I don’t think anyone wants to be a clone. Well, except for Steve Taylor.
If you’re not familiar with the music of Steve Taylor, you’re missing out. Steve belongs to the subgenre of Christian music I like to call ‘sardonic prophet music.’ These are the rabble-rousers of Christian music, the boat-rockers, the believers who aren’t afraid to believe in a Christian’s need for God. Sitting at this table are artists like the Swirling Eddies, Larry Norman, Keith Green, and of course, Steve Taylor.
Steve has a number of great songs, critiquing (with charm) things like media bias (“Meat the Press”), anti-interracial dating policies at Christian colleges at the time (“We Don’t Need No Color Code”), nihilistic college professors (“Since I Gave Up Hope I Feel Alot Better”), and more. I’ll leave you to guess what “I Blew Up The Clinic Real Good” is about.
My favorite Steve Taylor track is “I Want To Be A Clone.” A manifesto for uniformity, Steve delivers a passioned plea for all Christians to act, talk, and walk the same":
I asked the Lord into my heart
They said that was the way to start
But now you've got to play the part
I want to be a cloneBe a clone and kiss conviction goodnight
Cloneliness is next to Godliness, right?…Their language it was new to me
But Christianese got through to me
Now I can speak it fluently
I want to be a clone……'Cause if you want to be one of his
Got to act like one of us!
I think Steve points out a bad attitude in the church we are all prone to adopting: prefering conformity over community. In these moments, we believe truly following Christ means walking however we’re walking, talking however we talk. But this isn’t unity. It’s just being a clone.
One of the more famous literary friend groups were the Inklings, a group of Oxford professors who met regularly to talk about their writings and share any ideas they were mulling on. C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Charles Williams had much in common and became great friends through these gatherings. But they also had a lot of differences. It was the differences between them that Lewis recalls as lending the sweetness to their community:
“ ... In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity; I want other lights than my own to show all his facets...” - C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves
Commonalities brough them together, but their individual personalities made the fellowship truly sweet. Community is only possible by individuality, and individuality shines truest though community. If we were carbon copies of each other, we'd be, well...bored.
Here's just a few things Scripture outlines for what a community of Christians should look like:
should be known by their love for each other (John 13:35)
outdoing one another in honor (Romans 12:9-16)
hospitable and generous (1 Peter 4:8-9)
encourage each other in the Lord (1 Thes. 5:11)
Here's what Scripture doesn't require of Christian community:
only patronize Christian establishments and services
be in complete unison on tertiary, even secondary doctrines
consume only Christian-produced media, or do not consume media with a higher content rating than a Disney movie
creatives must produce art that is foremost evangelistic in nature
automatic adherence to whatever side of an issue the court of public opinion deems most virtuous
complete government takeover for theocracy or any other political ideology
We may choose to do the things above, but they neither affect our standing with God nor make us holier. They are a matter of personal choice. To pretend that our moral or preferential choices catapult us closer to holiness is to say that the Cross of Christ was not enough. Legalism is a cancer in the heart of a Christian.
Now, let’s be fair. Those who are knee-deep in legalism will say that what you choose to do with your time, money, creativity, and internet connection speak to the fruit of the Spirit in your life. To them, these are not merely preferences. A true Christian would not choose to watch an R-rated film, and if they did, they’re likely one dabbling in sin, flirting with a secret desire to backslide.
I once knew a guy who was utterly convinced he needed to listen to strictly Christian music all day in order to keep his heart and mind locked in on the Lord. When I suggested that this was unsustainable, he wondered why I felt I didn’t need to do this, too. “We are all so weak and self-centered,” he said, “If I listen to anything else I know it’ll take my eyes off God and it’s a slippery slope from there.”
This is what legalism says: it’s all about your grip on God, not about God’s grip on you.
They have a point: the way we order our lives and the content we choose to consume do reveal our own hearts. We should certainly pursue holiness in our days, aiming to fill our hearts and minds with things that are "pure and lovely and of a good report."
But pursuing purity is not the same as sanitizing or infantilizing your worldview. Consistent sheltering that warps our perspective of the true reality of a world full of horrific evil dulls our understanding of the sheer goodness of God in comparison.
As my pastor says, the law is our diagnosis but not our medicine. The law shows us how deeply we need to become new creations. It can't make us new creations. Only the grace of God, by the power of God, revealed by the Word of God, can do that.
Freedom in Christ is scary. It feels reckless, like risking your diet with a cheat day. Won’t I slip? Won’t grace give me license to sin?
Paul has always answered this question best.
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin. Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him: knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” - Romans 6:1-11
“All things are lawful, but not all things are expedient,” Paul adds in 1 Cor. 6:12.
What is expedient for me might not be expedient for you. What you might be able to consume or enjoy discerningly may be something that causes me to stumble. We need to take care of our 'weaker' brothers and sisters, refraining from suggesting activities, media, or arguments that we know will cause them to stumble. Concurrently, our weaker brothers need to refrain from judging the freedom others enjoy in Christ. This is part of what it means to outdo one another in honor. We honor the unique ways God is transforming our stories for His glory.
Christian community shouldn't require you to throw your uniqueness in the trash. We bring these things under the rule of Christ, allowing him to prune us of what is sin and purify us to become more like Him. This may mean that there are sinful parts of our personality, aesthetics, interests, and desires that we need to say goodbye to. But God isn't in the business of making a people for Himself with one personality; he's making a diverse Kingdom of people made more themselves. C. S. Lewis puts it this way:
“The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become—because He made us. He invented us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be. In that sense our real selves are all waiting for us in Him.… It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.” - C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
Through unique means and individual expressions, Christ is slowly transforming each one of us into the people he has predestined us to become. We put limits on Him when we assume each character in His story should look like some plain, boring, automaton NPC.
We are created to be more than clones. We were created to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Together.