John 5, Luke 6: You Will Turn Out Like Your Teacher

Your system is perfectly designed to give you the results you're getting. 

This quote from W. Edwards Deming has been stuck in my mind since the first time I read it. I have spent most of my life dissatisfied with the results I'm getting. I wanted better grades. I wanted to get the girl. I wanted more money, better friends, more cool stuff. I have wanted deeper relationships, with other people and with God. I have wanted to learn a new language. And on and on and on. Why have I accomplished very few of these things? Because, in so many ways, I have not changed. I have not changed. I am not doing anything differently, and yet I hope for a different outcome. And I get hurt and angry when it isn't happening.

What happens if a blind man leads a blind man? Won’t both of them fall into a pit? 

The truth is: I am a blind man. In more ways than not, I really don't have any idea what I'm doing. Few of us do. We are all trying to figure out this life and how best to live it. This question from Jesus makes me ask myself: Am I getting the results from my life that I hope? Because if I am not, I can't just keep continuing to live the way I do and think I'm somehow going to magically get different results. It's time for a change.

You can’t turn out better than your teacher; when you’re fully taught, you will resemble your teacher.

This is a sobering thought for me as well. Too often, I try to go it alone. I don't want to display my ignorance, so I would much rather try to learn things on my own than go to someone else for help. If what Jesus says here is true (which I'm betting it is), I am dooming myself if I am unwilling to learn from someone else, if I am unwilling to follow someone else. I think when Jesus is referring to a teacher here, He is talking about more than a professor who just transfers knowledge. He is talking about the transfer of wisdom and skill.

If the best I can do, when I'm fully taught, is to resemble my teacher, then I think I better get started looking for a good teacher, for a person who displays the likeness of Christ for me to imitate. This is the only way I will live fully the life God has designed for me. As long I am stuck trying to teach myself, it will never work.

Jesus continues this thought a few sentences later.

no good tree bears bad fruit, and no bad tree bears good fruit.

How can I learn to produce good fruit by following someone who is not producing good fruit? It doesn't make any sense. It isn't possible. I will become more and more like the people I follow and the teachers I listen to. How can I know if a teacher is bearing good fruit? I have to know that teacher. I have to be around him and see his life and his family and the way he handles himself. I need to be able to judge his life outside of the words he speaks in public or from a stage. I need to know him. This is the only way to know if he is producing good fruit. It is easy to look good from a distance. It is much more difficult up close.