What Are You Imitating?

Recently in a gospel meeting at Christiana I imitated a weedeater. No, I didn’t mow the people down like blades of grass; rather I did an impersonation where I sounded like a weedeater. Little did I know that it was such a hit that was what the majority of the talk was about after the sermon. When someone does an imitation of something, they are trying to look or sound like it. When the imitation is a good one, you know that it was really close to the real deal. That’s what impersonators are good at, especially when it comes to what they can do with their voices. While I don’t claim to be a master impersonator, the weedeater is probably one of my best sound effects. I know how to imitate that sound.

The apostle Paul told the church at Corinth to “Be ye imitators of me, even as I also am of Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1 ASV). The best thing we could ever imitate is the Lord. If you really stop and think about it, the name Christian means Christ-like. We are supposed to be like Christ in our actions each and every day. He came down to live on this earth to give us the perfect example of how to follow God. Even though none of us has seen God face to face, the Son of God explained Him (Jn. 1:18). There was no one better than Jesus to provide that perfect example and to show us what the Father was like by His actions and teachings. The apostle Peter says “...because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, that ye should follow his steps” (1 Pet. 2:21). Though Peter was contextually speaking of persecution, I think we can see that our entire lives should be following in the steps of Christ.

What are you imitating? While it is fun at times to imitate different things of this earth, our ultimate focus of imitation needs to be that of Christ Jesus. I can do a pretty good job of imitating a weedeater, but how good is my effort to imitate Christ? Just like people in the audience last night were paying attention to how effective my sound effect was going to be, even more people are watching our efforts to try to imitate the Lord.