“Imitating Christ does not mean living a life like Christ, but rather living your own life as authentically as Christ lived his.” ~Henri J.M. Nouwen
We’ve all seen it or heard it before. It could have been in a scripture passage, a spiritual book, a church hymn, or even in a preached homily at Mass. The message was this: each and every one of us should strive to imitate Jesus.
After seeing or hearing this, our response may have been something like, “Yes, that would certainly be a great goal to have, but extremely difficult to actually achieve.” After all, we live crazy-busy lives filled with responsibilities and commitments, both on professional and personal levels. There just is not enough time or energy in the day to live like Jesus – going all over the place preaching the good news and praying unceasingly. Yet, that is exactly what we are called to do by virtue of our baptism – just not in the way that we may think.
We tend to place ourselves back to the time of Jesus and think that we should imitate his physical movements and do exactly what he did, say what he said, and be who he was. (At least that is what I often catch myself doing.) But we cannot think that way, as hard as that may be. We need to change our thought process and realize that we are called to live like Christ by being who Christ made us to be – ourselves.
We are called to be who we are and no one else (because everyone else is already taken). This means that we live like Jesus by being the best “self” that we can be. It’s all about how we treat others and care for them, respect them, and love them. It’s all about how we care for God’s creation by striving to make this world a better place by being good stewards of what we’ve been given. It’s all about now we listen to the voices of those who suffer or are hurting as we try to help them through their difficult times with words of strength, encouragement, and hope. It’s all about living in peace and being the voice of calm in a world that is plagued with violence, chaos, and a lack of respect for human dignity. It’s all about putting our sinful desires behind us and moving out of the darkness into the marvelous light of Christ.
If this sounds too difficult, it’s really not. All we have to do is start taking little steps each and every day and simply love one another as God loves us. When we live an authentic life of love, peace, and joy, we cannot help but to be changed. Then and only then will we find ourselves imitating our Lord by simply being who we are – not a copy, but an honest-to-goodness original.
“God has created us to love and to be loved, and this is the beginning of prayer – to know that He loves me, that I have been created for greater things.” ~St. Teresa of Calcutta
Inspired and based on the writings of Henri J.M. Nouwen
