In my mind, the idea of imitating Christ has always been a high bar to clear. Maybe an impossible bar. How could I imitate a man who lived a sinless life, who healed sick and broken people, who created food out of nothing, who brought a friend back from the dead? It was a little more than I could imagine.
But I was recently reminded by my friend Chad, writing about Ephesians 5:1 in a devotional book published by my church, that imitating wasn’t an optional thing. The verse reads, “Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children.” Chad went on to quote Philippians 2:5, “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.”
For much of my Christian life, which is to say most of my life, Jesus seemed too much like Superman. He was so over-the-top it didn’t even make sense to imitate him. He was so amazing, he was so perfect, who would know where to start?
When I was a youngster I was never much of a Superman fan. I couldn’t idolize someone who was ultra strong and bulletproof and could fly and see through walls. I know, he had that kryptonite flaw, but only Lex Luthor knew how to exploit that. For all practical purposes Superman was totally invulnerable. That was so far above my own life I couldn’t relate to him, or even engage with his stories. I wasn’t much of a fan.
But I was a Spiderman fan. He seemed more achievable. He had to learn skills the hard way – he wasn’t born with them. He wasn’t invulnerable, he got tricked by villains, he didn’t know what to do with his girlfriend, and he often fell and crashed and got hurt. For me, idolizing Spiderman made more sense that Superman. I could relate to someone who crashed.
Similarly, people used to challenge C. S. Lewis over Jesus’ command to love our enemies. How can we love Hitler, was their complaint. Surely Jesus didn’t expect us to do that? Lewis just said, don’t start with Hitler, start with loving your neighbors as yourself. Maybe the Hitler issue will work out in the future, but stop using the impossible as an excuse to never get started.
In the past couple of days, in my daily reading, I found a couple of stories about Jesus that illustrated parts of him that I can imitate. Good places to start.
One story was from John 6:41-66 when Jesus was teaching about the cost of discipleship and His words scared away many of his followers. They said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” The Bible says many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
When I read that story I wondered why Judas, the disciple who eventually betrayed Jesus and went down in history as the definitive traitor and evil-guy-of-all-time, stayed with Jesus. With so many other guys leaving, this was Judas’ opportunity to take his disillusionment and go home. And Jesus, who apparently knew from the beginning that Judas would eventually betray him, didn’t take advantage of this moment to chase him away.
I need to be more like Jesus and give people second chances, third chances, lots of chances, even preemptive changes. I shouldn’t be so quick to label someone a betrayer. I should give them lots of time to become a true believer. Of course, they may never believe, but I should be the one to give them room to change. It’s Jesus I want to imitate, not Judas.
The other story I noticed was from John 8:1-11 about a time when Jesus was teaching in the temple and was approached by a gang of teachers and Pharisees who were dragging a women they caught in the act of adultery. They asked Jesus if it was OK to kill her because of her sins. Jesus famously replied: “The one who is sinless can throw the first stone.”
Jesus never condemned the woman. He didn’t condone her sin, either, but admonished her to leave her life of sin. He said, tenderly: I won’t condemn you.
And so if Jesus refused to condemn, even in an obvious situation like that, I should be willing to do the same. If I want to imitate Jesus, that’s a good place to start. Don’t condemn people.
Just this week I survived, which isn’t the same thing as winning, a citywide political campaign. It’s the sort of thing that begs evaluation and reevaluation of who my true believers are, and who should be first in line for condemnation.
But, as Chad reminded me, I must imitate Christ, not scary politicians. I don’t have to walk on water or calm the storms; I don’t have to be Superman. But maybe I can treat people a little bit better, softer and kinder, with more hope. That’s a good place to start.
