The Imitation of Christ
I have a lot of Spiritual books on my reading list.  Many of them that I have read already, and some that I am itching to get through.  Each one of these books holds a treasure to change who I am, and lessons to living life to the fullest in the realist way.  While I could have started with anyone of those books, I decided to start with a book that I am reading: The Imitation of Christ.

imitation of Christ
The Imitation of Christ is one of the most widely read devotional over 500 years.  Yup–I said it right, 500 years!  I first came across it by reading a quote in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.  All Christians can get something out of this, not only Catholics.  I honesty would say that this text is good for anyone who wants grow their devotion to  Christ.

 

Learning Detachment

 

One of the greatest lessons that I’ve learned through this book, is about detachment.  Not just from things around us, but detachment from praise, detachment from our own pride and desires.  Each and every single false attachment we have to things (and sometimes people) makes us less attached to God.  So for instance, if you’re always wondering what other people what think of you, maybe you won’t go out there and share the truth because you don’t want anyone to think that you are crazy.

To sum it up, there is a sort of self-death that happens to us when we truly become disciples of Christ.  

 

Discerning Desires

 

Desires (I think) is one of the greats things that leads us into great sin.  Not too long ago, I wrote a series on the Deadly Seven sins and how they usually lead us into breaking the Ten Commandments.  All of these have to do with our desires (or will) that is not in communion with God’s will.  This books helps us learn how to conduct ourselves not only in difficult situations but helps us from ourselves as well.

 

A Sober Read

 

Over all, I would call this a sober read.  Not in any way bad–it is a read that slowly tears away at your pride, and the chip on our shoulder, and reminds us about humility and being charitable.  How we are not see ourselves as proud people, but people who are lowly in the eyes of God.  How we should not seek the fame, and approval of everyone around us, but how we should always keep our eyes heaven bound.

Understandably, this world is full of temptation, and it’s full of evil deeds, and suffering, but this also helps us remind ourselves why this suffering is happening.  It help ground ourselves that we can endure this life–hardships and all–and that there is a purpose for it.

No burden is too great for any person, and while we are here on our earthly pilgrimage, we should always remember that this state is temporary.  Fame is temporary, wealth is temporary, because when we go (and we all will go) none of that comes with us.  All we will judged for is how we lived our lives and if we truly lived our lives as Jesus’ disciple.

 

Final Thoughts

 

While I am still going through this book, I wanted to make sure that I recommend it first.  Next to the Bible it is a highly read devotional book, and if you haven’t read it yet, I urge you to pick up a copy.  The words are easy to understand the advice and lessons are rich.  You can read through it quickly, but you may end up missing something.  I would suggest reading this to savor this.

This book has 4 parts, and the last two parts (Book 3 and 4) are like a dialogue.  

 

Favorite Quotes

 

No one in this world is so perfect or holy as to not have temptations sometimes.  We can never be entirely free of them.

 

It is good that everything is not always to our liking; for adversity makes people look into their hearts in order to realize that they are exiles and must not put their hopes into worldly things.

 

Learn to be patient in enduring the faults of others, remembering that you yourself have many which others have to put up with.

 

To think, these are just a few of my favorite quotes!  There are so many, but overall, there to many practical lessons that has helped me change my perception of myself.

For any of you interested in this book here is the information:

 

ISBN number: 978-0-89942-323-4

Title: The Imitation of Christ

Author: Thomas À Kempis

 

Have you read The Imitation of Christ?  If so, what have you learned from it? 


This post was originally published on Feb, 13, 2015.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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