Discipleship: For Super-Christians Only?
If you have never read Dallas Willard, I want to encourage you to check out some of his books. Warning: they are not leisure reading. I highly recommend Hearing God for starters. This book will guide you in understanding how God speaks and how we learn to hear Him.
What I loved about this modern-day mystic (he fell asleep in Christ a few years ago) are his conservative biblicism and his intellectual prowess. He served for many years as the head of the philosophy department at the University of Southern California.
In his book, The Spirit of the Disciplines, he devotes an appendix to the question: “Discipleship: For Super-Christians Only?” In it, he makes this statement - “Most problems in contemporary churches can be explained by the fact that members have not yet decided to follow Christ.” (p.337)
The call of Jesus in all too many churches today is no longer to “make disciples.” Instead, it has become “make converts (to a particular faith and practice) and baptize them into church membership.” (p.339) And there is no real training to teach new believers how to follow Jesus and to do, in His words, “all the things I have commanded you.”
As Christians, you and I are called to be disciples. The word “Christian” appears in the New Testament three times, while the word “disciple” appears 269 times. Sadly, Christianity today is often associated with cultural distinctives, things like conservative values, patriotism, freedom, gun ownership, abortion legislation, and political affiliation. These things may or may not be important, but they tend to become distractions to the message of the gospel and the call of Jesus to be peace-makers, mercy-givers, and salt and light in our world. Worse than that, these things become barriers to others deciding to follow Jesus.
So, what’s the answer to this great divide between cultural Christianity and the call to follow Jesus as his disciples? Consider these words of Dallas Willard -
Discipleship can be made concrete by loving our enemies, blessing those who curse us, walking the second mile with an oppressor - in general, living out the gracious inward transformation of faith, hope, and love. Such acts - carried out by the disciplined person with manifest grace, peace, and joy - make discipleship no less tangible and shocking today than . . . long ago. (p.341)
The greatest difference between cultural Christianity and genuine discipleship is what we prioritize as believers. Many of the things Christians focus on today are temporal and cultural. But the things that Jesus asks us to prioritize are relevant for any time and place, any day and age. And I might add, these are the things that demonstrate the good news of Christ to a struggling, hurting, and lost world.
I know I’m repeating myself, but Christian mysticism is just another phrase describing a Christianity based, not on human wisdom and thinking, but a Christianity rooted and grounded in God’s wisdom. As Paul says, “we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.” (I Cor. 2:13)
As we become more spiritually aware and spiritually minded, we find ourselves living more and more like Jesus; we find ourselves living on the edge. And the more disciples who join Jesus on the edge, the more churches we will see on the edge. And that’s my heart’s desire - to be a disciple of Jesus, in a church on the edge.
In Christ,
Dan
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