Being a Disciple

The decision to become a Christian – to accept Jesus as your savior (see Chapter 3) – is a key milestone. But this step is really the beginning of a lifetime journey, not the end point. A second step is to make Christ the Lord of your life, surrendering everything in your life to him. A Christian who takes this step of obedience is often called a disciple, which means a follower of Christ. Disciples understand that they’ve been “crucified with Christ,” so to speak. As a result, they no longer live for their own selfish wants and needs, but live in obedience to Christ instead (Galatians 2:20).

The original 12 disciples provide a great model of what a modern-day disciple should be. They weren’t perfect people by any stretch of the imagination, but each of them gave up creature comforts, his vocation, and personal safety to follow Jesus. They took these bold actions simply because Jesus called them to follow him. What’s more, they persevered in their faith as the years went by, reaching out to the world and sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ.

When Christians today follow their example, some of them feel called by God to become ministers or missionaries (see the “Sending out missionaries to evangelize the world” sidebar), while other disciples believe they’re called to do God’s work and be Christ’s servants through their normal, everyday jobs.

Still, the fact is that many people make honest, deliberate decisions to be Christians, but hold out on wanting Christ to be Lord of their lives. But when Christians do this, they end up being lukewarm believers with one foot in heaven and one foot in the world, so to speak. John Stuart Mill, a 19^th-century political philosopher and skeptic, sums up well the sad state of lukewarm Christians:

All Christians believe that the blessed are the poor and humble; that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven; that they shouldn’t judge, or else they’ll be judged; that they shouldn’t swear; that they should love their neighbors as themselves... that they should focus on today and not worry about tomorrow... They are not insincere when they say that they believe these things. They do believe them, as people believe what they have always heard lauded and never discussed. But in the sense of that living belief which regulates conduct, they believe these doctrines just up to the point to which it is usual to act upon them.

-William Ebenstein, Great Political Thinkers, (Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1951)

As  convenient as the lukewarm plan might be, Jesus didn’t hold this out as an option. He made it clear that everyone who follows him must first take his or her personal agenda and selfish wants and get rid of them. Or, as Jesus said, “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me” (Mark 8:34). He added, “Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:39).

That’s heavy stuff. When you read these statements, it’s very easy to want to water down the commands or dismiss them as being ideals that are reserved for true saints, such as Billy Graham or Mother Teresa. The last thing you and I often want to do is to actually take these commands literally. But Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a martyred pastor in Nazi Germany (see Chapter 18), once put Jesus’ call in terms that you can’t simply ignore: “When Christ calls a man, he bids him, ‘Come and die.’” (See the sidebar, “A must-read: The Cost of Discipleship,” in this chapter.) “Dying to self” then means gathering up every part of you – relationships, finances, career, ambitions, and hobbies – and giving it to Christ. (See the “How much do I have to give?” sidebar in this chapter.)

Jesus isn’t just being a meanie when he asks Christians to take this step. His reasoning is actually very practical – you’re only able to follow Christ and do his will if you’re dead to yours, because humans’ tendency to sin (see Chapter 4) directly contradicts God’s will. If you try to keep your own agenda and follow Christ, you constantly have mixed agendas, resulting in lukewarmness.

How much do I have to give?

Tithing is the Old Testament practice of giving ten percent of one’s income or possessions to God as an offering to him. The Old Testament discusses it several times, including in Genesis 14:17-20, Leviticus 27:30-32, and Numbers 18:21-32. This offering was also supposed to be the “first fruits” (see Ezekiel 44:29-30) of one’s income or possessions, not just the leftovers.

Many Christians today continue the practice of tithing ten percent of their income, even though the New Testament never specifically commands them to tithe a specific amount or percentage. Instead, Paul gives more general instructions to live by:

“Let each man give according as he has determined in his heart; not grudgingly, or under compulsion; for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7).

“On the first day of the week, let each one of you save, as he may prosper...” (1 Corinthians 16:2).

Although the New Testament doesn’t specify a fixed percentage, that fact doesn’t mean that Christians get off easy and can give peanuts. Instead, consider Jesus’ response in Mark 8:34, when he says that those who follow him will give up everything for him, not just part of themselves. Therefore, when it comes to finances, Christians should consider all their money and property to be God’s, not just ten percent of it. Christians are, therefore, called to be stewards of all that God has provided (see Romans 14:12; 1 Corinthians 16:1-3; 2 Corinthians 8:1-9:15) and to give God what he leads them to give, whether it’s a little or a lot.

Sending out missionaries to evangelize the world

Before he ascended into heaven, Christ’s last words told his followers to go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching people to obey everything he commanded (see Matthew 28:19; flip to Chapter 19 for more on this Great Commission). The apostles responded to this charge by spreading out over the entire Mediterranean region, proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ and establishing the Christian Church. Following their lead, the Church, through the centuries, has carried on the Great Commission by sharing the Christian message with people both locally and far away (a process known as evangelization) and by meeting people’s physical and emotional needs in the process.

People usually think of a missionary as a person who travels to a far-off land to talk to people about Jesus Christ who’ve never heard of him. Although that’s true, the term missionary refers more generally to any Christian, no matter where she lives, who simply shares the Christian gospel with others and helps those in need. In that sense, all Christians are called to be missionaries.

A must-read: The Cost of Discipleship

Apart from the Bible, I think that no book is as meaty or as significant for Christians as Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s The Cost of Discipleship. As a pastor in Nazi Germany during the 1930s, Bonhoeffer wrote his greatest work in the midst of the German Church’s giving in to Hitler. In this book, the German pastor shows the difference between cheap grace and costly grace. Common in his day and ours, cheap grace is all talk, no action. On the other hand, costly grace is costly because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ, and it is costly because it cost a man (Jesus) his life.

The Cost of Discipleship is a must-read for those who live comfortable lives and aren’t forced to make any big sacrifices (such as their lives) to be Christians in this 21^st century. If you want to more deeply understand the true nature of biblical Christianity and what it means to follow Jesus, read Bonhoeffer’s book.

Living Out Your Faith

As you discover in Chapter 3, Christians believe that faith in Jesus Christ is an essential component in an individual’s salvation. However, Christians express their faith in two ways: Saving faith is the belief that accompanies repentance and salvation, and living faith is the process of living out that belief. They aren’t two separate types of faith, but the latter is a progression or a maturity of saving faith. Said differently, saving faith gives birth to living faith.

Unfortunately, faith is one of those overused terms in the English language, meaning a variety of ideas. A person is said to have faith in himself or herself. A team down by five touchdowns isn’t supposed to ever lose faith during its comeback attempt. My wife has faith that I’ll help out with the laundry.

In some people’s eyes then, faith is nothing more than a positive mental state. Or, as one skeptic put it, faith is the “illogical belief in the occurrence of the impossible.”

Authentic Christian faith, however, should not be confused with

Head-in-the-sand optimism: Ignoring reality and simply hoping everything will be alright.

A forced “I hope so”: Muttering some positive-sounding words but being pessimistic inside.

A psyched-out feeling: Pumping oneself up to get an emotional high.

Superstition: Believing something that’s contrary to all the evidence.

Intellectual acknowledgement: Thinking that faith is simply a matter of brainpower. (At the same time, reason does play a role in coming to faith, as I discuss in Chapter 2.)

On the contrary, Christian faith is a confident obedience to God, no matter the circumstances or consequences. True faith isn’t blind or without merit, but it’s a natural response to what God has revealed in the Bible – that he is who he says he is and will do what he promised to do (Romans 10:17). Ultimately, faith requires trusting in what you can’t see in front of you; if you could see it and hold it in your hands, it wouldn’t very well be faith, now would it?