The following article is an excerpt from Make Me Like Jesus by Michael Phillips.

I cannot say what it might mean in your life, but for me, to abide in Christ begins thus:

To still the flood of subtle, wrong attitudes that assault me and try to make me think according to the world’s values— attitudes rooted in pride, independence, selfishness, and personal gain rather than in childness and Christlikeness…

To quell the lie of independence that is in the very air of the world, telling me I can do it on my own, I should do it on my own, I have a right to do it on my own…

To ask God to do his best for those who have hurt and wronged and spoken against me, to forgive them myself, and to go down on my knees and beg forgiveness for those occasions and relationships where the wrong lies with me…

To welcome rather than resist the submission of childness… To lay down the ambition to rise in the world or in the eyes of others, to lay down cherished hopes and dreams of achievement, possession, and success…

To trust the Father for those I love, and to trust him that all will come right in the end… To use the weapons of warfare God has provided me to combat melancholy, impatience, rudeness, judgment, discouragement, whining, despondency, complaint…

To meet those I encounter this day with the fruits of kindness, goodness, acceptance, graciousness, humility, generosity, peacefulness, gentleness, cheerfulness, and the simple friendliness of Christian love…

To calm worry, fretting, haste, frustration, covetousness, disappointment, envy, heartbreak, irritation, and other such persistent attitudes of mistrust that hound me from morning till night…

To open my eyes to the wonderful qualities in those around me; to see others as God sees them; to recognize what they are becoming in God rather than merely what they are at this moment, remembering what I once was myself, giving them the same grace God has extended to me, rejoicing in the good and looking beyond the rest; and to love them as he loves them…

To behave toward others as I would have them behave toward me…

To actively try—though crowds and noise and profanity and selfishness and immodesty and wealth all clamor about me— to remember that I am a citizen of a different kingdom…

And to welcome, rather than run away from, opportunities to whisper, “Not my will, Father…but yours be done.”

I cannot do these things on my own. As I have confessed before, I am a weak and frail vessel. I have not faced sacrifice, scourging and death, torture, utter aloneness. I have faced nothing in my life so difficult other than the ache of a father’s heart—difficult enough, God help me, but why should I not feel it? God’s heart aches for his children too.

Why should I desire less for myself? Certainly I have faced nothing to compare with what Jesus endured on my behalf. The ease of life in this modern, western culture in which I find myself is appalling. The blessings God has bestowed on me are enormous, far more than I have any reason to expect.

I am given strength in the knowledge that Jesus prayed for me… and is praying for me still. And yet…still I complain and rail and resist, as if the level of self-denial required by the abiding life were more than I could bear. But it is only difficult to lay down wills that want their own way.

Therefore, when I sink to my knees and the practicality of Christlikeness is set before me, the first prayer I always must sigh is, “Lord…I fail so entirely to do these things of which I speak. Please help me!”

And then I must arise and go forth and live in the Christlikeness that has been commanded of me: If you love me, you will keep my commands. If you obey my commands, you will abide in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and abide in his love. This is my command: Love one another.

As I do, I am given strength in the knowledge that Jesus prayed for me. And as his life is eternal, I have every reason to believe that he is praying for me still, and that his prayers must all be answered: My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. I pray for Michael Phillips.

May he also be in us, and be one with you and with me, so that the world may believe that you sent me. May all believers everywhere be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

– Excerpted from pages 106-110 of Make Me Like Jesus by Michael Phillips