Be ye therefore imitators of God, as beloved children,
Here the letter turns from what God has done for us to how His children should live. The standard is one short line: copy God. How can anyone do that, and what keeps such a call from crushing us?
The verse does not stand alone. It looks back to the end of chapter 4, where God has already acted towards us in kindness.
The "therefore" of the first verse connects this portion with the last verse of the preceding chapter. God has acted towards us in kindness and grace, and now we should act towards one another as God has acted towards us. So we are urged to be imitators of God "as dear children". We are not to try to imitate God to become children, but because we are children. Walking as "dear" children implies a walk governed by affection. A servant may obey correctly because the law requires it, but a child should obey out of love. We are not servants but sons.
Reverse that order and it falls apart. Copying God to earn something from Him is a mistake, not a weaker kind of devotion.
God becomes the pattern of our imitation the moment we accept, by faith, the gracious declaration of His love to us in Christ. To aim at that likeness while still knowing nothing of His free forgiveness of our sins is nothing but proud folly from a darkened mind. Only those born of God can really imitate what God does.
There are two kinds of copying, and only one of them is meant here.
The imitation enjoined is not artificial but natural. Here are children playing in the market-place. They hold an imaginary court. This little girl, dressed in cheap finery, is pretending to be a queen. She copies a queen's manners as best she can, but it is all crude and put on. Nearby a small boy is watching his father. Soon friends smile and remark how like his father he is. He hardly knows he is doing it, and it is completely natural: he is his father's son, with his father's life and nature. Now it is as children of God that we are called upon to be imitators of God.
The law made demands on man. This command stands on different ground.
What a mighty principle opens up here for believers! What limits can there be if we are urged to imitate God Himself! This is not a demand pressed on man, as the law was, when man stood before God on his own responsibility as a creature. God has revealed Himself in grace. Still He is God and no one else. And since He has given us His own nature, there could be no lesser or lower standard. That would dishonour Him and the very grace He has shown us.
The title in the verse is not a description we earned. It is one that belonged to Another first.
Having accepted us in the Beloved, the title which naturally could be only His is now by grace applied to all His saints. It is as "dear children" that we are called to show to one another some faint reflection of that love which He has so abundantly bestowed on us in Christ.
More than a title, it is God speaking, and the tone of the word carries its own message.
If He says to me, "Dear child," what a thought I have of Him and what a wonderful condition I am in! Suppose a father says, "Dear child" — the expression gives consciousness of the love. He may have done all kinds of things for me, but the very word conveys to me where I am.
The command names God as the model, yet the next verse points to Christ. Writers hold both together.
We are light in this way — as His imitators. This light has come to us in the person of Christ, so we keep our eye on Him. We are to "walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us." So it is God we imitate. But it is Christ who brought the knowledge of God to us, and that makes Christ our pattern. He is our light, because He has faithfully and perfectly presented God before our soul.
This gets practical fast. One writer points to how God speaks about King Asa in the Bible's record of his life.
Asa's history reveals his weaknesses. God, in His comments on his character, gives no hint of them. He loves to commend whatever is lovely in His servants' lives, and only when necessary exposes their failures and follies. May we in this, as in all things else, be "imitators of God"!
- Forgiven first. The word "therefore" ties the command to what God has already done for us — we imitate God because we are children, not to become them.
- Given the name. God calls us "dear children." That one word carries His love and tells us where we stand.
- Given the nature. Only those born of God can truly copy Him; the imitation is meant to be as unforced as a small boy resembling his father.
- No ceiling. God has given us His own nature, so no lower standard would fit. The law made claims on man; this call rests on grace.
- Seen in Christ. God is the model. Christ makes that model visible — down to small things, like praising what is good in others instead of exposing their faults.
and walk in love, even as the Christ loved us, and delivered himself up for us, an offering and sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour.
Paul has been urging his readers to imitate God. Now he shows what that looks like: Christ's own self-giving, described in the language of the altar — which raises the question of how much of it we can copy.
The command is not to work up a feeling foreign to us. It is to let out what is already there.
We are to walk in love. This is not natural to us as the children of Adam, but it is natural to us as born of God, for God is love. Walking in love simply shows the Divine nature in practice. So it adds, "as Christ loved us," because in Christ the Divine nature appeared in all its fullness and perfection.
The order matters. What we are comes first; how we walk follows from it.
If we are accepted in the Beloved, we are now urged to "walk in love" (Eph. 5:2). We ought to walk in a way that matches our high place. Responsibility flows from relationship... But to imitate anyone, we must know that person. Now God has made Himself known to us. He has placed us in His presence and given us His mind.
The verse traces a movement: love reaches us, and then returns to its source as self-sacrifice.
The burnt offering pictures Christ — He freely offered up His life to God as a sweet savour... When divine love comes down here, it always returns upward as self-sacrifice. God acts in love; Christ walked in love; and divine love acting in a person offers itself to God as a sweet savour.
Two little words carry the weight of the verse. One points to us; the other points higher.
He gave Himself for us, yet His blessed offering and sacrifice was to God. As an offering, it speaks of the value of the gift in God's eyes. As a sacrifice, it shows how great a thing Christ gave up for the glory of God. His sacrifice has the character of both the peace offering and the burnt offering. The peace offering brings us into sweet agreement with God in Christ, and the burnt offering rises to God to delight His heart of infinite love.
The Bible does not always describe Christ's death in these terms. Set this verse beside another, and the difference stands out.
Here we see the sacrifice of Christ on its burnt offering side. It was a sweet smelling savour, and — blessed be His name — it was "for us." In 1 Peter 2:24 we get the trespass offering side of His cross. There "a sweet savour" could not be said. He bore our sins, and drank the cup of divine wrath that our sins deserved.
The verse sets Christ as pattern, but not every part of His death is open to imitation.
The death of Christ was a propitiatory offering, and we cannot follow Him in that. But we can imitate Him in the love that would lead us to lay down our lives for the brothers and sisters (1 John 3:16). Paul mentions two saints of God who risked their own necks for his life. If one risks his life for another, that is the same as laying it down.
This standard reaches past anything the law asked, and it comes with a promise about our own small acts.
Such love goes far beyond what the law demands, that a man love his neighbour as himself. Christ did more, for He gave Himself to God for us. This is the love we are asked to imitate... In its little measure, like the infinite love of Christ, it will go up as a sweet savour to God.
- Down — Love begins at God's side, not ours. Walking in love lets our new nature show itself in practice.
- Up — Divine love comes down to us. When it acts in a person, it turns back upward as self-sacrifice offered to God.
- To — The gift was for us, but the offering was to God. Christ gave Himself up for the glory of God.
- Fragrance — This verse shows the burnt offering side of the cross, which delights God's heart. The sin-bearing side is different: there Christ drank the cup of wrath.
- Echo — We cannot repeat the propitiation. But we can love enough to lay down our lives, and even that small measure rises to God as a sweet savour.