Jesus Christ is the Perfect Example.
He is the Perfect Example of a Physical Man.—The test here is bodily endurance and perfect control over the body. Look at Jesus Christ and note His physical endurance tests. He was forty days without food (Matthew 4:2); this is not a weakling's task. A man must have a strong body to endure through such a starvation period. For a man to be crucified upon a cross, after being scourged, was to undergo the most terrible agony; yet Christ so had His body under control upon His cross that He could speak forgiveness for His enemies and commend His mother to the care of a disciple. "How can I start a religion?" said one great Frenchman to another. "Go and be crucified," was the reply. If we want to behold the perfect physical man, who had His body in complete control and made it do His will, we must look to Jesus Christ. How many sins come to man through a weak physical control!
He is the Perfect Example of an Intellectual Man.—What man can compare with Jesus Christ in the power of His intellect? He stands ready before all to state and defend His precepts and principles. He so spoke to the people that they listened with growing conviction. "Never man spake like this man." Difficult questions were brought to Him, questions which would make the wisest judges hesitate in their answers, and at once He gave His replies which stand unimpeached to-day for marvellous wisdom and power. Living in an age long before modern science had its birth, He handles Nature as her Master and makes no mistake. His words to-day are a power in the court, in the senate and the marts of the world, as well as in the pulpit. He is the perfect intellectual man for our example.
He is the Perfect Example of a Moral Man.—Many intellectual and physical giants fail upon the moral test; but in Christ we find no moral flaw. He is the standard of moral perfection. He is the perfect moral example for all men.
Here is the foundation for physical and intellectual progress, but without a true moral foundation they will both fail.
No man ever so ministered to men as Jesus Christ.
QUESTIONS
What is man? What shall we think of him? What is the Christian thought of man? Give the five points in the Christian conception of man. Man made in the image of God; give a statement of this case. What is the image of God? Did God make the good man, the evil man? What is the chief end of man? What threefold obligation rests upon man to serve and glorify God? What should be the great concern of man? What can be said of God's measure of a man? What can be said of Jesus Christ as the perfect physical, intellectual and moral man?