Landmarks

Read: 1 Thessalonians

Coming off of Philippians and Colossians, 1 Thessalonians is kind of a dissapointment. It's more of a personal letter to those in Thessalonica (or is it neke something? neke sounds better) than chock full of the Pauline wisdom of Phil. and Col. that I love so much. But, with the rest of the word there are definitely some nuggets as usual.

What I want to look at today is 1:5: "You paid careful attention to the way we lived among you, and determined to live that way yourselves. In imitating us, you imitated the Master."

I think there's a lot of value in what Paul is acknowledging here. It's hard sometimes to be able to conceptualize the WWJD? in everyday life so therefore there is value in looking towards those who do seem to embody a Christlike characteristics. Of course the temptation might be to make that person a personal Christ and thusly get yourself into all manner of trouble but with the right intentions in place, it could be a valuable thing.

One of my heroes, spiritually speaking, is Rich Mullins. Rich isn't God (although he's as close as I've seen here on earth). What I admire most about Rich is his humility, his poverty, his wisdom, and his contentment with those gifts that he did have. God is our true north but every once in a while we find those who point very closely to that north. Not perfectly, but still able to give us an idea where we're headed. If you've ever tried to follow a compass reading, it's pretty hard to just take a reading and go. More often than not, the procedure is to take the reading and look at what's in front of you. A certain tree or rock? Great, walk to that rock and then look for the next landmark on your degree heading. That landmark doesn't become your destination, it's a, well, landmark and by following those you get closer to where you're headed.

I find landmarks all over the place and I find that kind of fun. I've mentioned how I've been rewatching the Firefly series again and one of the things that I've really, really appreciated is Simon's relationship with River. Simon is by far an imperfect person with a complete lack of tact and awareness to a lot of things going on around him. But that is so easily forgiven when one considers the incredible sacrifices he has made to save his sister. Simon, for his sacrifice and his faults, is one of my landmarks right now. That kind of selfless living isn't easy by any stretch but it's a lot closer to "go for second place" command that Jesus gives than how I usually live my life. He, of course, only says that command that way in The Message.

So, thank you, Paul and the rest of the apostles for your examples. Thank you, Rich for the way you lived your life so selflessly. Thank you, Joss Whedon for making a story that has captured my imagination so amazingly and showing what a living sacrifice looks like. And thank you, Jesus for the sarifice you did make and for providing a very, very difficult but worth example.