A new blogger whose site I recently ran across notes the following in describing that site: "I hope to be able to look back over time and see how I have grown."

That's always a good strategy, not just for a blog.

For me, it's been almost 3 and a half years since I, starving and destitute, decided to humbly seek the position of a slave in my Father's house, and He, seeing me coming in the distance, shamefully and ecstatically ran down the road to welcome me back.

Soon after, I was gripped by a burning desire to investigate the nature of that Being who I had just met. Not being one to seek much in the way of guidance from others, I began to read...anything I could get my hands on that had "God" or "Jesus" or "Bible" or "Christ" in the title. No rhyme or reason, mind you. Just anything.

As you can imagine, my early Christian education was comprised of quite a potpourri. I read some Pagels and Crossin, but they simply didn't resonate with the experience I had had with the Living God. I devoured one systematic theology after the next, but the atmosphere of most of them didn't seem to be the same substance as I was experiencing when I read the Bible. If you have ears, then hear.

One of the books I stumbled upon was Thomas à Kempis' "The Imitation of Christ." In retrospect, I would never recommend "Imitation" to a fledgling Christian. It's a dangerous book, in one sense. In several senses, now that I think about it. But for me, for some reason, I think it served a significant purpose. The more I read it, the more I got the sense that the life I was living, post-salvation, was nowhere close to the life I should be living. Not that I wasn't "imitating Christ"enough, though that was also true. Even back then, I had the sense that there was something radically wrong with the concept of viewing Christ as simply an example to be "imitated."

But, like I said, it did serve a purpose. The best way I can explain it is this: it allowed me the analytical space within which I was able to understand, in the months that followed, that following Christ was difficult from the perspective of day-to-day life here on earth. The whole game was not the Christ-come-into-my-heart-and-I'm-saved kind of cakewalk that I was being sold from within the tradition I inherited. It made me aware of what I later read Bonhoeffer refer to as "cheap grace."

I had another habit in those early days. I would take extensive notes on whatever I read. I'd jot down major points, snippets, thoughts, etc. I did a lot of that with "Imitation." It was disheartening then, inasmuch as, page after page, I was being bombarded with example after example of how badly I was missing the mark. But I kept at it.

And recently, I went back and read over those notes from my earliest readings, "to see how I have grown." Have I grown? I guess only God can answer that question, but at the risk of sounding arrogant, I'd like to think so. And I think "Imitation" had something to do with that growth, again, not in the manner in which it sought to instruct me to live, but in the manner in which it shined a light on my absolute inability to live in accordance with the principals it outlined, unless God was at the helm.

I've read and pondered much else since those early days. I now have come to believe that one can attain a level of goodness in one's behavior as called for in "Imitation," within a 21-st century context. But I've also come to understand that one cannot come to that place by trying to imitate Christ, or by trying to follow the graduate-level moral rules delineated in that masterful yet mysterious work. Rather, the way one gets there is to change completely from the inside out. Apple trees don't produce cherries, only cherry trees do. God promises He can change us from an apple tree to a cherry tree, if we let Him, bit by bit.

But don't try to pop out any cherries until that happens. You'll just hurt yourself. I'd let you know when and how you can know when the transformation is complete enough, but since I'm still nowhere near that point yet, I'd just be guessing.

Having said all that, when I recently re-read my notes, thoughts, and snippets, from "Imitation," I found that it was a little less disheartening now than it was then. I'll post some of those snippets next time; maybe another fun Top-10 list.

But I quite enjoyed being less disheartened. Maybe its a sign of growth.

Maybe.

Grace and Peace,

Raffi

Legalism, Spiritual Growth and Kempis' "The Imitation of Christ"