Standing on the desk!

The Dead Poet's Society, in my opinion may be one of the best films ever made. Robin Williams plays an inspiring young teacher named John Keating who believes that education is not so much about teaching your students facts, but teaching them how to think for themselves. In this clip takes a good illustration and turns it into an even better invitation. 


"I stand upon my desk to remind myself that we must constantly look at things in a different way... You see, the world looks very differently from up here..." is an illustration, but "Don't believe me? Come see for yourselves." is an invitation. Keating does not just want his students to think about what it would be like to stand on the desk, he wants them to experience it first hand. 
I think I am guilty of looking at the life of Jesus in this same way: as an illustration of a way to live. As if the sole purpose of Jesus' visit to earth was to set an example of a good life for us to look at. But maybe Jesus doesn't want us to think of it as an illustration at all, maybe it was an invitation. What if Jesus is saying, "I want you to look at the world in a completely different way, I want you to see it how I see it"? What if He didn't come to set a bunch of standards and guidelines for us to live up to, but instead He came to invite us to live a life completely transformed- a life full of beauty, mystery, and power beyond anything we could even hope to imagine? What if that life He is calling us to is the one that deep down in our hearts we know we were created for all along?
Could it even be possible that Jesus wants to be a part of my story, and me to be a part of His? 
... I certainly hope so!