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Imitatinggod, Intro Imitating God in Christ RECAPTUR ING A BIB LICAL P ATTER N JASON B. HOOD ImitatingGodChrist.indb 3 3/22/13 8:47 AM InterVarsity Press P. O. B ox !"##, Downers Grove, IL $#%!%-! " & $ World Wide Web: www.ivpress.com Email: [email protected] ©2013 by Jason B. Hood All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from InterVarsity Press. InterVarsity Press® is the book-publishing division of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA®, a movement of students and faculty active on campus at hundreds of universities, colleges and schools of nursing in the United States of America, and a member movement of the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students. For information about local and regional activities, write Public Relations Dept., InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, $"## Schroeder Rd., P.O. Box '()%, Madison, WI %*'#'-'()%, or visit the IVCF website at <www.intervarsity.org>. Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright !)() by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved. While all stories in this book are true, some names and identifying information in this book have been changed to protect the privacy of the individuals involved. Cover design: Cindy Kiple Interior design: Beth Hagenberg Images: foot washing: Foot Washing by Sally Elliot. Private Collection/+e Bridgeman Art Library. foot print: ©sureyya akin/iStockphoto ISBN )'(-#-(*#(-&'!#-' Printed in the United States of America ∞ InterVarsity Press is committed to protecting the environment and to the responsible use of natural resources. As a member of Green Press Initiative we use recycled paper whenever possible. To learn more about the Green Press Initiative, visit <www.greenpressinitiative.org>. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. P &! &# !) !( !' !$ !% !" !* !& !! !# ) ( ' $ % " * & ! Y *! *# &) &( &' &$ &% &" &* && &! &# !) !( !' !$ !% !" !* ImitatingGodChrist.indb 4 3/22/13 8:47 AM Contents Acknowledgments . ! Introduction: What Paul Taught Everywhere . " PART ONE: Imitating God # Idols of God . #" $ Imitators of God . $! % Priests of God . &# & Participating in the Work of God . &" PART TWO: Imitating Jesus ' The True Human, the Gospel and the Gospels . (# ( Ambassadors, Apprentices and Agents . !# ! Family Resemblance and Paternity Tests . )% ) Resurrection and Imitation . "' " The Holy Spirit . #*! #* The Apostle of Imitation . ##! ## The Jesus Mirrors . #%! PART THREE: Imitating the Saints #$ A Community of Imitation . #'' #% Objections, Obstacles and Presuppositions for Interpretation . #(% PART FOUR: Imitation Yesterday and Today #& Imitation for Today’s Left, Right and Center . #)% #' A History of Imitation . #"% ImitatingGodChrist.indb 5 3/22/13 8:47 AM Conclusion . $*" Author and Subject Index . $$# Scripture Index . $$' ImitatingGodChrist.indb 6 3/22/13 8:47 AM Introduction What Paul Taught Everywhere When I was in seminary, a friend of mine asked a question about the Bible that changed my life. I’m not much for trivia, but this question struck home: “What does Paul explicitly say that he teaches ‘every- where in every church’?” Paul taught a number of things “everywhere in every church”: Jesus as the Son of David, the atoning death of Jesus on a cross, his resur- rection and enthronement as Lord, justi+cation by faith, the gi, of the Holy Spirit, the unity of the family of God across racial and social lines, the law of love, future judgment at the feet of Jesus. Paul taught these things with enough consistency that we can safely say he never failed to communicate them to his congregations. Yet none of these things is the correct answer. Since my seminary days I’ve asked this question of many students and colleagues, but I’ve never gotten the correct answer from an evangelical.- .e answer is that Paul teaches his own “ways in Christ . everywhere in every church” (- Cor /:-0).1 .is statement concludes a paragraph in which Paul describes these “ways in Christ” and contrasts them with the mindset the Corinthians have inherited from the world around them: For those keeping score at home, “the cross of Christ” is the most popular answer, with Cor : o#en cited. See language similar to “everywhere in every church” in Cor :; :-. 'e ()*’s translation is misleading: “my way of life in Christ Jesus, which agrees with what I teach everywhere in every church.” 'e italicized words are added to the Greek; they open up the possibility that it is not Paul’s “ways in Christ” that are taught “everywhere in every church,” but some other teaching with which his “ways” merely agree. ImitatingGodChrist.indb 9 3/22/13 8:47 AM -2 Imitating God in Christ We are fools for the sake of Christ, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute. To the present hour we are hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clothed and beaten and homeless, and we grow weary from the work of our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we speak kindly. We have become like the rubbish of the world, the dregs of all things, to this very day. (- Cor /:-2--3) By both ancient and contemporary social standards, many of the characteristics Paul presents here are anything but exemplary. In his day (as in our own), working with one’s hands was a shameful, second- class activity to be reserved for slaves if at all possible. What kind of mindset or self-understanding would lead someone to choose to su4er the things Paul describes here? Earlier in this passage Paul states, “I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all, as though sentenced to death, because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and to mortals” (- Cor /:5). Paul is perhaps describing the apostolic mission here as a march of the condemned, a post-victory parade of captive rebels being marched o4 to a life of slavery or to be fed to beasts or killed in mock battles. Whatever the imagery behind this sentence, it is clear that Paul sees himself and his disciples as part of a grisly display before humanity and the supernatural world alike. Any psychologist worth his or her salt can con+rm that this sort of martyr complex is unhealthy. But it gets worse. Paul is attempting to instill this framework of death in others. He insists that his approach must be duplicated in the lives of Joe and Jane Christian in Corinth: “Indeed, in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. I appeal to you, then, be imitators of me” (- Cor /:-6--7). As an example, Paul o4ers Timothy. “For this reason I sent you Timothy, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord” (- Cor /:-0). Timothy is a 8esh- and-blood model who knows and lives the ways of his spiritual father, Paul.3 He displays for the Corinthians what they should have been putting into practice: a sacri+cial, cross-shaped life that re8ects Paul’s 'is label for Timothy should remind the Corinthians of the expectation to become faithful “children” in Cor : and the faithfulness of stewards required in Cor :. ImitatingGodChrist.indb 10 3/22/13 8:47 AM What Paul Taught Everywhere -- “ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere in every church.” .at’s the answer to our pop quiz: Paul taught his sacri+cial, cross- shaped life “everywhere in every church.” Now if Paul’s cross-shaped life doesn’t come to mind as a likely answer to our question, perhaps it’s simply because this passage is obscure. But while this question may be the stu4 of Bible trivia, there’s nothing trivial about the answer. .is passage cannot be written o4 as an obscure thought, tucked away o4 the beaten path of passages that are more memorable and theologically signi+cant. Paul repeats his cross-shaped résumé throughout his letters to Corinth. Moreover, he insists that he is simply imitating Messiah (- Cor --:-), in line with what Jesus repeatedly taught: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me” (Lk 5:13). D!"#$#$% I&#'('#)$ When we think of imitation, we typically think of a process that in- volves precise copying. And there is a good bit of rote mimicry in the Bible. God’s people rehearsed creeds, prayers, songs, proverbs, stories, rituals and laws with precision. But because there is very little precise copying of Jesus in the Bible, we sometimes downplay the importance of imitation, pointing out how little we can duplicate the actions of Jesus or other biblical characters with precision. But that is a mistake. In the Bible imitation is rarely about precise copying./ Consider how Paul uses imitation. He does not imitate the Messiah by +shing, wearing his hair in a particular fashion, fasting forty days in the wilderness or collecting precisely a dozen disciples. He rarely speaks Jesus’ native language, Aramaic. Even when he rec- ommends celibacy (- Cor 0), Paul does not appeal to Jesus’ celibate lifestyle as a model. And in turn, when Paul tells the Corinthians to “imitate me as I imitate the Messiah,” he does not mean that they should duplicate his su4erings and sacri+ce. Successful imitation of “Mimēsis is not about making exact copies. 'e Christian vocation is rather that of cre- ative imitation.” Ke v i n Van ho oz e r, +e Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-Linguistic Approach to Christian +eology (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, ), p. ImitatingGodChrist.indb 11 3/22/13 8:47 AM -1 Imitating God in Christ Jesus does not depend on literal cruci+xion, and the Corinthians are not failures if they are never shipwrecked like the apostle they have been instructed to imitate.
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