How to Be Human Like God

Holy Week reminds us to imitate Jesus Christ as the author and perfecter of our faith.

I’m both young and old enough to remember the WWJD bracelet fad of the ’90s and early 2000s—a daily reminder of what Jesus might do or say in any given situation.

But what some may not remember is that WWJD was not welcomed with uncritical support in all corners of the Christian world. Growing up in evangelical circles, some church leaders claimed it was the wrong question to ask. Others chalked WWJD up to a “cultural Christian” phenomenon—focused on being a better person instead of being saved in spite of yourself.

Modern evangelicals still struggle to prioritize imitating Christ as a scriptural mandate. There are several reasons for this, many of which are bound up in the history of Protestantism, and especially Reformed and modern evangelical theology.

For instance, a 1965 CT cover story explains how—in an effort to resist the liberal deconstruction of the time, which promoted a parody of imitating Christ—Protestant neo-orthodox theologians overreacted and eventually eclipsed the doctrine altogether.

To this day, many Christians remain divided over whether our faith is more about believing and sharing the message of what God has done in Christ or about following Jesus in all he taught through word and deed. This often boils down to whether Christians should focus on orthodoxy (right belief) or orthopraxy (right action).

But as Tish Harrison Warren recently pointed out, there is an additional step that bridges these two: orthopathy—or cultivating the right passions. Orthopathy speaks to matters of the heart, such as what we love and what we desire.

Luke Burgis argued in CT that the reason we love the streaming show “The Chosen” so much ...