imitating Christ

The Sincerest Form

Posted on by Betsy

What is the sincerest form of flattery? Imitation. When someone is trying to copy you, it is because they admire you and want to be like you. Unless it’s your sibling playing the copy-cat game where they repeat everything you say. That’s just annoying.

In our passage today, Paul advises that we should do what we can to imitate the life of Christ. Now that’s a copy game worth participating in! Living, loving, giving, and serving in the manner of Christ is the goal for every believer.

To that end, he wrote to the Corinthians that they should look out for each other and do things for the advantage of promoting the Good News of Christ to the unbeliever. If that meant eating meat that might have been sacrificed at the pagan temples and then sold in the market, something Jewish Christians did not do, then simply accept the dinner invitation and don’t worry about it.

1 Corinthians 10-11 (Common English Bible)

23 Everything is permitted, but everything isn’t beneficial. Everything is permitted, but everything doesn’t build others up.24 No one should look out for their own advantage, but they should look out for each other. 25 Eat everything that is sold in the marketplace, without asking questions about it because of your conscience. 26 The earth and all that is in it belong to the Lord. 27 If an unbeliever invites you to eat with them and you want to go, eat whatever is served, without asking questions because of your conscience. 28 But if someone says to you, “This meat was sacrificed in a temple,” then don’t eat it for the sake of the one who told you and for the sake of conscience. 

Verse 26 offers more support for his argument. This reference from Psalm 24:1 is a bold reminder that everything that is in the earth belong to the Lord. Thus the meat sacrificed to idols cannot have any power. It’s just meat. The “gods” to whom the meat was sacrificed cannot have any power. They are just false idols. So the food is not the issue here: It’s a matter of conscience.

29 Now when I say “conscience” I don’t mean yours but the other person’s. Why should my freedom be judged by someone else’s conscience? 30 If I participate with gratitude, why should I be blamed for food I thank God for? 31 So, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, you should do it all for God’s glory. 32 Don’t offend either Jews or Greeks, or God’s church. 33 This is the same thing that I do. I please everyone in everything I do. I don’t look out for my own advantage, but I look out for many people so that they can be saved. 

Paul’s primary goal in Corinth was to save people. He longed to save all people. So if someone was disturbed by the idea of meat that had been in the temple before it made it to the market, he advised his people not to eat it: Not because it is bad, but in regard and out of respect for the conscience of the one who is objecting to it.

11 1 Follow my example, just like I follow Christ’s.

We remember that Christ ate with the sinners. We remember that he gave his very life as a sacrifice for all sinners. So what would Jesus do in this case? He would give thanks to God for the meal and eat.



All That Is in it Belongs to the Lord by Kathy Schumacher

Taking Off and Putting On

Posted on by Betsy

My daughters and I exchange clothes like other people exchange recipes. We are able to wear each other’s things and have very similar tastes, so this makes it easy, not to mention affordable. One of my favorite dressy dresses is a hand-me-down Lily Pulitzer lace dress from my youngest and I just delivered a bag of work-appropriate skirts to my oldest. It is fun for us to see each other in our used clothes and it always reminds me of when they were little girls and would play dress up in my closet. I did the same in my mother’s closet when she was getting ready for a night out with my father. I loved to parade around her bedroom with my grandmother’s hand-me-down fox stole over my pajamas. It came complete with the head and beady eyes. I did not let that pass down to me.

In our reading today, Paul wrote a letter to the church at Colossae and advised them about taking off things in order to put on better things. We are invited to dress up in the image of Christ, who wears neither Greek not Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free. In clothing terms, Christ’s clothing is one-size-fits-all.

Colossians 3 (Common English Bible)

5 So put to death the parts of your life that belong to the earth, such as sexual immorality, moral corruption, lust, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). 6 The wrath of God is coming upon disobedient people because of these things. 7 You used to live this way, when you were alive to these things. 8 But now set aside these things, such as anger, rage, malice, slander, and obscene language. 9 Don’t lie to each other. Take off the old human nature with its practices 10 and put on the new nature, which is renewed in knowledge by conforming to the image of the one who created it.11 In this image there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all things and in all people.

Imagine what our world would be like if we took off anger, rage, malice, slander, and obscene language. Gosh, imagine what political campaigning would be like if we took off those things! Then imagine what would our world be like if we put on compassion, kindness, gentleness, and patience. Can you feel the difference?

12 Therefore, as God’s choice, holy and loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. 13 Be tolerant with each other and, if someone has a complaint against anyone, forgive each other. As the Lord forgave you, so also forgive each other. 14 And over all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity.

It starts with you and me. It starts with how we treat people in the grocery store, how we speak to our neighbors, what we post on social media, and how we talk to our children. Take off the ugly and let your life be a reflective image of our Lord.

Let there be peace of earth. And let it begin with me.

Peace on Earth by Mary Anne Mong

Imitation Game

Posted on by Betsy

It is said that imitation is the most sincere form of flattery. I suppose that is true, as it means you have something so appealing, others want to emulate it and have it for themselves. In second grade, I liked my friend’s cat-eye glasses so much, I insisted to my mother that I needed glasses, too. My mild astigmatism allowed an eager eye doctor to fulfill my request, and I was thrilled. I looked sharp and I knew it! Now, when I see the school picture from that year, I wonder what in the world I was thinking!

We are going to look at 1 Thessalonians 1 again today, this time from The Message:

1 Thessalonians 1 (The Message)

2-5 Every time we think of you, we thank God for you. Day and night you’re in our prayers as we call to mind your work of faith, your labor of love, and your patience of hope in following our Master, Jesus Christ, before God our Father. It is clear to us, friends, that God not only loves you very much but also has put his hand on you for something special. When the Message we preached came to you, it wasn’t just words. Something happened in you. The Holy Spirit put steel in your convictions.

5-6 You paid careful attention to the way we lived among you, and determined to live that way yourselves. In imitating us, you imitated the Master. Although great trouble accompanied the Word, you were able to take great joy from the Holy Spirit!—taking the trouble with the joy, the joy with the trouble.

Paul’s comment that the church had become “imitators” of his work is not Paul arrogantly patting himself on the back. Indeed, their imitation of him to accept the joy that came along with suffering is a direct compliment to their work on behalf of the message they had all received and accepted. Thus his praising them for imitating him was simply a nod from teacher to students that they had learned well and aced their exams. Their actions were praise-worthy as they stood in direct opposition to the people of Thessalonica, who worshipped national and local gods. To be a people who stand against a strong cultural norm is a difficult thing.

The modern church experiences this when it calls out the idol worship of politicians, political agendas that contradict Scripture, celebrity infatuation, and social media vitriol. Is there suffering when we stand up for what’s right? Yes. Do our actions imitate our forefathers and foremothers who also stood against injustice and evil? Yes. We, like the church of Thessalonica, are invited to become imitators, not imitations. Look again at our verse 6: “You became imitators of us and of the Lord when you accepted the message that came from the Holy Spirit with joy in spite of great suffering.” Can there be any better calling than to imitate a great apostle and the Lord, empowered by the Holy Spirit? I think not.

Paul invites us to “imitate me, just as I also imitate Christ” (1 Corinthians 11:1). The Thessalonians then went on to become examples to all in Macedonia and Achaia (verse 7) and thus the imitation game continued. Thessalonica was a metropolitan trading center, giving them the opportunity to effectively sound forth the good news to every region.

Lent is a season of imitation. We wake up every morning and ponder what Jesus would do with the day. How are you imitating Christ in your life? If it were a crime to be a Christian, would there be enough evidence in your life to convict you? May we imitate him so effectively, people know to Whom we belong just by watching.

Day and Night by David Jones

Citizenship

Posted on by Betsy

In 2008, Pixar Studios released a cautionary tale called “WALL-E.” It was a love story about two robots who were left behind to work on what remained of earth after humanity fled on starships. As we journey through their relationship issues, we see a startling portrayal of what has become of humankind. With robots available to do every kind of work, people have become debilitatingly obese and are confined to lounge chairs, living their lives through screens and artificial intelligence.

In Biblical terms, they have “allowed their god to be their stomach” and are now suffering from the pursuit of earthly pleasures and indulgences. This dystopian look at humanity’s future was also predicted by Paul, who warned against such things in our reading today. Even as he addressed the church at Philippi, he was very forward thinking, wasn’t he?

Philippians 3:17-21 (Common English Bible)

17 Brothers and sisters, become imitators of me and watch those who live this way—you can use us as models. 18 As I have told you many times and now say with deep sadness, many people live as enemies of the cross.19 Their lives end with destruction. Their god is their stomach, and they take pride in their disgrace because their thoughts focus on earthly things. 20 Our citizenship is in heaven. We look forward to a savior that comes from there—the Lord Jesus Christ. 21 He will transform our humble bodies so that they are like his glorious body, by the power that also makes him able to subject all things to himself.

Paul was deeply distressed over these “enemies of the cross” who lived lives that were complacent and content in the wrong-headed assumption that once salvation of the soul had occurred, the body could pursue earthly delights with abandon. This type of thinking was called Gnosticism and it became the bane of Paul’s ministry throughout his life. He encouraged them to follow his example and the example of others who were imitating the life of Christ.

And we know that the life of Christ was a life of self-denial. The Gnostics practiced a life of self-indulgence, and it grieved Paul to his core.

We, too, are to imitate Christ as Paul did. One of the best things about the season of Lent when it comes around is the deliberate resetting of our priorities as we reevaluate the quality of our spiritual health. Practicing self-denial for 40 days goes a long way toward recalibrating our hearts and minds toward Christ. Perhaps we should practice Lent as a daily lifestyle all year long.

Paul reminds us that we are citizens of heaven and should focus our thinking as those who are merely foreigners here. Earthly delights will fade away in the light of heaven’s rewards, and if heaven is our true home, we will be strengthened against any temptation this “colony” has to offer.

God has promised to transform us into the likeness of Christ when we join him there. Our challenge today is to transform our thoughts, actions, words, and deeds into his image in such a way that others will see and know that we don’t belong here but are just passing through. How is God calling you to respond to this text today? Do you need to give something up in order to claim your heavenly citizenship? Save your own soul and follow Paul’s example.

Just Passing Through by Michelle Robertson