For the Strength of Youth
The Savior Is Our Perfect Example
For the Strength of Youth January 2027

Digital Only: Hidden Treasures

The Savior Is Our Perfect Example

By Eric D. Snider

Church Magazines

These New Testament stories help us understand how Jesus Christ wants us to live.

Jesus Christ

Even the Savior needed a few minutes alone with His Father.

It was early in Jesus’s ministry, and not many people knew who He was yet—but that was about to change.

All in one day, Jesus:

  • Taught in a synagogue.

  • Cast an unclean spirit out of a man.

  • Healed Simon Peter’s mother-in-law.

  • Healed all the people who showed up after hearing about the first three things. (See Mark 1:21–34.)

There were a lot of people, too. Mark says, “All the city was gathered together at the door” (Mark 1:33). Suddenly many people wanted Jesus’s time and attention.

The next morning, knowing it was going to be another busy day (there would probably be nothing but busy days from now on), Jesus did what He needed to do to be ready. “Rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed” (Mark 1:35).

Jesus got up before sunrise and found a place to be alone so that He could pray to His Father, to prepare Himself before the people started clamoring for Him that day.

If the Savior needed to take time to be alone and pray and recharge His spiritual batteries, imagine how much we need to do that!

How can you help people you won’t even talk to?

Levi, also known as Matthew, was a “publican,” or tax collector. He must have been a righteous, faithful man—the Lord called him to be one of His Apostles, after all—but working for the Roman government that controlled Judea made him and his fellow publicans unpopular. The Pharisees considered publicans to be traitors against the Jewish people and “sinners,” regardless of how they lived their lives.

(As we’ll see a lot in our study of the New Testament, the Pharisees had a hard time with the concept of not judging others.)

When the newly called Levi/Matthew hosted a dinner party attended by some of his coworkers and by the Savior, the Pharisees questioned it critically. “Why do ye eat and drink with publicans and sinners?” they murmured to the disciples (Luke 5:30).

Jesus didn’t bother pointing out that working for the government didn’t mean a person was a sinner. Nor did He mention that (except for Himself) everyone was a sinner, Pharisees included. He accepted their premise—that Levi and his friends were “sinners.”

Jesus said: “They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:31–32).

It’s perfectly logical. Jesus Christ associated with everyone to help them repent—because everyone needs to repent and come unto Him.

This logic holds today. The gospel of Jesus Christ is for everyone. He has commanded us to take it to them. We can’t do that if we shun everyone who doesn’t already share our beliefs and standards. And we definitely can’t do it if we look down on entire groups of people just because of their occupation or social standing.