Jesus stands out as the greatest teacher of all time, not only because of the truth He proclaimed but also because He lived out His teachings. As a matter of fact, what He taught proceeded from His actions. Luke tells us of ‘’all that Jesus began to do and teach’’. For Him, doing precedes teaching. He wanted His disciples to serve one another after His departure, so He demonstrated that by washing their feet. Only after washing their feet did He explain the meaning behind His actions. Jesus taught only what He practiced, so He is a perfect model of everything good. His actions also teach us that only those who practice what they preach can truly earn followership without coercion.

Jesus taught only what He practiced, so He is a perfect model of everything good…The moral authority to teach a thing derives from the practice of it.

The need to be a doer of the word and not just a teacher of it was stressed in one of Charles Spurgeon’s commentaries. He was dealing with children upbringing as entrenched in Proverbs 22:6 – “Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it.” (NKJV). Charles Spurgeon put a beautiful spin on this verse when he said, “Train up a child in the way he should go – but be sure you go the way yourself.” Children are more likely to imitate their parents’ actions than follow their words. The moral authority to teach a thing derives from the practice of it.