The election is over. The ending was just as bizarre as the whole process. One of the most bizarre things of all was a candidate sputtering to answer if she thought that the Republican nominee was a good role model. Duh. Good role model? Maybe instead of politicians – or athletes or entertainers — we should look to the Bible for role models. St. Paul wrote, “You know how you ought to imitate us.” Not some rich and famous athlete, not some good-looking young fellow, but imitate a gnarled, well-travelled, wrinkled old apostle. In another of his letters he wrote, “It is now no longer I that live but Christ that lives in me.” So when Paul says “you know you ought to imitate me” the complete thought is “just as I imitate Christ.” Don’t just look at the words I say, look at how I live.
The ancestors taught us: if you’re going to talk the talk, you’ve got to walk the walk. When people hear the word of God on our lips, they are amazed at its beauty and power. However, when they see those words have no effect in our lives, they accuse us of hypocrisy or worse. If we say turn the other cheek but are in fact smacking the other cheek, the gospel will never be believed. If we say forgive seventy times seven times but in fact are holding onto resentment and grudges, the gospel will never be believed. If we say when I was hungry you gave me to eat, when I was sick you came a visited me but are in fact hoarding our time and our treasure as if they were ours instead of gifts from God, the gospel will never be believed. If we say love your enemies, do good to those who hate you but are in fact being divisive, the gospel will never be believed. You know how you ought to imitate us, says St. Paul, as we imitate Jesus. Unless and until we walk the walk, unless and until we put into concrete action the faith we have received, we’ll never become the disciples Jesus has called us to be.
The Apostle gives some examples of what imitating him might look like. “We did not live lives of disorder when we were among you.” If we find ourselves eating too much, or drinking too much, or watching too much TV, or spending too much, or doing anything too much, we have lives of disorder. We aren’t imitating Paul and we certainly aren’t imitating Jesus. The apostle goes on, “We worked day and night, laboring to the point of exhaustion.” I saw a poster once which said: There are three kinds of people in the world, those that make things happen, those that let things happen and those that wonder what happened. St. Paul was definitely one of those who made things happen. If we want our families to be better, if we want our community to be better, if we want our church to be better, if we want our wounded souls to be better we’ve got to make it happen by working at it, day and night, laboring to the point of exhaustion. A third example, St. Paul enjoins all of us that imitating him means “keeping busy, not acting like busybodies.” The easiest thing in the world is to get into someone else’s business, to think of things they should be doing. If we pin our hopes on someone else’s changing we’ve got a long wait coming. We’ve got to keep busy about our own conversion, about our own need to imitate Christ better and pray that the Holy Spirit will inspire others to do the same.
But this is not easy. It is a day by day process. Maybe that is why Jesus said in the gospel, “By patient endurance you will save your lives.” Aha, there’s the rub. Patient endurance is not our best thing. We get tired of always being good when other people seem to be having fun. We get tired that our families coming apart at the seams. We get tired of eating right and holding our tongue and paying the bills. We get tired of being afraid in our own neighborhoods and homes. We get tired of turning the other cheek. We get sick and tired of being sick and tired. So when Jesus tells us that we need patient endurance, we’re too tired even to protest. We can be strong for an occasion or during a crisis. It’s the daily hanging in there that wears us down. Maybe our ancestors could do it better. Maybe they had patient endurance. But we want our families, our communities, our churches, our nation to improve and we want them to improve now. Things have been bad for so long we’ve lost patience. Do you know the old song, “Lord, help me to hold out until my change comes.” That’s how we must pray, “Lord, help me to hold out until my change comes.”
How can we hold out? How can we get patient endurance? If our bodies are any clue you get endurance by, well, enduring. Think of exercise. When you first start running if you go a hundred yards you’re bushed. But if you keep at it you build up endurance. Pretty soon you can run a half mile, then a mile and soon races that are five miles long. It seems, then, that one acquires endurance by building it up bit by bit over time. The more one endures, the more endurance one has. And I know a people who have endured a lot. Because the Lord helped them to hold out they have endured. I know a people whose hopes for a better world, a more just and peaceful world, are constantly disappointed. But because the Lord helped them to hold out, they have endured. I know a people who are having their children stolen from them through drugs and alcohol, because of crime and violence, but they have endured. Because the Lord helped them to hold out they have endured. I know a people who have been belittled, demeaned, mortified and embarrassed but they have endured. Because the Lord helped them to hold out they have endured. Now any people who have been through all that must have built up some kind of endurance. They can run a marathon of grace. So when we pray, Lord, help me to hold out until my change comes, it is with hope. The Lord has helped us. We have survived. We can hold out. And Jesus will come to make all things new. AMEN!
