Imitation

Extract from "Disciplemakers' Handbook"
Edited by Alice Fryling
Published by Inter-Varsity Press, 1989.
Pages 86-88

As much as we all long to be unique individuals, we spend much of our lives imitating others. And this is not all bad. Michael Griffiths in "The Example of Jesus" writes that

"Imitating others is a mark of being human. In all human societies people watch other people and this has been the way in which civilization has made progress. One man discovers the wheel and others imitate him, and find further uses for it. Someone else discovers that strawberries are good to eat, and others follow his example in collecting and eating wild strawberries. . . Everyone is forever watching everyone else."

Our job as disciplemakers is to provide models that are worthy of imitation. This is a biblical concept. Paul wrote to the Christians in Thessalonica, "You became imitators of us and of the Lord. . . . And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia" (1 Thes. 1:6~7). The Hebrew Christians of the New Testament church were told, "Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith" (Heb. 13:"7). "We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised" (Heb. 6:12). Imitation is a way of learning, a way of growing.

Paul was very aware of this in his own ministry. He went so far as to say to the Corinthians, "I urge you to imitate me" ( 1 Cor. 4:16). He wrote to Timothy, "What you have heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching" (2 Tim. 1:13). Does that sound audacious? It does to me! Personally, I think Paul had a lot of nerve. But as we will see, it was that nerve which enabled him to be an effective discipler of young Christians.

I am not suggesting that we run around telling people to imitate us. Rather, we should humbly remember the powerful influence of the example of our lives. In his classic work, Rhetoric, Aristotle wrote, a few hundred years before Jesus lived, that the character of the speaker "may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion he possessed". When God became a human being, his influence among us was greater than any words or arguments.

Imitation is a fact of life. It happens all the time. John warned his friend Gaius, "Do not imitate what is evil but what is good" (3 Jn.11). If people do not imitate what is good, they will imitate what is evil. Think of what happens at a social gathering when one person tells a story with a slight exaggeration here and there. Soon the next person jumps in, telling another story with more exaggeration. Before long a whole group of people are telling stories, and truth and falsehood become indistinguishable.

But our example can influence others for good. Several Sundays ago, as I hustled through last-minute details before church, I noticed that my minister is always in his seat about ten minutes before the service starts. I thought to myself, "I want to do that. Next Sunday I'll come a little earlier.' I wanted to imitate what I saw in my minister. Now ' I have him to thank when I am more prepared to worship on Sunday mornings.

Part of being the salt of the earth, or being light in a fallen world, is being an example of God's good work to men and women today. Part of disciplemaking is modelling.

What do you think of when you think of "modelling'? Perfectly proportioned young men and women parading on the catwalk, yet artificial in their heavy make-up and exaggerated gestures? This is not the kind of model we are to be. We will not be perfect, and we must never be fake. As we become disciplemakers, we must be willing to let people see the inside, so that they will know that true beauty, which is worth imitating, comes from Jesus and not from little bottles and brushes.

Paul may have sounded audacious to some, but he was also able to admit his faults. "Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy' ( 1 Tim. 1:13}. He wrote publicly that he was "less than the least of all God's people' (Eph. 3:8). He was not afraid to let people see his weaknesses because those weaknesses showed God's strengths. It was probably this freedom to be real which enabled Paul to say to the Thessalonians, "We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well' ( 1 Thes. 2:8).

This should be our perspective in disciplemaking - to share our lives with our friends in such a way that they will be drawn to love Jesus as Lord. As we share ourselves with young Christians, we are not inviting them to move into our lives, lock, stock and barrel. Rather, we are inviting them to look into the windows of our hearts.

When young Christians look into the hearts of their disciplemakers, what will they see? It is hoped that they will see a love for Jesus, a confidence in the Bible, a commitment to prayer, a desire to learn and grow, and a love for other people. These characteristics are at the heart of the disciplemaking process.