May Newsletter

Hey people of God,

I have been considering what it looks like to be a disciple of Christ. As I have meditated on this I have had to decide whether or not I could be considered a disciple, according to Jesus' own criteria, as well as how many true disciples I really know. Let me explain.

In Luke 14 Jesus starts explaining the importance of counting the cost of following him before making the decision to follow him. At the end of his teaching he says, "Any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple." At first I downplayed this hard verse. But as I began thinking about it and trying to remember if there were any other scriptures to back this thought up John 15:13 came to mind. In it Jesus explains, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." Additionally 1 Corinthians 6:19 clearly states, "You are not your own; you were bought at a price." What does this even mean?

While considering this I was forced to think about something else: the commitment level of the disciples Jesus ended up using and the commitment of those he rejected. Luke 6:57-62 describes those who almost became disciples. Although they were ready to follow Jesus they were reluctant to completely lay down their lives to serve him. On the other hand Mark 2:13 and Matthew 4:18-22 describes men who eventually became disciples of Christ, and all of them immediately laid their lives down to follow Him. And now the big question is, am I really a disciple of Jesus or am I a church-goer pretending I'm a disciple?

Can I say my finances are truly His or do I still ignore His nudging so I can spend my extra money on toys and vacations I want? Is my free time really His or do I make up excuses for why I didn't make it to prayer meetings, or why I can't volunteer for this or that program? Do I consistently make up reasons why now is not the time to obey Him in certain leadings, so that I don't have to become uncomfortable in my lifestyle? If I am going to be a true disciple I cannot ignore these questions because apparently Jesus believed that if you wanted to be one of His followers you had to be willing to give up your life. And apparently the church can't function very well with people who claim to follow Him but won't die to self.

I guess I'm just asking you to think more about this with me, as I have not yet thought out the implications of a group of halfway committed Christ followers or if we can even call ourselves Christ followers without laying our lives down. Maybe we should consider that it could be necessary (almost imperative) for us to raise the bar when it comes to what it means to be a disciple of Christ and not let ourselves get away with pseudo-Christianity any more. I don't know.

Still carefully praying on this,


N8