Imitate them

Dr Martin Fair

THERE are all kinds of situations in which we might say to someone ‘here’s how I do it.’

When introducing my sons to golf I took them to the driving range and showed them what a golf swing looked like, saying: ‘Now you do it.’

That’s pretty much what Paul said to the new Christian converts in Thessalonica. Writing to them some time later, he declared, ‘You became imitators of us…’ c1v6. Of course I could have handed my sons a golf manual and suggested they read it but surely it was better to show them? Sadly, in these days we’re not seeing many people becoming Christians and taking their places in our congregations. But there are some!

In these cases, we need mature Christians who can be pointed to with an encouragement to, ‘Go on, imitate them!’ That’s how learning and growing in faith take place; when we have an example to follow.

Can you think of someone you looked up to when you were young in the faith? Of course what Paul wrote, in full, was, ‘You became imitators of us and of the Lord.’ Putting it slightly differently we might say: ‘Follow me as I am following Jesus.’

Though we may indeed serve as an example to others, in the end we will always want to point to Christ, rather than ourselves. As with John the Baptist, our role is to say, ‘Look… there is the one!’ John 1:19-30. The Glasgow-born Senior Pastor of Cleveland’s Parkside Church, Alistair Begg, writes: ‘You will never have a better friend than a friend who points you to Christ.’

When it comes to imitating the Lord, we could do worse than take note of how impressionists go about their business. By all accounts, they spend countless hours poring over video footage of their subjects, intent on picking up every mannerism and inflection. Might we similarly pore over the gospels that we might come to know better the One we’re called to follow?

Paul tells us that the Thessalonian Christians had, ‘welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering, with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.’ c1v6.

As we know, many of those first believers paid dearly when committing to Christ. Many still do today.

Some years ago, I attended a conference at which the keynote speaker was Andrew White, known as the ‘Vicar of Baghdad.’ Andrew spoke of having baptised a group of young people a few weeks earlier and of how, only days afterwards, the bus carrying those same young people had been subject to a targeted terrorist attack in which nearly all of them had been killed outright.

For some of our brothers and sisters in faith, severe suffering is their reality. Let us stand with them. Tolkien wrote: ‘Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.’ Let us not be faithless in this matter.

At the beginning of his letter, Paul refers to faith, love and hope – three of the nine referred to as fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23.)

Now he adds joy. It seems clear that these early Christians had within them that which enabled them to ‘sing through days of sorrow.’

There is Christian joy; not the same as happiness, which may come and go, and utterly unrelated to daily circumstances. Truly, may you know the joy of the Lord.

The Rev Dr Martin Fair is minister at Arbroath: St Andrew’s.