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Home , Imitation of Christ

Aaron Coyle-Carr 11:00 service Wilshire Baptist 15 April, 2018 Dallas, Texas “The Imitation of ” 1 John 3:1-7

A little book called The Imitation themselves, just as he is pure.” of Christ is perhaps the most And then later on in verse seven, popular piece of devotional “everyone who does what is material in all of is righteous, just as he is history, apart from the , of righteous.” It’s pretty clear that course. First John believes that the beloved community, the church, Written in the early 1400s by a is made up of those who spend Dutch monk named Thomas, the their lives imitating . It is book begins like this: the sincerest form of flattery, after all. “‘He that followeth Me, walketh not in darkness,’ saith the Lord. And there’s some powerful truth These are the words of Christ, by to this idea of imitation. which we are taught how we Elsewhere in the New ought to imitate his life and Testament, Paul asks the church manners, if we would truly be at Corinth to be imitators of him, enlightened, and delivered from even as he imitates Christ. We all blindness of heart.” 1 should be imitators of Christ, but I worry that, in the modern For Thomas, disillusioned by the world especially, the idea of material excess and superstition imitation doesn’t go nearly far of the medieval church, the key enough. to all of Christian spirituality was pretty basic: being a faithful Almost fifteen years ago, a Christian simply meant imitating landmark project called “The the life of Jesus Christ. National Study of Youth and Religion” was published by I read a passage like First John 3, sociologists Christian Smith and and I’m right there with Thomas. Melinda Denton. And one of the Just listen to the third verse: “All most interesting things these who have this hope in him purify two found in their study was

1 Thomas a Kempis, (Chicago: Moody Press, 1984), 23. that the majority of youth in string of prohibitions with the America – regardless of their odd platitude tacked on about professed religion – practiced a happiness, what are we really form of spirituality Smith and offering people? Is it anything Denton came to call “Moralistic more than they can get from a Therapeutic Deism.” movie on the Hallmark Channel?

It's a mouthful, I know. But what St. Augustine, a fourth century it means is that most American Christian bishop, knew of the teenagers who believe anything problem with this simple kind of believe in a kind of spirituality “imitation” when he wrote, “For where God only exists to make those who are called sons, and you happy and the only thing are not sons, what profit them God really wants in return is for the name where the thing is not? you to be a “good person.” 2 How many are called ‘physicians,’ but do not know It’s not an entirely bad form of how to heal! How many are spirituality, surely. But it’s not called ‘watchers,’ but sleep all entirely good, either. Because, night long! So, many are called especially in North America, ‘Christians,’ and yet in their moralistic therapeutic deism has deeds are not found to be reduced much of to because they are not actually “imitating Jesus,” and the what they are called, this is, in Christian life has often been life, in hope, in charity.” 3 reduced to a simple and strict moral code. Don’t drink, don’t Imitation can be a good smoke, don’t have premarital beginning , but it is not the sum sex. No dancing, no cards, no fun. total of the Christian life. For Which are not inherently bad many, imitation has the power to moral guidelines (well, except make us appear to be like Christ, for the fun part; I’m not budging without the transformation on dancing, though). But when required to actually be like we reduce the magnificent Christ. Which is why, though drama of the Christian life to a there is certainly an element of

2 Gleaned from Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton, Soul Searching: The 3 St. Augustine, Homilies on the First Epistle of Religious and Spiritual Lives of American John , trans. Boniface Ramsey (New York: New Teenagers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, City Press, 2008), 67. 2005), especially chapter four: “God, Religion, Whatever: On Moralistic Therapeutic Deism.”

2 imitation in First John, the But Gaius Octavius’ path was primary metaphor of our forever altered in the year 51 passage today is the metaphor of when, at the tender age of adoption . Hear again the words twelve, he was called upon to of verse one: “See what love the deliver a eulogy for his Father has given us, that we grandmother. So great was his should be called children of natural talent for public God.” speaking and persuasion that Gaius Octavius began attracting Now, adoption in the ancient the attention of very important world was a little bit different Romans – chief among them his than it is in our modern context. grandmother’s brother: Julius For us, adoption is primarily Caesar. about the creating of family and the raising of children. There Seven years later, Julius Caesar were certainly elements of that was assassinated. And when his in the ancient world, but will was read, a surprising adoption was primarily about discovery was made: he had the continuation of a legacy. designated Gaius Octavius his Being adopted constituted a kind legal heir and wished to adopt of personal transformation, and him into his family. the person being adopted often took the name of their new Thus, at the age of nineteen, parent as the first step towards Gaius Octavius Thurinus was enhancing and expanding the renamed Gaius Julius Caesar, and family legacy. he made it his mission to control the Roman world the way his Perhaps the most famous story adopted father had. Barely a of adoption in the ancient world year later he was elected the is the story of Gaius Octavius Roman equivalent of president, Thurinus, a young man born into and he spent the next fifteen an old but declining family in the years eliminating Rome’s year 63 BC. Though the boy was enemies and consolidating his clearly very bright, he seemed already considerable power. By destined for an unremarkable the time he turned thirty-six, he career in Roman middle controlled the largest empire in management. the known world and was awarded the title most of us

3 know him by: Caesar Augustus. God’s own family. God takes the Transformed indeed. gracious initiative on our behalf.

Now, Caesar Augustus’ story is The modern American monk and far from typical, and I don’t mystic Thomas Merton, says it mean to suggest that the Roman this way, “…my Emperor would have been a is much more than an imitation model to emulate for early of his virtues as they are Christian communities. But I described in the : it must don’t doubt that the Roman be a union created in me by the notions of adoption and legacy transforming action of His own and transformation were surely Spirit.” 4 on the mind of the author of First John. When God graciously Like Caesar Augustus, we find adopts us into the divine ourselves transformed, household, God does not simply graciously marked not only by ask us to behave better; God Christ’s death on our behalf, but begins the process of also by his life – by his very transforming us into the likeness name. We are Christ -ians, after of Jesus Christ. all. And like Caesar Augustus, through this transformation we You’ll notice that there are no find ourselves newly and commands present in this powerfully committed to the passage from First John. Often, family legacy. when we talk about being conformed to the image of It’s not just that we lead a “good Christ, about the imitation of life,” it’s that we lead a Christ, the onus is on human transformed life, one shaped by behavior. We have to be kinder, the cruciform way of Jesus. It’s do justice better, love more fully, not enough to be a “good whatever the case may be. And person,” but rather to be a “little these are worthy goals, make no Christ,” to be marked not just by mistake. But the first step is basic morality, but by self-giving never ours. We can only respond love, compassionate presence, in imitation of Jesus because God and a willingness to confront first graciously adopted us into injustice. The beloved community is not a community

4 Tomas Merton, The New Man (London: Burns & Oates, 2003), 119.

4 of people merely trying to do or to know that Christians still . be good. It’s a community of Just turn on the evening news. people forever changed by the way of Jesus. This question of being able or unable to sin is a particularly live The tricky part is, the beloved one for me. I was raised as a community is not yet the fullest Wesleyan, which a holiness- expression of what it shall be. flavored branch of . First John says, “we are God’s In that Wesleyan tradition, there children now; what we will be is a doctrine called “entire has not yet been revealed.” sanctification,” which describes Though we have already been their belief that one can attain a adopted into the family of God state of sinless perfection prior and are continually transformed to one’s own death and ultimate into the image of Christ, there is union with Christ. a future element to all of this. We do not know exactly what it will In theory, entire sanctification is look like, but we do know that a gift of God and an act of great what is to come will be rooted in grace. In practice, it often came our experience of the risen down to a question of willpower. Christ here and now. We who The question I found myself are God’s children now “will be facing over and over again as a like him” in the future. The two teenager was: “Did I have experiences go hand in hand. We enough willpower of my own to who are already being keep myself from sin – transformed into the image of specifically, what my church Christ will be perfectly defined as sin?” Of course, I transformed into that image in found that I didn’t. the age to come. Thanks be to God, beloved, that Which is also, by the way, why none of this is actually about First John can also say, “No one willpower. None of this is about who abides in him .” I can’t our human ability to more begin to express to you how closely imitate Jesus. It’s not much ink has been spilled trying about being a “better” Christian to interpret this one brief verse. or even a “better” person. It’s Because of course we still sin. about the gracious activity of You don’t have to be a theologian God in conforming us to the image of Christ. So when First

5 John talks about not sinning, it’s not absurdly claiming that Christians magically don’t want to sin or are incapable of sin. It’s claiming that the image towards which we are being conformed is the image of sinlessness and holiness – the very image of Jesus Christ.

In her autobiography, the American writer Gertrude Stein tells an interesting story about an encounter she had with the Spanish painter Pablo Picasso. During dinner one night, a guest at the table remarked to the painter how much she enjoyed Picasso’s portrait of Stein. “Yes,” he is said to have replied, “Somebody said that she does not look like it, but that doesn’t make any difference, she will.” 5

Beloved, we might not look like Jesus now, at least not entirely. But we shouldn’t let shame overtake us. Looking like Jesus isn’t something we can force ourselves into by sheer force of will. The image of Jesus is one into which we are all growing, thanks to the gracious activity of . Somebody may say we do not look like Jesus, but we will.

5 The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas (New York: Random House, 1960), 12.

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