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Tag: disciple (Page 11 of 29)

Hide The Spies

December 17, 2023 / / 1 Comment

Another example of an unexpected person used by God to save His people is found in Joshua 2. This is the story of a woman who lived a life that did not line up with God’s desire for healthy relationships. She found herself looking for approval and love from any man who came by. She made her living bouncing from man to man. Yet God chose to use her. 

Could you imagine for a minute being Joshua and his men? They go into a town and things get a little dicey. They need help getting away from the people trying to hurt them. Who do they find willing to help them? Rahab! You know the woman who didn’t look like a follower of God by her actions. She’s the one God chose to call for this particular mission – Save my people.

She would even go on to give a pretty good testimony of her faith that God had already delivered things over to the Israelites. She let her faith lead her actions even though her lifestyle to this point didn’t show it. 

When God chose to send His Son to be born in the little town of Bethlehem, he didn’t do what everyone expected. He didn’t send a powerhouse king or a warrior. He sent a child. Not even a rich child. Just a regular lower to middle class child! 

This child would grow up and do more than just hide God’s people from danger like Rahab did. Jesus would grow to win the ultimate victory over our greatest enemy – death. The point of Advent is to put our hearts in the right place to be able to see what God is up to this time of year. He’s giving us time to slow down and prepare for the coming of the unexpected King of kings who looked more like a peasant than royalty. That’s just how God works. Now it’s time to look for the unexpected as we prepare our hearts for Christmas.

Stutterer

December 16, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Have you ever thought there’s no way I could do that? When we’re met with an obstacle we just are not qualified to tackle, that’s one very common answer. We say it when we’re overwhelmed. We say it when we’re scared. We say it when we lack confidence or focus. We say it when it appears that our resources are just not lined up in the right places. And we’re not alone in thinking this way. 

In Exodus 4, God tells Moses that he will be the one to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. The plan would involve Moses going to Pharaoh and telling him that God said Let My people go. Moses simple answer was I don’t think I’ll remember that and I stutter a bit so you should probably pick someone else. 

And it’s not just Moses that has these feelings of inadequacy either. All throughout the Bible, God picks the unexpected people to do his work. This will be our focus the next few days as we continue our journey toward an Unexpected Christmas. 

Moses would end up leading the people out of Egypt but not without consequence. He had his failures but God was able to still work through him. That’s the story of Advent and Christmas. It’s the story of God sending an unexpected person to be the one we need to save us. 

As we journey through this time of year, who are the unexpected people God has placed in your path. Maybe it was a co-worker or a friend at school. Perhaps it was the person who cut you off on the highway making you slow down and avoid an accident just seconds ahead of you. God uses some very unlikely people to accomplish the mission for which he came – the most unexpected of all was Jesus. No one thought he could be the one they were looking for – even his closest friends. 

This season of Advent we celebrate the unexpected person of Jesus not only as a baby in a manger but as God made man. 

It’s Not Supposed To Be That Way

December 15, 2023 / / 0 Comments

No one likes to be blindsided. Something coming out of nowhere and knocking you off course is not fun. Maybe it’s an unexpected car repair or a leak in your roof. Maybe it’s a bill you just didn’t see coming or hospital stay you weren’t planning on having to pay. Sometimes these unexpected blindside moments come in confrontations with people that become angry and divisive. They can even be disobedient moments from our children. 

It’s easy in those moments to think It’s not supposed to be this way. That’s probably what was going through the heads of the disciples in Mark 9:31 when Jesus says, The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him.

Wait just a minute! We were just getting in a groove here Jesus. Everything is just starting to work out. We’re starting to click and really understand what you’re about. This is not how it’s supposed to work! Now that all is a guess as to what was going through their minds but if you read the surrounding passages, it’s probably pretty accurate. 

One of the most unexpected parts of the plan for Christmas was that it would all end in this gruesome and horrific death. That’s not the image we’re generally given around Christmas time, but without Good Friday and Easter this season really doesn’t mean a whole lot. 

When Mary and Joseph welcomed their little baby in that tiny town of Bethlehem, they had no idea what he would end up doing. So often we take the Christmas Jesus and hold onto him as if that’s all there is. But the beauty of this story is that it doesn’t go how we expect because God uses unexpected plans to accomplish his perfect outcome. The season of Advent is all about this unexpected plan of God that ends with us getting a new and perfect life. 

Upside Down

December 14, 2023 / / 1 Comment

Have you ever turned upside down so you could see the world from a different perspective? If you stand on your head everything looks kind of odd. People are walking in the air. Your hair falls down in your face. Things are backwards to your eye and it’s sometimes hard to figure out exactly what is going on. 

That’s the image we need as we look at today’s bible verse – upside down. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 1:27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. 

Look all over the Bible and you’ll see it. This should not be seen as an unexpected plan of God, yet we seem surprised every time we run across it. David is the youngest son and he is able to take care of Goliath with one whip of the slingshot. None of the disciples were college graduates, yet Jesus chose them to be his disciples. 

God’s plan almost always involves using things in ways we would not normally expect. Even the extended Christmas story shows us this and we often miss it. Shortly after Jesus is born Mary and Joseph present him in the temple. When they do they have to offer a sacrifice. There are two different options for the sacrifice. You were to bring the offering of a lamb for sacrifice in this ritual, but they couldn’t afford that. So God made an option for those who were less well off, a pair of turtle doves or a pair of pigeons. 

You see God would bring the greatest demonstration of riches into the world and drop it in the lives of a poverty stricken couple. Mary and Joseph didn’t have a lot of extra. Yet God showed them his amazing grace and love and flipped the script for them. He didn’t require them to have everything together before he chose them. And he doesn’t do that for us either. Instead he chooses those of us who are less than kind of people in the world. He chooses the weak, poor, and outsiders and comes right to where they are. 

The story of Christmas is the story of God welcoming those who no one else would welcome and making them part of the family…just like He did with you and me. 

Are They Even Qualified?

December 13, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Over the past couple of weeks, splattered between some devotions for Advent, we’ve covered a couple of posts on the idea of discipleship. It’s one of those sticky words and is about a process that’s often left undefined at best. If you haven’t looked at those posts, I’d encourage you to take a quick peak before perusing what follows. Here are a couple links to help you out.

The two posts I referred to above are titled Sticky Words and What Discipleship Is NOT.

Assuming you’ve read those, we’ll continue with the qualifications needed to be a disciple. Here’s the list…

Yep that’s the list. Did you get it all? No you did not miss a paragraph. There is no list of qualifications needed!

If you dig through the Bible you’ll probably see some pretty odd characters being invited to the process of following Jesus. They didn’t come from the same background. They didn’t all have jobs in the church. None of them were people who were super well respected. Most were uneducated. And not a single one of them was the head in their class in seminary.

Discipleship and leadership in the world Jesus lived in had nothing to do with your qualifications. Actually it only had to do with Jesus’ qualifications and your surrender. The disciples that Jesus called to come and follow him were not the prime candidates to change the world! We’d call them the misfits. The B team. The not quite good enoughs. The bottom of the barrel. You get the point.

So if that’s how Jesus gathered his disciples, then why don’t we do it the same way? Or at least in a similar fashion? I think we tend to make things way more complicated than they really have to be.

We make the hurdles higher for people to come into our churches as members than we do for admission into Ivy League colleges. We make leaders and pastors in churches go through enough classes they could be doctors but they aren’t. Now I’m not saying that we go out and just throw everyone into the hopper but perhaps there is a better way? or maybe another way even if it’s not better.

A group I’m part of uses the phrase belong before you believe in a few different scenarios. And I think we could apply this here as well. Look at what Jesus did with his disciples. None of them believed in him when they started to follow! They didn’t even know who he really was, aside from the son of a woman named Mary and guy named Joseph. That’s pretty much it. He was a carpenter’s kid who looked, talked and acted pretty normal from what I understand.

So when he invited them to follow him and be part of his life, he didn’t make them take a test first to see if they got it or not. He invited them to walk with him and shared some pretty amazing life experiences.

Could it really be that easy? Could we really invite people into the journey of a lifetime? Treat them like they are real humans who really belong to something far bigger than themselves without putting up a bunch of hurdles? Then walk with them as the Holy Spirit does his work?

I mean I hate to be the one to break it to you but we don’t really play an active role in the whole believing and transforming gig anyway. That’s the Spirit’s job. So how about we do what we can do and let God sit in the God seat. He’ll take care of the qualification part. We just need to do the loving and relationship piece of the puzzle. It’s really just that easy.

So if we’re going to be really practical here, take a look at your life. Who do you know? Who are the people in your circle? Your barber or hairstylist? The dude at the gym? The girl on the volleyball team? The kid next to you in class? Your neighbor? Yeah even that one, the one who really gets on your nerves. When you make a list of who is in your life, you can see just how many chances there are to enter into these relationships with great intentionality.

After you make that list of your own personal who’s who, hang out with them. Walk with them. Talk with them. Have a beer with them. Sit down for coffee. Don’t preach to them. Just ask how their day is going. Show them how much you care. Show them that they actually belong somewhere. When that relationship is grounded in real care, the next steps will be way easier…and we’ll talk about that in the next post.

I Got It

December 13, 2023 / / 0 Comments

Some days I miss the cartoons from when I was growing up. You know the kind I’m talking about. Not nearly the animation technology we have today, but we didn’t really care. They were often corny but we all got it. I can remember the symbol in those cartoons for when someone had an idea, one of those moments when the light goes on. 

As we prepare for Christmas we often fill our lives with artificial lights. We put them on our tree and string them around our house. We light them as candles in our windows. We even have things that shimmer and reflect the light around it. I’m a sucker for all things Christmas. I love the tree and lights and fire crackling in the fireplace. These are just part of the season to me. But they can’t replace the real light we all need this time of year. 

There’s a story in Joshua 24 that deals with the darkness of the world taking over the hearts of God’s people. They were confused who they should follow. They got distracted by all the shiny things around them. The glamour and light of popularity and fame, money and power were all the rage. But Joshua calls them back again with one of those lightbulb moments. 

Choose this day who you will serve…but for me and my house we will serve the Lord.This is Joshua’s call to the people to come back to following God in verses 14-15. 

As we approach the day that all of these lights point us toward, we can’t lose focus. We have to remember that all these extra lights of the season can’t replace the real light we have in Jesus. The meaning of this whole time of year is found in the light that would come into a darkened world. That light wouldn’t come in fancy things or lots of money. It would come in a towel wrapped baby. In a manger for a bed. It would come in the most unexpected plan you could ever imagine and that’s what made it the perfect plan!

How Did You Get Here?

December 10, 2023 / / 0 Comments

The Christmas season brings with it several parties and celebrations. We have family and friends, coworkers, special teams of people with whom we work, bosses, teammates and the list goes one. Each one of those has a special list of invitees. We wouldn’t invite our boss to a family gathering. Or a friend from college to a party with our coworkers. 

When someone shows up that’s not invited it generally brings with it a hiccup in the plans. But what happens when the wrong person is invited to the party? You can’t undo the invite. That just isn’t right. Or perhaps the better question to ask is who says they’re the wrong person? 

In the book of Acts we meet a man named Saul. He’s a bit of a nasty one. He’s even worse than the Grinch if we’re being honest. He didn’t steal kids stockings. He would beat people for a living. But in Acts 9 we find Jesus meeting Saul on the road and inviting him to a party. Ok so it’s not a party with gifts or special platters of food. It’s not really a party but more of a movement. 

Jesus invited Saul to change his name and join his team. When Paul switched to the Jesus Team, he wasn’t really liked at first. He was kind of like the not so nice boss walking into your family Christmas. Who wants him there!? Simply put, Jesus wanted him there. 

Jesus has a tendency to include some pretty sketchy people into his life. Shortly after he was born, the Bible includes a group of traveling fortune tellers that we call Magi as some of his famous visitors. But why would they be there? It was about who they weren’t and what they brought. You see they weren’t Jewish people which reminds us that he came for an unexpecting people that no one would have considered. And they brought some gifts with pretty cool meanings. Gold was the gift for kings. Frankincense was the perfume used in temple that reminded of God’s presence kind of like the prophets would remind us of God’s presence in various situations. And myrrh was the oil used to anoint the priests. By welcoming this unexpecting group of travelers he was reminding us that he would be the perfect prophet, priest and king. 

And all this by using unexpecting people. Imagine what he can do with us! 

What Discipleship Is NOT

December 8, 2023 / / 1 Comment

We’ll start this post by saying it’s ok if you disagree with me, and I know some of you will. So don’t get your undies in a bunch over it. If you don’t like what I’m about to say, then scroll on and walk away or reach out and we can chat.

Some people in my tradition think that the crux of discipleship is going to worship. Some feel that being in a worship service where the hymnal is used is the best way to make sure discipleship is happening correctly. I’ll be honest. I think this is a ridiculous concept! If someone believes that the best and most effective way to do discipleship is by going to a worship service, then by default you’re saying Jesus didn’t use the best way!

Jesus didn’t invite anyone to “go to worship,” at least I don’t remember seeing that invitation in any of the gospel accounts. Now before you take those words and form some arsenal against me, don’t mix up my words. I did not say worship isn’t good, essential, necessary, etc. I said it’s not the way Jesus did discipleship.

I think a person who is growing in their relationship with Jesus will go to worship and be a part of a larger group of people following Jesus. But I don’t believe going to worship means you’re a disciple of Jesus. I think it means you’re going to worship and that’s it.

Also, discipleship isn’t memorizing your confessional documents either. Sure they’re important to know and really beneficial to help you understand how you do certain things in ministry and church life, but they are not markers of discipleship.

If you remember from an earlier post, the definition I use for discipleship is the process of being transformed into the image of Christ for the sake of others. This definition has at its core transformation of the person through relationships.

Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the function of worship is transformation of the person worshiping. As a matter of fact the Bible says that we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. I don’t see the primary function of worship being to renew our minds. Worship is about receiving the gift of forgiveness in the fellowship of other believers and returning praise to God.

Worship is an expression of a life being transformed but it’s not the primary avenue this transformation happens. So how then does discipleship happen?

Well, I’m glad you asked! I don’t like to give a bunch of negatives without giving a little bit of best practice as I’ve seen it. In my mind, discipleship best happens in a setting with a smaller number of people who agree to journey through life together. It’s highly relational. It’s profoundly personal. It’s intentionally individual while at the same time being curiously corporate. Ok that’s enough alliteration.

If we want to see the best way for discipleship to happen, we need look no further than the life of Jesus. He was kind of the master at the whole discipleship gig. He didn’t sit them down in classrooms. Didn’t ask them to read a book. Actually I don’t even think he required bible memorization. From what I read, he invited them to walk with him so he could show them what it looked like.

He did two basic things which we’ll dive into over the next week. He taught them, or maybe better yet, he reminded them what God had said. Then he led them to a place where they could see it in action. And if we want to get really serious about it, we have to admit he made some pretty high expectations known for those who sought to follow him. It’s pretty much that simple.

Knowledge that led to actions which became a set of expectations for a transformed life.

The long and short of this post is that you don’t need some massive ministry plan to make disciples. You don’t technically need to have someone come to a worship service to be part of this journey either. It’s about walking relationally with someone in an adventurous lifestyle keeping Christ at the center. We don’t transform anyone. That’s God’s job. So start with the journey. Start with the relationship and let God handle the God part. It’s a way bigger job than many people think, but it’s way easier than we make it out to be!

Sticky Word

December 6, 2023 / / 0 Comments

There are some words that I call sticky. They’re the kinds of words that you hear and don’t really know how to categorize. You have them. We all do actually. And you might even have an idea what they mean but really don’t have a clear and concise way to explain them.

One of those sticky words that is super prevalent in the church world right now is the term discipleship. Ok so it’s not new by any stretch and it’s actually been one of those sticky words for quite some time. That probably has to do something with the final command of Jesus being for the people of God to focus on making disciples.

Throughout history we’ve done our best to draw pictures, make up definitions, write books, craft bible studies, and have cleverly worded mission statements that are all focused on discipleship. We want so badly to do this but just don’t know what it even really means…much less have a concise way to communicate it to anyone.

I really don’t think it’s quite as hard as we make it out to be. And even more I don’t think making disciples is something that happens in a book, bible study, worship service, or some kind of bible memorization tool. These are all really good things! And I completely advocate all of them as part of the overall life of a person who follows Jesus, but I don’t think it’s quite the whole picture Jesus intends.

Discipleship isn’t some assembly line process where we run a group of 60 people through a program and they all come out looking the same. That’s just not how it works. Put 60 people into a worship service or bible study group and you don’t get 60 exact replicas come out the other side on fire for Jesus.

I really believe that it all starts with a definition. You have to define the term. I’ve defined discipleship the same way for years. Discipleship is the process of being transformed into the image of Christ for the sake of others. Is this your definition? Maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. But you need somewhere to start. So either use this one or come up with your own based on your study of the Jesus’ words.

After you have a definition you’ll have some picture of where you’re headed. And for me this definition gives some clarity to what discipleship does and does not look like. It’s not an event in time which is why we call it a process. It’s replicable to an extent which is also part of that process language. There is a change that is expected as you progress through this process, hence transformed. The output of the process is Jesus. If you’re simply trying to make members of a church or denominational clones, then you’re not really doing discipleship. Finally it’s about relationships, for the sake of others kind of talk. It’s about a journey not a jolt in time.

Unlike the assembly line imagery, discipleship is more of a life-to-life adventure. It’s about inviting someone into your life and letting them walk with you through the mundane. It’s not about adding another block to your already too full calendar either. Discipleship is about adding someone else to your calendar. Discipleship is not about tasks or to dos. It’s about people and relationships.

Look. I really hope discipleship stays one of those sticky words, not because we don’t know what it means either. I hope it stays sticky because we’ve finally arrived at some form of clarity on just how important it is to live around people for the sake of a greater mission.

Don’t Strive For Success

November 10, 2023 / / 0 Comments

In a culture that is bent on getting ahead and being the best and coming out on top, this is not a very popular idea. But if you hang with me for a bit hopefully you’ll come around and see things a little differently.

Success is defined as the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.

At face value success isn’t really a bad thing. Actually there’s nothing really wrong with success in and of itself. Being successful simply means that we’ve done something the way it was expected of us.

But there’s a problem when success is our aim. When all we care about is success at all costs things go off the rails quickly. And just like a train that goes off its rails, when we go off the rails people get hurt. Innocent and unexpecting people get hurt.

When we strive for success it will quickly overcome us. Success isn’t the problem. We are the problem. When we let success become the driving force behind what we do, it quickly takes over. If you’re in it for yourself then success might take you a decent distance. But it will always have a ceiling. Success can only take you as far as your achievements allow.

I’d like to encourage a little different approach than mere success. Instead of success strive to be a person of value. The difference between striving for success and striving to be a person of value is that a person of success will never surpass their talent, but a person of value builds on the success and value of the rest of the team or organization.

Being a person of value means that you’re not just in it for yourself. Being a person of value means that even when you don’t succeed you still don’t fail because you maintained value for the team or organization.

Striving to be a person of value is something lacking in so many aspects of the world today. Instead of getting ahead at all costs, perhaps we could stop and find how we can add value to the group granting us an even better chance at long term success.

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