Discipleship is Discipline

Discipleship is Discipline.

Discipleship is learning from a master towards becoming like him. Discipleship to Christ Jesus is learning from Him to become like Him. The goal of discipleship isn't to become an attendee of a religious gathering but to live like Him in our society.

It demands total allegiance to the principles of the Master and the applications of those principles in day to day life within the host communities.

It is a narrow and strait way and door. It doesn't give room for any serious maneuver. It is a yoke, howbeit an easy yoke. It would demand cutting off of excesses that won't fit in into the strait way. You can't come in with everything.

Yet, it is freedom. It removes the heavy yoke and frees the follower of the weight of the world's worries, anxieties and cares. The narrowness is made of guardrails to keep the follower from the dangers of excesses that may trip one over the cliff and not made of fences to restrict freedom. Freedom has boundaries, beyond those boundaries are dangerous snares. Discipleship is meant to keep us from those snares.

One day, Jesus Christ was going somewhere and a large crowd followed Him. One should be glad that a great crowd follows you'll think. But suddenly he stopped and turned to them and gave a speech.

Anyone who wants to follow must be ready to 'hate' father, mother and every social connection including self. Such a person must forsake all he possesses, such must deny self, carry his cross in readiness for crucifixion and then follow Him... Anyone who wants to follow must sit down and count the cost of following vis a vis the Kingdom to gain and then make the decision either to follow or not to follow. Luke 14

This is the discipline of the disciple. It is such that these conditions have to be considered in every decision to be made in order to remain in discipleship. If I have to choose between the principles I'm learning from Christ and the comfort or the pleasures these things bring to me, my discipleship demands that I deny myself of those enjoyments to maintain my stand as a disciple.

Putting any other person, including oneself, before the Master, makes that person or oneself the master. In that case discipleship allegiance changes. You can't be a disciple to two masters same time.

If you have a possession or an opportunity to possess something that you cannot leave or forsake, if you have to choose between it and your allegiance to Christ and His principles, then discipleship allegiance changes from Christ to whatever that possession or opportunity is.

If you have to be crucified for your allegiance to Christ, you are to offer the cross you're already carrying for the purpose instead of denying Christ.

Every opportunity isn't a good one for a disciple, except it protects your allegiance to Christ and to His principles. Self denial is part of the discipleship deal. It is the discipline of discipleship.

The world knows this and would offer opportunities with conditions that negate our allegiance to Christ probably to even demand allegiance to other ways of life.

Improper discipleship is the foundation of falling away from Christ under unfavourable conditions.

Apostle Paul prophesied that in the last day, perilous times would come. Some other translations rendered it as, in the last days, it will be difficult to be a Christian. And these are the days. 2Tim 3

Each one of us would have to ask ourselves if we are merely part of the hosanna shouting crowd or those who believe to the saving of the soul and are ready to die for what they believe?

Ask if the things you enjoy from the world are compatible with your convictions of Christ and decide what you want to do about it.

Know this, that this is where our faith is tested. Reading through Hebrew 11, we see that faith and conviction are matters of making choices between things that are compatible with one's convictions against things that offer pleasures and comfort but aren't compatible with what one believes.

And we see how God came to the defense of each of those patriots of faith and how He rewarded their steadfastness, even those who laid down their lives, as they joined the cloud of witnesses, in that better country with foundation, where the maker and the builder is God, a heavenly city, prepared for us by God.

How are you doing with the disciplines of discipleship? Are you a disciple of Christ or of something else? It isn't by being born into a Christian family or bearing a Christian name, attending a big church or being a minister with a big title... It is by your convictions about Christ...and how strong they are in making you able suffer discomfort in maintaining your stand for Jesus Christ.

Good day to you!

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Where is Boasting?

Where is Boasting?

We met energy here. Life isn't man made. The potential to live and to make things happen came from God but how we use life and the energy we met here depends on either we lean towards fulfilling God's desires or  on following our own purposes.

It's a fact that man is a free moral agent who can make independent decisions and make things happen here on earth without God and even directly against God's pleasure. Man can be successful in rebellion against God in this world.

It is under this leverage that sin becomes possible. If nothing can happen except by God, then sin would not have been possible.

So success in any particular endeavour isn't a sign of God's approval. Babel was built to an extent and God Himself said, they would have achieved that, were He to let them be. Who knows how many millions of Babels have been built since then without God interference? 

That lack of divine interference is now making us think we can do and undo, and whatever we achieve even with God's involvement is based on our own life, prowess, energy and personal development and not God's. 

When we operate this way, we feel we don't owe God any glory or thanksgiving for what we achieve and in so doing, think God is unnecessary in man's affairs. We don't see grace, divine permission, support or any contribution of God into our success rather all the glory comes to us.

You may think I'm speaking only of unbelievers, no, it happens also among believers, even among ministers of the gospel. I once heard a man of God making comments on the infrastructure of their ministry headquarters back in the late 80s saying, when God was the only one working there, that it was all bushes and forests until he joined Him and those things were built. Though I understand the principle he was speaking from, it sure sounds as if he was the one who made the difference and not God.

Pride is a very deadly emotion. It points only to self absolving any other of any credit including God. Those who want to experience God deeply must avoid it like a plague. Pride won't give glory to God rather runs a person in direct collision with Him.

You may be a very casual Christian who don't pray much, who don't study God's word much, who don't go to church much, who don't do all the standing on God's word to receive anything specific from God, yet it will be safe for you to know that the life you have and the energy with which you live to make things happen comes from God. Give Him that credit and give Him the glory. 

You may be a big fasting and prayer person, a mighty seed sower, a giver in the realm of giving all, holier than all, working perfectly before the Lord, a man of great faith and love, yet, don't ever think that the smallest thing you receive from God is because of any of these wonderful things you do. The grace to do any work of righteousness is purely from God. He is the One who works in us both to will and to do of His own good pleasure. Give Him all the credit and praise. 

The truth is that we all have our weaknesses and if that's all we have, we may never be able to achieve what we have achieved, no matter how modest.

If our outcomes have been by the reason of those things we do wrongly and not by those we do rightly, we won't be able to boast of anything at all.

Jesus Christ told us through His disciples that without Him, the Vine, we, the branches can do nothing. Here in His Kingdom, we who have submitted to His Lordship should learn to work with Him and to stay within what He permits us to do and to accomplish and not to overreach beyond His workings within us. We should only work on the outside to catch up with His working on our inside, nothing more according to Colossians 1:29. Seeking self glory won't make us limit ourselves to that inner working. I know that sounds condescending but that's our life.

Because another end of boasting is to think that we deserve more than what He permits us to accomplish in spite of our gifts and efforts. Our gifts, intentions and efforts aren't enough, it takes divine working for us to become all God has prepared for us to become without becoming what God didn't have in mind no matter how impressive that may be to people. 

When we, who have submitted to His Lordship and leading, understand that we can only do so much as He permits, we won't have any reason to boast, to look down on ourselves or to query God why we aren't as big or as good as others in achievements.

Rather, we will give God glory that we are able to do as much as we do, trusting God to be able to do more if He wills. We may dream big, put in big efforts but the outcome will be within God's limits in fulfilling His own purpose and pursuit. Paul plants, Apollos waters, but the increase is of the Lord. The only One who matters according to Paul, is the one who gives the increase. To Him alone must the glory go. 1Corinthians 3:6&7

You can't measure your success or judge another person's failure by the size of outcomes but in relation with divine purpose. If we build big but fail to fulfil purpose, we fail before God even if the world sees us as billionaire achievers. Life is all about divine purpose and divine purpose depends on divine power and it is that input of grace that gives God glory.

Have you been boasting lately? Have you praised your own wisdom, power and might? Have you looked down on others to blame them for the size of their achievements compared to yours? Have you seen yourself as bigger than where God has prepared for you? It's time to repent and give glory to God. 

Give God glory and avoid boasting. God resists the proud and give more grace to the humble.

Psalm 147

10 His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse,

nor his delight in the legs of the warrior;

11 the Lord delights in those who fear him,

who put their hope in his unfailing love.

12 Extol the Lord, Jerusalem;

praise your God, Zion.

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