Recently, I was writing a newsletter article (this one) and was reminded that Jesus commissioned us, his disciples, to duplicate ourselves. The newsletter article was only one of about 225 printed and mailed. The original took hours, perhaps days, of work producing content and determining lay-out. But, once the original was complete, the process of duplicating it was done in mere minutes! Consider for a moment how the quality of duplication has improved. Remember the old mimeograph?! Today, the quality of printers makes it virtually impossible to distinguish the original from a copy! That’s the point: we Christians have been charged to duplicate ourselves: “Go now and make disciples,” he says to his disciples in Matthew 28. That is, “Disciples, make disciples.” I realize that’s an awfully simplistic analogy. Unlike reproducing by machine and on paper, duplicating disciples takes much more time and is wholly more complex. We will never be exactly like Jesus, and no two disciples will look exactly alike. Even so, the idea is that we “copies” become as much like our “original” as possible; and in the process, we “make” more. Jesus doesn’t need more people that resemble a thirty-year-old, first-century, Middle Eastern man like himself. His commission is that we make more of those who demonstrate his qualities and characteristics – specifically: giving attention to the poor and to the outcast, and living a life of sacrifice and service. Jesus was a servant leader, and his life was the model for us, his disciples – he is The Original. The questions to ask: How might I live in a way that is virtually impossible to distinguish myself from that life? And how might I, his disciple, make more?
Pastor Leonard
