) We will walk with each other, we will walk hand in hand, And together we'll spread the news that God is in our land.... (3) We will work with each other, we will work side by side, And we'll guard each one's dignity and save each one's pride.... (4) All praise to the Father, from whom all things come, And all praise to Christ Jesus, His only Son, And all praise to the Spirit, who makes us one....    Then each of the four verses is to be followed by the refrain: And they'll know we are Christians by our love, by our love.  Yes, they'll know we are Christians by our love.

I would add for this morning, Yes, they'll know we are Christians, because we work out and act out the love of our Creator God, our Father, through the example and blood of God the Son in Jesus Christ, because of the work and inspiration of God the Holy Spirit.  That is the impression we are to bear and leave for others to imitate.