DISCIPLESHIP JESUS' WAY

-On Wednesday nights I am trying to give a well-rounded discipleship study, and I have dedicated the third Wednesday of the month to talk about discipleship itself. That is our mission as a church—We LIVE AND GROW IN CHRIST TOGETHER. We learn from Christ and then we live like Christ. But to do that, discipleship needs to be taken seriously. So, tonight I want to look at discipleship Jesus’ way—what does Jesus demonstrate about discipleship, and so we’ll look in Mark 1.

-In the Dictionary of the New Testament it says that the word “disciple” does not appear in the New Testament except in the gospel and Acts. But the word never means a pupil who receives instruction from a master. Rather, it always refers to someone who shares a close and definitive relationship with one person. That means discipleship is not only about me standing behind a pulpit teaching you stuff, it is also being together with others maturing in the context of a relationship.

-That right there is a lot to chew on, but I believe that we see discipleship done Jesus’ way in the way that He called the first disciples and then in how they responded. This is how Mark records it:

Mark 1:16–20 ESV

16 Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. 17 And Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” 18 And immediately they left their nets and followed him. 19 And going on a little farther, he saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. 20 And immediately he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him.

-Three quick lessons about disciples and discipleship tonight. First let’s look at:

1) The disciples’ response to Christ’s summons

-In first century Judaism it was actually normal for the student to approach the teacher to ask to become a learner/disciple from that teacher. But here, Jesus does the opposite—He seeks the people out (and aren’t we glad He does). Here he summons these four men to follow Him in order to become fishers of men. And their response teaches us a lot about what our response should be.

-First, we notice that their response was prompt. It says in v. 18 that Peter and Andrew immediately left their nets to follow Him, and in v. 20 John and James left their nets and their father and their servants to follow Him. They knew the urgency of the call, so they immediately followed. They didn’t him and haw. They didn’t tell Jesus LET ME THINK ABOUT THIS FOR A MINUTE.

-They dropped everything they were doing to follow Jesus, and we are called to the same. There is nothing more important on this earth than following Jesus and becoming a fisher of men.

-Second, we notice their response was complete—it was a response of total commitment. They left all in order fulfill the calling of Jesus on their lives. Now, that doesn’t mean we ought to leave job and family right now and become a church planter somewhere. But what it does mean that whatever Christ calls you to do as His disciple that is where the priority lies.

-And then, third, their response to the summons was sacrificial. They were willing to give up their earthly comforts to follow Jesus for the things of eternity. If you think about it, all they’ve every known was fishing their whole lives. That was their comfort zone, and Jesus called them to leave their comfort zone for a greater work—to walk with Him and learn from Him and live for Him.

-They weren’t going to gain a lot of money by following Jesus. They weren’t going to gain glory and fame. They weren’t going to gain a whole lot on this earth. But they made sacrifices in their earthly life because they knew that following Jesus was much more important in the whole of eternity.

-A lot of American Christians don’t think Jesus would call them out of their comfort zone, but He said to take up your cross, die to self, and follow Him. And then you are His disciple. So, we see that the disciple’s response to the summons was prompt, complete, and sacrificial. The second lesson I want to touch on tonight is to look at:

2) The disciples’ attachment to Christ’s person

-Here’s the thing: a call to Christian discipleship is not a call to a religion. It is not a call to follow rules, regulations, laws, and tradition. It is not a call to church attendance or church membership (although, those things are important). What did Jesus tell these men? He said: Follow ME! He said: Come after ME! (Emphasis on the ME.) It was not a partnership: He was the Master, they were the servant-disciples and they were called to come after the person of Christ, to seek Christ, to follow Christ, to imitate the example of Christ, to make Christ eh center of their everything.

-That means that true Christianity is not merely about doctrine and ethics—true Christianity is about CHRIST as He has been revealed to us in the Scripture. Doctrine and ethics are important, but we get those from the person of Christ. This is where so many American Christians fall short. So many in our churches today believe that if they merely oppose what they are supposed to oppose and confirm what they are supposed to confirm then they are doing Christianity the right way. If you oppose abortion and LGBTQ and they affirm the ten commandments, they think that’s Christian discipleship.

-Now, yes, God is against those sins and is for His moral code, but that is not the center of Christian discipleship. There’s a lot of conservative people in the USA that believe those things but they’re not Christian. True Christian discipleship is centered on the person of Christ. As one author summarized it:

Jesus’ followers are not called to follow the study of the law but to follow Him…They were not so much followers of a particular teaching, sacrament, hermeneutical theory, or ethic but to a person—Jesus Christ. The object of their faith and hope was Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The call of Jesus also differed from that of the Old Testament prophets, for whereas they called people to follow God, Jesus called people to follow Him.

-Christian discipleship is centered on the person of Christ. You are a disciple of Christ when Christ is the center of your life, decisions, family, work, church, entertainment, etc. God help those who think that they can have a Christless Christianity. Jesus is the person that is the center of discipleship. Finally, we see:

3) The disciples’ acceptance of Christ’s authority

-To leave everything behind to follow Jesus meant that they were submitting themselves not only to the teachings of Jesus and the lifestyle of Jesus, but as servants they placed themselves under His authority. To be a disciple of Christ is a recognition that Jesus is the Master and the disciple is the servant, which means that Jesus’ words and teachings and life rule over us. As one author stated it:

The call of Jesus was not to find fulfillment in what they were already doing but to a radically new purpose in life. From henceforth they would serve not their own interests and desires but those of Jesus who called them.

-For far too many Christian, the concept of Christian discipleship is to just put a religious veneer over their own lifestyle—to bless their own self-centered pursuits. What I mean by this is that they are fully in control of their lives and their destinies; they make the decisions for the direction their lfie takes; they make the decisions for everything without listening for the voice and guidance of Christ. Their version of discipleship is to sprinkle a little Jesus here and a little Jesus there and say that what they are doing is blessed of God. That is their Christian discipleship.

-For so many it is about what they choose to do instead of responding to Christ’s summons, attaching to Christ’s person, and accepting Christ authority. It is so easy to become our own authorities. But Peter, Andrew, James and John left everything, placed themselves under the authority of Jesus, so that where Jesus said to go they went. What Jesus said to do they did. What Jesus said to say they said. They didn’t just do their own little thing and sprinkle Jesus in there. Jesus was their ultimate authority, not themselves. That’s discipleship.

Conclusion

-Without us seeing Christ face to face, how can we be disciples of Jesus? Let me use an illustration from Chuck Swindoll:

Let’s play ‘Let’s Pretend’. Let’s pretend that you work for me. In fact, you are my executive assistant in a company that is growing rapidly. I’m the owner and I’m interested in expanding overseas. To pull this off, I make plans to travel abroad and stay there until a new branch office gets established. I make all the arrangements to take my family and move to Europe for six to eight months. And I leave you in charge of the busy stateside organization. I tell you that I will write you regularly and give you directions and instructions. I leave and you stay. Months pass. A flow [of emails were sent] by me from Europe and received by you at the national headquarters. In the [emails] I spell out all my expectations.

Finally, I return. Soon after my arrival, I drive down to the office and I am stunned. Grass and weeds have grown up high. A few windows along the street are broken. I walk into the Receptionist’s room. She is doing her nails, chewing gum and listening to her favorite [podcast]. I look around and notice the wastebaskets are overflowing. The carpet hasn’t been vacuumed for weeks, and nobody seems concerned that the owner has returned. I asked about your whereabouts and someone in the crowded lounge area points down the hall and yells, "I think he’s down there." Disturbed, I move in that direction and bump into you as you are finishing a chess game with our sales manager. I ask you to step into my office, which has been temporarily turned into a television room for watching afternoon soap operas. "What in the world is going on, man?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, look at this place! Didn’t you get any of my [emails]?"" [Emails]? Sure! I got every one of them. As a matter of fact, we have had [an email] study every Friday since you left. We have even divided the personnel into small groups to discuss many of the things you wrote. Some of the things were really interesting. You will be pleased to know that a few of us have actually committed to memory some of your sentences and paragraphs. One or two memorized an entire [email] or two. Great stuff in those [emails]."

"OK. You got my [Emails]. You studied them and meditated on them; discussed and even memorized them. But what did you do about them?"

"Do? We didn’t do anything about them."

-That is a great picture of modern discipleship—Jesus is gone, but He will return, what will He find when He does? Christian, lets pray He finds us faithful in following Him. But for some, they haven’t taken the first step of discipleship—believe in the Lord Jesus Christ...