We are not called to God-likeness, but Christ-likeness. And while it may seem a trivial difference in wording to some, the chasm between these two ideas could not be wider.
Humanity's goal, seemingly from our earliest moments of consciousness, has been to transcend our humanity, and attain something far more celestial, eternal, and God-like in quality. Our myths and legends, which often tell tales of mere humans going on epic quests in order to overcome their mortality, and taste the divine, testify to this fact.
In Christian thought, however, this quest for divinity is turned on its head, as we see divinity itself -God- becoming man. And it isn't merely that he becomes man, but that he becomes a humble, lowly man, without any outward qualities that would hint at his being divine. Not only does he take a humble form of humanity upon himself, but swims to the very bottom, the black abyss, of the human experience, in his tasting of death, via crucifixion.
In myth, man seeks to become God, but in the Gospel, God becomes man.
Jesus' humanity is not discarded once it is no longer needed in order to "blend in with the natives", but is assumed into the Godhead, so that one can no longer refer to God without referring to his humanity, as well as to his status as a victim of crucifixion. God has, in Jesus, embraced our lowly and poor estate, and not simply in order that we might become Gods, as though everything He does is based on some concept of exchange. No, he embraces our humanity in order that we might come to see that it is not on the other side of our skin that the Kingdom of Heaven begins, but that it is right here, right now, in the middle of all of our faults, frailties, and weaknesses. It is here, in the land where tears still flow, hearts still break, and loss is still a possibility, that the Kingdom of Heaven has set up shop, and so it is here, therefore, that it is to be experienced, and that through our living of others-centered, self-giving lives.
The Kingdom of Heaven is not coming, it has come, and now seeks to express itself in and through our frailties. God does not call us to seek out escape routes, postmortem palaces, or experiences so mystical that they bear no resemblance to the earth on which we stand. No, "heaven" calls us earthward. To follow Christ is to follow him, not to a celestial kingdom located just behind yonder cloud formation, but into the dust of planet earth. It is to see the sacred nature of every man and woman, and to serve and treat them just as though they were the sacred object to which we do obeisance. To follow Jesus is to recognize that he would leave golden streets empty and untraveled, and walk with us in the dust of everyday life.
To follow Jesus is not to seek escape from the "dirt", but to serve and care for his needs by living others-centered lives. Worship does not look like staring at a screen and singing songs about heaven, but like learning to love, while sometimes lying in ashes. Any system that encourages escapism is inherently Gnostic, and cannot in any way be thought of as "Gospel". The Gospel is an earthy message that calls us to embrace the dirt, not to escape it.
And so I say again, we are not called to be God-like, but Christ-like, for in Jesus we see that God is not found so much in the transcendent, but in the transient. He is not served by holy ritual, but in sometimes messy human relationships. To be Christ-like is to abandon the quest for the ethereal, and to embrace that which is earthy.
Humanity's goal, seemingly from our earliest moments of consciousness, has been to transcend our humanity, and attain something far more celestial, eternal, and God-like in quality. Our myths and legends, which often tell tales of mere humans going on epic quests in order to overcome their mortality, and taste the divine, testify to this fact.
In Christian thought, however, this quest for divinity is turned on its head, as we see divinity itself -God- becoming man. And it isn't merely that he becomes man, but that he becomes a humble, lowly man, without any outward qualities that would hint at his being divine. Not only does he take a humble form of humanity upon himself, but swims to the very bottom, the black abyss, of the human experience, in his tasting of death, via crucifixion.
In myth, man seeks to become God, but in the Gospel, God becomes man.
Jesus' humanity is not discarded once it is no longer needed in order to "blend in with the natives", but is assumed into the Godhead, so that one can no longer refer to God without referring to his humanity, as well as to his status as a victim of crucifixion. God has, in Jesus, embraced our lowly and poor estate, and not simply in order that we might become Gods, as though everything He does is based on some concept of exchange. No, he embraces our humanity in order that we might come to see that it is not on the other side of our skin that the Kingdom of Heaven begins, but that it is right here, right now, in the middle of all of our faults, frailties, and weaknesses. It is here, in the land where tears still flow, hearts still break, and loss is still a possibility, that the Kingdom of Heaven has set up shop, and so it is here, therefore, that it is to be experienced, and that through our living of others-centered, self-giving lives.
The Kingdom of Heaven is not coming, it has come, and now seeks to express itself in and through our frailties. God does not call us to seek out escape routes, postmortem palaces, or experiences so mystical that they bear no resemblance to the earth on which we stand. No, "heaven" calls us earthward. To follow Christ is to follow him, not to a celestial kingdom located just behind yonder cloud formation, but into the dust of planet earth. It is to see the sacred nature of every man and woman, and to serve and treat them just as though they were the sacred object to which we do obeisance. To follow Jesus is to recognize that he would leave golden streets empty and untraveled, and walk with us in the dust of everyday life.
To follow Jesus is not to seek escape from the "dirt", but to serve and care for his needs by living others-centered lives. Worship does not look like staring at a screen and singing songs about heaven, but like learning to love, while sometimes lying in ashes. Any system that encourages escapism is inherently Gnostic, and cannot in any way be thought of as "Gospel". The Gospel is an earthy message that calls us to embrace the dirt, not to escape it.
And so I say again, we are not called to be God-like, but Christ-like, for in Jesus we see that God is not found so much in the transcendent, but in the transient. He is not served by holy ritual, but in sometimes messy human relationships. To be Christ-like is to abandon the quest for the ethereal, and to embrace that which is earthy.