A Disciple of Jesus Christ: Bounds
As I said in the previous post in this series (“A Disciple of Jesus Christ: Introduction”) simply defining the terms related to disciples and discipleship does not define what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.
The term “disciple” can refer to someone who is a pupil or student, or it can refer to someone who continuously and consistently follows a teachers and the manner of life of a teacher.
We find the term “disciple” used from one extreme of these definitions to the other extreme. While the term is primarily used positively in the Gospels, there are a few exceptions.
John gives us a glimpse of the range of meanings of “disciple” in the sixth chapter of his Gospel. For example, Jesus teaches about the necessity of “eating the bread that was sent from heaven, that is, his flesh.” While some equate this with the Lord’s Supper / Communion / Eucharist, it seems in context to refer to both trusting completely in Jesus Christ for life and to living life according to Jesus Christ.
After this “hard teaching,” John says:
After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. (John 6:66 ESV)
Notice that these people are identified as “disciples,” and yet they choose to follow Jesus no longer.
In contrast, when Jesus asks “the Twelve” (who have previously also been identified as “disciples” – see earlier in this same passage John 6:3, John 6:8, John 6:12, John 6:16, John 6:22, and John 6:24) if they intend to stop following him also, Simon Peter, answering for the group, says:
“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6:68-69 ESV)
Furthermore, in case we think there is something special about being a disciple who is also one of the the Twelve, John writes:
Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the Twelve? And yet one of you is a devil.” He spoke of Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the Twelve, was going to betray him. (John 6:70-71 ESV)
In this short passage, we see “disciple” referring to those who were interested in Jesus but only up to a point. We see “disciple” referring to those who are physically close to Jesus and remain with him after others leave, but even those are not guaranteed to be “true disciples.”
So, at the beginning of John 6, there are many disciples. They follow Jesus around the lake. After Jesus points out what it takes to truly follow him, some turn back, but others continue to follow him. At this point, there are fewer disciples. However, even those are not all “true disciples.”
In this passage, and in other passages in his Gospel, John helps us understand (beyond the definitions of certain terms) what it means to truly be a disciple of Jesus Christ. I’ll continue examining what it means to be a “true disciple” in my next post in this series.
Why Obey the Commands of Scripture?
We know that Paul wrote that we are saved by grace through faith, and not by our works. (Yes, I know that James wrote that we are justified by faith that includes works, but that’s for another post.)
But, after writing something like that in each of his letters, Paul would then write a series of commands. These were typically written as imperatives: you must do this. Or, simply, “Do this!”
Have you ever wondered why Paul would write commands that we must (apparently) obey, even though obedience does not earn our salvation? And, if we understand other parts of Scripture, obedience will not cause God to love us, and neither will disobedience cause him to reject us.
So, why obey the commands of Scripture?
When do the training wheels come off?
Last week, Jeremy at “Till He Comes” wrote a very good post called “Always at Training, Never Trained.”
This is a great post to consider during my current series on discipleship.
After talking about different “tracks” and “traps” that people often get caught in, Jeremy concludes with this paragraph on “On the Job Training”:
This is why Jesus never really did any formal training with His disciples. It was all “on the job training.†Sure, He taught and instructed them, but it was almost always on the way to something Jesus was going to do, or as a debriefing for something He had already done. Eventually, He just kicked them out the door with a pair of shoes and a shirt, and said, “Come back in a few weeks and we’ll talk about how it went†(Luke 10).
There is a tendency in the modern church to see training as the goal. Most traditional church meetings are geared to training: what to believe especially. Most Bible studies are also geared toward training. Very little in the modern church actually gets people involved in the lives of others.
Training is not our goal.
A Disciple of Jesus Christ – Introduction
Several days ago, in response to my post “Q&A Session,” Jack asked a very good set of questions (and statements) concerning being a disciple of Jesus Christ:
I am working on a paper about discipleship and I was wondering if you could give me your thoughts on the usage of ΜαθητευÌω, μαθητηÌÏ‚, and μανθαÌνω.
I am finding very little definition, but a lot of demonstration of what discipleship is from Jesus. I would like a better understanding of the greek words and if I am using them correctly.
As I thought about Jack’s questions, I realized that I could not answer in one post. Plus, if I answered the specific questions about the Greek words, the answer would be incomplete. As Jack said after asking about definitions, understanding discipleship in Scripture requires more than understanding the definitions of specific Greek terms.
But, let’s begin with the three terms that Jack asked about:
μανθαÌνω (manthano) – This verb generally means to learn or to find out. It is found several times in the New Testament (and in the LXX – the Greek version of the Old Testament). (For examples of this verb, see Matthew 9:13, John 7:15, Acts 23:27, Romans 16:17, and Hebrews 5:8.)
μαθητευÌω (matheteuo) – This verb is only found in four places in the New Testament: 3 in Matthew and once in Acts. When found in the passive form (Matthew 13:52 and Matthew 27:57), it means to be or become a disciple. In the active form (Matthew 28:19 and Acts 14:21), it means to make or form a disciple. (To examine the meaning of “disciple,” we have to look at the noun version.)
μαθητηÌÏ‚ (mathetes) – This is the noun form from which we get the translation “disciple.” This noun is only found in the Gospels (all four) and in the Book of Acts. Glosses such as “learner,” “pupil,” and “disciple” are often used in English translations of this noun. (For examples of this noun, see Matthew 5:1, Matthew 9:14, and Matthew 10:25.)
These terms (like most – if not all – Greek terms in the NT) are not specifically “Christian.” These words had been around and had been in use before Jesus was incarnated and before the New Testament was written.
Furthermore, most of the noun uses (i.e., “disciples”) simply refer to a group of people and do not necessarily tell us what the term means.
Since the terms themselves do not help us understand what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, we’ll have to look for other clues in the text of the New Testament.
Where’s my super suit?
You know that scene from the animated “The Incredibles” right? It’s one of my favorite scenes of all time.
Lucius (a friend of Bob Parr a.k.a. Mr. Incredible) is preparing to come out of retirement as Frozone to battle the evil Syndrome.
But, there’s one problem. He has a date with his wife Honey. Here’s the dialog from the scene:
Lucius: Honey?
Honey: What?
Lucius: Where’s my super suit?
Honey: What?
Lucius: Where – is – my – super – suit?
Honey: I, uh, put it away.
[helicopter explodes outside]
Lucius: *Where*?
Honey: *Why* do you *need* to know?
Lucius: I need it!
Lucius had been living as a normal person. But, now that there was trouble and he felt needed, he was ready to jump into action as the superhero Frozone. (Of course, Honey had other plans.)
But, I think many Christians live life like Frozone. No, not as superheros in hiding… although, it is something like that.
Instead, they think that God cannot and will not use them unless everything is just right: they’ve had their “daily quite time” or they’ve been reading Scripture regularly or they’ve attended the right kind and right number of church meetings or they’ve had a certain amount of education and training or they hold a certain position in the church.
Nothing could be further from the truth. For those of us who are God’s children (that is, we’re saved and indwelled by the Holy Spirit), then God is ready, willing, and able to work in and through us in a variety of ways.
God is not waiting for us to find our “super suit.” Instead, he’s waiting for us to begin working to serve others so that he can then work through us.
What? God is waiting for us to work? Yes. God works through the efforts of his children. While studying Colossians, I saw this clearly in the following statement that Paul made about his own work for the gospel and for the church:
For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me. (Colossians 1:29 ESV)
Paul is working hard, but as he works he finds that God is providing the energy he needs to get the work done. I think the same concept can be found in other parts of Scripture as well.
There are no “super” Christians. There are followers of Christ who are working for others, and there are those who are not working for others. There are Christians who are love God by loving others, and there are those who are not loving God or others. There are believers who are serving through the gifts that the Spirit has given, and there are those who choose not to use their gifts to serve others.
Stop looking for or waiting for your super suit. As I’ve told many people: God is able to more through you than you think (regardless of what you think).
So, start serving others (working hard or toiling at serving others) and give God a chance to empower you as well.
Equipment Failure
I love it when a post or writer causes me to think about something from a different angle.
Dan at “The Ekklesia in Southern Maine” recently did that in his post “Equipped.” He used a metaphor to help me think about discipleship in a new way.
In the post, Dan talks about the difference between the way that Mainers deal with snow and the way that North Carolinians deal with snow. He writes:
So what is the difference? Like I said at the beginning, it always snows in Maine. It rarely snows in North Carolina. Mainers are prepared and equipped to deal with heavy snowfalls. North Carolinians are not equipped to deal with any snow. [In Maine] Every town, every grocery store, every strip mall has it’s own fleet of tractors, back hoes, dump trucks, or whatever other dinosaur vehicle they can get to plow snow. Every homeowner has a snow blower or a plow for their pickup. Every car is equipped with an ice scraper. Every porch has a shovel and a bucket of sand or salt sitting on it. Every Mainer has gloves and hats and boots and heavy jackets. We are prepared. We are equipped.
Dan compared being equipped for snow with making disciples. He wondered what would happen if the disciple-making chain (“the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” – 2 Timothy 2:2) was broken.
But, Dan’s post made me think of something else. Since North Carolina rarely gets snow, it would be ridiculous to be as equipped for snow here (in North Carolina) as Mainers are. Oh, it might be beneficial for North Carolinians once or twice per year (or decade), but day in and day out, it would not be beneficial for North Carolina to be as equipped for snow as Mainers.
And, I wondered… could it be that most Christians and churches are “equipped” for the wrong things?
What do you think? What are most Christians and churches equipped for today? What should they be equipped for?
Well, we did pray for that, didn’t we?
A few months ago, I had the opportunity to get together with some of the other elders who are part of our fellowship. When we were talking and praying, we all mentioned some sense of discouragement concerning our opportunities to reach out to people outside of our fellowship. We prayed for one another, and we asked God to open those doors for us.
A few nights ago, we got together again. We talked about several different things, but mostly we talked about and prayed for each other and other people we know.
As we were talking, each person would list a few names of people that God had brought into their lives, and how they now had opportunities to serve these people and to share the gospel with them. Most of the people had also introduced one or more of my brothers to their family or friends, who presented even more opportunities for us.
Suddenly, we realized that God was answering our previous prayer! We had asked God to give us opportunities, and he was. Oh, these were probably not the opportunities or the people that we had in mind. But, God had opened these doors for us to love and serve people in the name of Jesus, and we were doing just that.
For example, I’ve recently become acquainted with an older couple who is part of my wife’s Meals on Wheels route. They’ve introduced me to some of their family. At a recent food pantry, a man told me that he wanted to understand Scriptures better, and I’ve had several opportunities to talk with him and begin planning a Bible study for him and others. Another family stopped by our meeting place, and we’ve since had several opportunities to help them and even meet their family.
And, the people that mentioned above are only a few of the people that God has brought into my life in the last couple of months. The other elders told about other people like neighbors or coworkers or even complete strangers that God has since brought into their lives.
We sat stunned for only a moment, and then we realized: Well, we did pray for that, didn’t we?
Have you recently (or ever) prayed that God would bring people into your lives or give you opportunities to share with others the love and grace of God through Jesus Christ? Or, have you prayed that God would bring other believers into your life to share in fellowship with you? How did God answer that prayer? (Or has he not answered it yet?)
When you pray…
Andy at “aBowden blog” has a very good post called “Myths about prayer.” He offers several “lessons learned” about prayer from a study of Matthew 6.
Andy has alot of very good points in his post. I think he has seven points in all, and they are all worth considering. Most of his points deal with the quality or effectiveness of his prayers.
He ends his post with this:
When I take Jesus’ words about prayer to heart, I find my own prayer life strengthened. No longer do I judge the effectiveness of my prayers by their length or verboseness, and this God-blessed simplicity fuels my prayer life. I can simply talk to God, and when I’ve told him what is on my heart — even if it is only a few short sentences — that is okay.
We’ve also recently finished a study of prayer (well, it continues for one more week). Here are a few things that I’ve learned:
- There’s nothing special about bowing your head and closing your eyes when you pray, or saying “In Jesus’ name” or “Amen” at the end.
- If you have a “daily quiet time,” that’s fine. But, don’t think that you’ve finished praying when the “daily quiet time” is over. In fact, you’ve only just begun to pray.
- Your relationships with other people affect your prayers – both what you pray for, and how God hears your prayers.
- God is always present, and every word and thought is a prayer, whether we realize it or not.
What do you think?
Encourage one another daily
On this blog, I write alot about the church. I mean, the title of the blog is “The Assembling of the Church,” so what else should you expect.
But, sometimes, we can all fall into the trap of thinking of the assembling of the church as a once per week thing (or even twice or three times).
However, when we read Scripture, we see a different picture. Consider just this one snippet of Scripture from the Book of Hebrews:
But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. (Hebrews 3:13 ESV)
In that passage, the author tells his readers to help one another so that they (individually or together) do not become hardened to sin. But, to the point of this post, he tells them to do this daily. Not weekly; but daily.
When reading through Scripture, it doesn’t take long to see a pattern: we need each other in our lives daily. Getting together once per week – even in a highly participatory meeting – will not give us opportunities to love, teach, care, share, admonish, encourage, etc. one another as we need for our spiritual growth.
No. The interaction must be more often and more personal than we see in most church meetings. We need others to ask us the hard questions about our own lives, and we need to ask others hard questions about their lives.
Of course, this all assumes that we are willing to share our lives with one another, and that we are willing to make the extra effort (and give up much personal or family time and energy and resources). To be honest, many are not willing. Many are not willing to open their lives to other people, and they are not willing to step into other people’s lives that are opened to them.
But, we need this. It’s not just a good idea; it is the way that God has chosen to work in and through us. Paul wrote that we grow when our lives are knit together and function together like muscles and ligaments. And what happens if we are not knit together in this fashion? We don’t grow.
If you look around the landscape of the church today, you’ll see many, many, many immature Christians. We are not growing.
So, how are you planning to encourage others today? What? Planning? Yes, planning. We must be intentional.
How are you planning to encourage others today? What about tomorrow?
How have others encouraged you day to day?
(Please share… these are not rhetorical questions.)
Theological Sources
Three years ago, I published a series called “Theological Sources” based loosely on “Wesley’s Quadrilateral.” There were six posts in the series: Introduction, Scripture, Tradition, Reason, Experience, and Conclusion. Here is the conclusion of the series.
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Theological Sources – Conclusion
In this series, I want to discuss the various sources that inform our theology – that is, our understanding of God. For an outline, I will use John Wesley’s Quadrilateral: Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience. I realize that this is not new information for many of my readers. However, perhaps we can all help ourselves think about this important topic.
My understanding of Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience have all worked together to shape what I think about God – my theology. Your understanding of Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience have all worked together to shape your theology. While Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience may all be object (real things), our interpretation of them is subjective.
This does not mean that there is no reality. I believe there is reality, and I believe that God is part of that reality. Again, however, this is part of my theology. There are many who believe that God does not exist, or that many gods exist, or that everything is a god.
Our theology is our attempt to understand that reality. Our interpretation of Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience all play a part in that attempt to understand reality. The subjectivity of our attempt at understanding reality does not negate the objectivity of reality itself. (By the way, Jeff suggested Nature as another theological source. This is very intriguing, especially given the modern attempt at developing a Natural Theology. I have not thought through Nature as a theological source, but if you want to discuss it in the comments, please do so.)
Now, if God is part of that reality – and I believe that he is – and if God communicates to us – and I believe that he does – then I must add him to my theological sources, especially his indwelling presence through the person of the Holy Spirit. Now, it is true that God communicates to us through Scripture. And, it is true that God communicates to us through Tradition, Reason, and Experience. However, Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience are not the totality of God. God is a person that exists apart from Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience. And, God is objective – not subjective. However, just like the other sources of theology, our understanding or our interpretation of God’s communication with us is subjective.
My theology – my understanding of God – is not perfect. It is wrong. However, my understanding of God can grow closer to the reality of God himself as I allow him, Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience to all work together to inform, grow, and mature my theology. Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience apart from God will not grow my understanding of God. This assumes, of course, that I allow God to use these various influences to modify my theology. For example, Calvin spent many years developing his theology. Today, people continue to study and hold to his last edition, sometimes to the point of vilify any who would disagree with this particular version of Calvin’s theology. I wonder how Calvin would have changed his theology in later editions if he had lived longer. (By the way, I’m not picking on Calvin at this point. The same could be said of many theologians and their followers.)
Furthermore, many people study Scripture, Tradition, Reason, and Experience – and other theological sources – apart from the indwelling presence of God. Many times these people will understand the words of Scripture, the teaching of Tradition, the logic of Reason, and the meaning of Experience better than God’s own children. However, this does not mean that their theology matches up with the reality of God. God must be recognized as the primary theological source.
The reality of God is not different from God as he is described in Scripture, but the reality of God may be different from our understanding of Scripture. This is true of all of the theological sources. The reality of God defines the sources, not the other way around. Similarly, our faith is not based on what we think we know about God, but in the person of God himself, even recognizing that he is different than we think he is.
Please do not misunderstand what I am saying. I am not saying that we can know nothing about God. We can. I am not saying that it is impossible to understand anything about God. It is possible. However, as the Proverbs teach us, we must trust completely in God himself – the real person that he is – not in our own understandings – even our own understandings about God. When our understandings about God are wrong, we must trust God to reveal those to us in whatever means he chooses. If our understandings about God are correct, then we also must trust God to confirm that to us, again in whatever means he chooses.
Furthermore, we must be very careful that we do not condemn someone because their understanding of God is different from our own. Yes, I recognize that there are times when Scripture instructs us to distance ourselves from certain beliefs, and we should do this. However, today, it is rarely the case that I see two believers separating because one denies that Jesus is the Son of God or that Jesus came in the flesh or because one of them refuses to work or is divisive or even because one of them continues to live in unrepentant sin. Primarily, when I see two believers separating themselves from one another it is because their understanding of God differs in another area. I could produce a long list here, but I would probably leave out too many.
The questions that I feel we must ask ourselves at this point is the following: If we can recognize that we do not fully understand God and that God continues to work in our lives to refine our understanding of himself, why do we not allow God the same freedom to work in the lives of other believers? God is real. He is present. He is working. He is communicating. He cares about his people more than you think. He is able to bring them to a better understanding of himself. Perhaps, by remaining in fellowship with other believers, God may even use them to bring you and me into a better understanding of who he is.
As I finish this conclusion, I want to leave with some questions for discussion: 1) Do you agree that God in the person of the Holy Spirit must be the primary source of our theology? 2) How do you see the Holy Spirit working through the other sources? 3) Is it possible for us to rely on the other sources (even the words of Scripture) to a point that we do not rely on God himself?