Being nice like Jesus…? 8 February 2013

One prominent Southern Baptist reported that the sum total of his Sunday School training could be summed up in one sentence:  Jesus is nice, and he wants us to be nice too.  Well, I was a disaster as a Sunday School teacher – and indeed, when I think about it, I am even now unsure what it is we are supposed to tell little children except to love them and keep them safe. 

Perhaps it’s interesting to ponder just how nice Jesus actually was, by modern politically correct standards and what would pass muster in the local Play Centre.  But what we do know is that our faith is not a matter of admiring Jesus – atheists can do that much -- but rather becoming conformed to his way.  St Paul writes to the Philippians:  Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus [Phil. 2:5].  In another place he writes:  As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ – the somewhat blunter King James Version says, have put on Christ [Gal. 3:27] – and indeed the Greek verb does mean putting on a garment.  Paul loves that metaphor; it occurs several times in his letters.   Clothed with Christ is a very powerful image indeed. 

It is about becoming a new person.  It is not about being nice.  It is not about believing the right things.  It is not about criteria by which we may decide who belongs and who doesn’t, who qualifies and who fails.  The very next verse in Galatians is a shattering rebuke to much that parades as Christianity in our day…

As many of you as have been baptized into Christ

            have put on Christ.
            There is neither Jew nor Greek,
            there is neither slave nor free,
            there is neither male nor female.
            All are one in Christ Jesus.

Our stillness and our silence, our innermost disciplines, our quiet, gentle choosing of the mantra above all else for the moment, our determination to return to it over all the distractions, all of this is our steady, peaceful consent to being clothed with Christ.  The consent is not always easy.  It is likely to be an inner battle at times, as we confront the memories and the knowledge of people and events that have formed us up till now. 

And the experience of contemplatives tells us that the struggle is never over and resolved. It is not as though one day we enter some quiet space where all is serene and undisturbed.  St Teresa, St John of the Cross, St Francis, may have had their ecstasy.  St Paul did too, he mentions, but then he seems simply to discount it.  The struggle is the point.  We are part of a bent, cruel and unjust world, and we are not seeking escape.  We are consenting to conform to Christ, day by day, hour by hour.