We don't want to be like Jesus.

"He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not." Isaiah 53:3

As my big brother/extra dad/mentor Timotheus Pope says, "We want to be like Jesus, sure... we want to be like the glorified Jesus after He rose from the dead. We don't want to be like Jesus who took up the cross and died for people who hated him." 

I'm realizing, though, that I don't even want to be like one of the prophets or disciples. 

Moses: He wandered in the desert for forty years because freedom scared the Israelites. Moses helped deliver them from slavery, and he continually gets shafted. He doesn't even get to live in the Promised Land.

Hosea: God tells Hosea to marry a prostitute named Gomer as a demonstration of Israel's betrayal of God. She keeps cheating on him. He has to buy her out of slavery.

Ezekiel: He loves his wife. God says she's going to die and that he isn't allowed to mourn.

Jeremiah: No one likes him. He's got fire inside his bones. He cries a lot. 

David: He gets anointed as king, but his BFF's dad hunts him down for over a decade. 

Paul: “Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food,a in cold and exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.”  2 Corinthians 11:24-28

"And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword; whose weakness was turned to strength; and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies. Women received back their dead, raised to life again. Others were tortured and refused to be released, so that they might gain a better resurrection. Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. They were stoned; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.

"These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect." Hebrews 11:32-40

Samwise Gamgee says in the movie Two Towers, "It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were... But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you, the ones that meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going because they were holding on to something."

I prayed that my life would be a story that shouts God's love, grace, and mercy. I didn't understand what that would entail. I still don't fully know. 

But, you know what? 

I want to be like an apostle or prophet... or maybe even like Jesus.

I'm holding on to something.

I believe He is good.

I see He understands.

But, most of all, I know He is worth it.