(Please purchase your own copy of Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith.)
When we think about Jesus as that exceptional, unusual person who lived long ago and whose life and words continue to inspire us, we might avoid the realization that Jesus wants us to be like him. Jesus himself keeps saying in many ways that he, the Beloved Child of God, came to reveal to us that we too are God’s beloved children, loved with the same unconditional divine love.
John writes to his people, “You must see what great love the Father has lavished on us by letting us be called God’s children—which is what we are.” (1 John 3:1). This is the great challenge of the spiritual life: to claim the identity of Jesus for ourselves and to say, “We are the living Christ today!”
