How to be Like Jesus

Do you know that old song?

"Be like Jesus, this my song
In the home and in the throng.
Be like Jesus all day long,
I would be like Jesus."

Look up the rest of the verses sometime (a good place is the Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal, number 311), and ponder what they really mean, how daring our lives would be if we would truly be like Jesus.

Usually when I think of being like Jesus, I think about the things I want to do:  be kind, welcome children, provide enough food for five thousand people.

But there's more to being like Jesus than the warm fuzzy nice things.

"Who, when He was reviled, reviled not again...."

Wait.  What is reviled?  Mr. Webster says if you are reviled, you are spoken to abusively. 

So....to be like Jesus means that when someone is abusive to me in language or action, I don't say or do anything in angry retaliation.  I don't get to yell back if I get yelled at, or justify my revengeful acts or even thoughts and feelings by convincing myself that turnabout is fair play.

Tough stuff.

And there's more.

"... when He suffered, He threatened not..."

When people spit in His face?  He didn't use any power that He had to threaten them back.  Not words, not fire from heaven.  Even if it would have been fair for Him to do so. 

{Instead, He went on to pay the just price for the very sins people were committing against Him....but that would be a whole topic by itself.}

But how did He have such immeasurable self control?  Being like Him can seem like an impossible task.  Because I'd really like to threaten back while I'm suffering wrongs.  There are moments when I really would like to ask not so nicely how people could do what they've done.

"...but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously."  1 Peter 2:23

Jesus knew full well that there was Someone who would take care of every wrong, deal with every injustice, heal every wounded person who came to Him.  He trusted His Father to manage every circumstance He faced, and remained calm and collected in that faith.

Don't you think there's that kind of calm and collectedness for me?  For you?