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Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Imitating My Father.


This Is What I Do In the Bathroom..., originally uploaded by use2blost.     
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Love. Big, broad topic. Posted on it a few times...I'll try not to do it again for a little bit, so here goes:

     Love.
     The kind  patient thing. More important than the really impressive stuff, like speaking in angelic languages, or foretelling the future. Superior to faith and hope.  1st Corinthians 13 is probably the definitive passage on love. Paul explains it in detail. Paul doesn't mention (in this passage) that it's the only way to imitate God. The only way you can intentionally imitate God is by loving.
     Unless you can walk on water.
     Or sling together a space-time continuum, like our mascot.
     Imitating is not to be confused with resemblance. Imitating is better.  We resemble our Father, we are an image of him. There are things about you that are inexplicably beautiful, for this reason. Looking like Daddy is cute, but it's nothing compared to putting Daddy's hat on or grabbing Daddy's briefcase, and swaggering through the doorway, a tiny little voice intoning dadspeak over the shoulder as baby wanders off. That's even cuter. I guess that's my love angle. Imitating Jesus. Cuz I can do that. Some days I can even do it well.
    Often, I'm sadly lacking patience, kindness, spiritual fruitiness. I'm experienced at keeping track of your screwups, and of the times you've hurt me. Yadda yadda. I sometimes rejoice in injustice or the bad fortune of others...and I'm hoping y'all do too, or I'm even worse than I thought.
     I hope my failure to measure up to the standard I hold is a human condition, not a personal failing.

Perhaps agape sojourned here for 33 years, visiting from another world, the only place it occurs naturally. Perhaps love left a picture. Maybe we are just trying to sketch the photograph we have been given. Perhaps some of us sketch better than others.

    My love is bad. However, I can sometimes for a few moments, on a situational basis, imitate Jesus. I have these occasional episodes of shining excellence. I pull it off and you are amazed, or impressed, or converted. Andy Stanley talks about not having to ask a question, because he knew what his father was going to say, because he knew his father that well. There perhaps is a point where we reach an intuitive understanding of God's character (Only the tip of the iceberg...), and can begin to practice the imitation of God. This is probably where I should concentrate. Not on a bar set impossibly high by myself, my denomination, or the pulpit I sit in front of.
     There are I times when I know what he wants me to do. I can look back and spot these times. Practice lets me recognize them as they occur.Sometimes courage lets me seize the moment, sometimes fear drives me to scurry past it. As always, repetition promotes competency...and that other stuff, the spiritual fruit.

More about love @ Bridget's

About the photo:
I practice my hubris. I flex my chutzpah. This is my first attempt at staging a concept. Since it is the easiest room in the house to convert into a ghetto lighting studio, I do some strange things in the hall bathroom, but this takes the cake. I am hugely surprised...Twelve layers processed in PS elements, and Dynamic Photo. Everything except yours truly is taken from the Hubble website, and nope, I'm not wearing any panties!. I plan to post in a blog carnival thing on love and I've never done it before...the angle I intend to explore is love as an imitation of God....sort of  "in His image..." speculations. Thus, a visual pun.
For the ghetto lighting group...I'm standing in my bathroom perpendicular to the mirror using onboard flash, which was evidently aimed right at my tattoo.



7 comments:

  1. You're absolutely right -- imitating is not to be confused with resemblance. Imitating Christ is not the same as resembling other Christians. Great post.

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  2. CHRIS!!! You've outdone yourself, dude. I'm not sure what I appreciate more: the picture (which I LOOOOVE), the image of a kid wearing Dad's clothes, or your transparency about "lacking patience, kindness, spiritual fruitiness. I'm experienced at keeping track of your screwups, and of the times you've hurt me. Yadda yadda. I sometimes rejoice in injustice or the bad fortune of others...and I'm hoping y'all do too, or I'm even worse than I thought.".

    You're an incredible communicator, Chris. And I'm thrilled you decided to participate in the blog carnival.

    GREAT POST. :)

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  3. Nice. Because imitation is intentional, it carries more weight. Great post.

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  4. Thanks, y'all... and thanks for asking Eva. It was a helpful distraction yesterday. The pic is doing a lot better on flickr then my usual stuff...

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  5. "Sometimes courage lets me seize the moment, sometimes fear drives me to scurry past it. As always, repetition promotes competency...and that other stuff, the spiritual fruit."

    I 'love' these words! Thanks so much for sharing this with us at the carnival, Chris!

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  6. hiya chris

    glad you joined in the carnival, good to meet ya.
    i like photography, but, i am not good on at the photoshop like you.

    i really like your words on love, very cool.

    nAncY

    ReplyDelete

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