Theological Commentary: Click Here
Discipleship Focus: Imitation
- Imitation: This is the second over-arching step of the discipleship process. First we gain information, then we imitate our spiritual mentor. Imitation leads to innovation of spirituality in our own life.
Until I
read this passage again today, I had completely forgotten about the Rechabites
and the teachings of Jonadab. If you don’t
know the background, read my blog post from 3 years ago, to which I have
created a link above. I’ll summarize
here:
- Jonadab was linked with Jehu as God judged Israel.
- After the judgment, Jonadab turns to a nomadic lifestyle and swears off all alcohol. After all, what nomad has time and space to make alcohol for themselves?
- Over 200 years later, the descendants are still following Jonadab’s instructions.
What I am
blown away by is that this time span is approximately the same length of time
that America has officially been a nation. How many of us still follow the
moral directives of our ancestors who lived at the time of the forming of this
country? How many of us even know who those ancestors are?
There is
only one way that a moral directive like that can pass through a group of
people with any kind of proficiency. The
culture of the Rechabites understood the need for imitation. They understood that the way to remain
faithful is to find faithful people around us, learn what they have to teach
us, and then imitate it in our own lives.
The
Rechabites are a great example of faith formation. They are able to stay true for generation
after generation. They are able to stay
true to their faith even when the world around them are forsaking God to pursue
their own desires. They can do it
because they took seriously what it means to imitate the faithful people around
them.
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