Be Imitators of Me

Be Imitators of Me as in the bible it says , Jesus invited the crowds to learn from him; he was gentle and lowly in heart (Mt 11:29). This invitation does not surprise the readers of the Gospel. However, the repeated references in the Pauline letters wherein Paul invites his communities to imitate him may cause surprise! Writing to the Philippians  –  a  community to which he was strongly attached – Paul told them, “Brethren, join in imitating me, and mark those who so live as you have an example in us” (Phil 3:17).    On yet another occasion, he said something similar    to the same community: “What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, do; and the God of peace will be with you” (Phil 4:9). Here (in this text), Paul was drawing their attention to no less than four areas! Taking up the theme of work, Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, “For you yourselves know how you ought to imitate us; we were not idle when we were with you ... but to give you in our conduct an example to  imitate”  (2  Thes  3:7-9).[1]  To   the  Galatians, Paul wrote saying, “Become as I am” (Gal 4:12). Paul told the Corinthians on two occasions about imitating him: “I urge you, then, be imitators of me” (1 Cor 4:16). And again, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Cor 11:1). Paul wanted his communities to imitate him as he was imitating the Lord Jesus. Writing to his one- time co-worker, Paul said, “Follow the pattern of the sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim 1:13). The communities did not seem to have taken amiss this apparent proud claim of Paul for he was truly a zealous apostle, a unique pastor, a competent teacher, and a committed herald of the Gospel.

We want to draw our attention to fourteen priorities from Paul’s life and ministry.[1] They can serve as an icon and paragon for the modern-day evangelizers. This could be a concrete way of imitating Paul. We base ourselves only on the Pauline corpus. There is no claim to be exhaustive here. We buttress each of Paul’s priorities with a few references that we cull out from his letters to individuals and communities. It is well-nigh impossible to bring into this short article all the references on each topic we are considering. Our purpose is served if this presentation of Pauline priorities can spur our readers to do a systematic and meditative reading of the letters of Paul.[2]

1.    Paul’s Passionate Love for Jesus Christ

Paul’s life and ministry indicate the type of relationship and attachment that he had for the person of Jesus whom he encountered on the road to Damascus. Until he met Jesus on the road to Damascus, his preoccupation was how to destroy the followers of the way whom he considered renegades and heretics of the Jewish faith. From the moment he heard the voice – Saul, why are you persecuting me? – he realised how, until then, he had gone wrong. Writing to the Philippians, he said how all what he had considered as of great value – his Jewish heritage – he now considers as loss,[3]  and as dung (Phil 3:7-9).[4]

Paul was writing to the Philippians from the prison. His passionate love for Jesus comes through when we hear him telling the Philippians, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Phil 1:21). He was so much enamoured by Jesus that he wanted to depart from this world[1] to be with Christ (Phil 1:23; see also 1 Thes 4:17[2] and 5:10). If he has second thoughts about it, it  is only for the ‘progress’ of the faith of the community at Philippi (Phil 1:25). In these citations here above, one encounters Paul’s Christ-devotion.[3] He was aware that Jesus loved him tenderly. From this sprang his reciprocal love for Jesus. He wrote to the Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal 2:20).

In an unforgettable language, Paul wrote to the community in Rome, describing his love for Jesus. He wrote thus: “... if God is for us, who is against us? ... Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, of the sword? ... For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:35-39). The two sets of lists are significant – the former with seven items and the latter with ten items! They imply that there is nothing which can distance Paul from Jesus. Further, all the sufferings that Paul had to undergo as mentioned here above, they were meant to make Christ visible.[4]

Paul wrote to the Ephesians. Here, too, he has a unique language to indicate his love, and also the love which the Ephesians ought to nourish for Jesus. He told them: “... and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have the power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Eph 3:17-19). This four-dimensional love that Paul speaks of is unique. It is important to comprehend God’s love; to be rooted in God’s love is what matters; this will help discover the immense love that Jesus has for the Ephesians.[1]

Paul wrote something similar to the community   of Colossae as well. He told them: “As therefore you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so live in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving” (Col 2:6-7). Paul had the moral ascendency to speak in such a tone, for he lived what he taught. Paul could tell the Corinthians, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold the new has come” (2 Cor 5:17). He used a similar language in his correspondence with the Ephesians and Colossians. He wrote to the Ephesians in his inimitable style. He said: “Put off your old nature which belongs to your former manner of life... and put on the new nature, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” (Eph 4:22- 24). He spoke to the Colossians, saying, “Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old nature with its practices and have put on the new nature, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator” (Col 3:9-10). Consequently, love for Jesus is not at the superficial level! It calls for a true transformation.

To the Galatians, Paul spoke of the deep implications of Baptism when he said, “For as many as of you were baptised into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus”  (Gal  3:27-28).  True  love  for  Jesus  is  God- oriented and people-oriented. Paul told the Corinthians: “For by one Spirit we were all baptised into one body – Jews or Greeks, slaves or free – all were made to drink of one Spirit” (1 Cor 12:13). Schnelle observes that “By Baptism believers are incorporated into the sphere of the spiritual and are en Christo [in Christ] a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17)”.[2]

The Christological hymns illustrate not only Paul’s understanding of the identity of Jesus but also speak volumes about his love for Christ. In the Christological hymn in Ephesus (1:3-14), the following points emerge: 1) Jesus is the source of all blessings, 2) God chose   us all in Jesus Christ, 3) We are God’s sons in and through Jesus, 4) Thanks to Jesus we have redemption and forgiveness of sins, 5) It is through Jesus that God wants to unite all things in heaven and on earth, 6) God’s purpose for mankind is achieved through  Jesus, 7) It is through Jesus that we have access to the Good News. And the Christological hymn in the letter to the Philippians helps us to recapture the mind of Paul (see Phil 2:6-11). We recall some of the teachings that Paul conveys to the community at Philippi: 1) Jesus, though he is in the form (morphē)[1] of God, did not claim equality with God, 2) Jesus became man, emptied himself, and took the form of a slave, 3) his obedience and humility found expression on the cross, 4) acceptance of the cross was the pathway to glorification; and now aware of Jesus’ unique identity, everyone will worship Jesus, confessing that he is Kyrios! Paul passed on the hymn with a double purpose: that the community, in imitation of Jesus, should grow in mutual love (Phil 2:15), and all are to worship the crucified and risen Lord!

The Christological hymn in Colossians is another masterpiece depicting Paul’s insight into the identity of Jesus and his fascination for the Lord (Col 1:15-20). We highlight a few salient features of this hymn: 1) Jesus is the image (eikon)[2] of God, 2) All creation is through him and for him, 3) Jesus is the preeminent one who is the head of the Church, which is his body, 4) In Jesus, the fullness of God is found, 5) Reconciliation of mankind is made possible through the blood of Jesus on the cross.

In the brief Christological hymn in 1 Tim 3:16, Paul refers to the following features: 1) Our religion is a mystery (mysterion),[3]  2) Jesus (God) was revealed to the world in the flesh (en sarki), 3) Jesus was vindicated in the Spirit, 4) Jesus was seen by the angels, 5) Jesus was preached among the nations, 6) He was believed in by the world, 7) He was taken up in glory. Although the hymn is short, it contains the entire soteriological and redemptive plan of God for the world in Jesus Christ.

The above four Christological hymns offer the readers an insight into Paul’s understanding of Jesus, which developed in him a passionate love for the person of Jesus. Paul had counted everything else as “loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Phil 3:8). This explains not only his intense love for Jesus but also the reason behind his commitment to the spread of the Gospel as we shall see at a later moment. Therefore, it makes meaning when Paul writes to Timothy, saying, “For I know whom I have believed” (2 Tim 1:12). Similarly, it is no empty boast when he says, “But we have the mind of Christ” (1 Cor 2:16).

To be Continued…

About the Author

Fr. Jose Varickasseril SDB has his Doctorates in Biblical Theology and Spirituality. He is currently Assistant Parish Priest at St. Dominic Savio Church, Mawlai (Archdiocese of Shillong). He teaches Scripture in several Seminaries.