Today Pastor Mike Kearns talked about discipleship and it made me raise a question for YOU. What is the difference between a disciple and a Christian? I look forward to your comments and will finish with part 2 soon.
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7 comments:
we just won't talk about what I think right now....
yeah, ideally there shouldn't be any difference between the two. it seems like a lot of christians in the west especially are content to skate by & take it easy. i don't think that's being a disciple at all. only jesus knows our hearts, but i think that being a christian means being a FOLLOWER of christ. following implies that we are in motion, that we are pursuing him & it also implies that jesus is the one blazing the path. we're behind him & he is leading the way.
being a disciple of jesus? yeah, that's got to be the same thing - submitting ourselves to his teaching & his authority, putting ourselves under him, deferring to him in all things. it means associating ourselves with him in the deepest & most intimate way. it means (like jesus said) taking up our crosses daily & following him.
this being a christian thing is an active life. no coasting allowed.
Good question my friend...I can only hope it will be a question we continue to ask ourselves as we walk out our desicion to follow Jesus. We are all a disciple of someone or something...choose carefully who or what you choose to emulate.
It would seem difficult to be nothing other than Christian if you are choosing to be a disciple of Jesus. Sadly, the same isn't always true in the claim of being a Christian. The choice to follow Jesus isn't simply an add-on to our busy little lives.
Rather, we would choose to give our hearts to God so that we might pursue His...and in turn be called Christians by those drawn to this divine dance.
Rock and roll...
hi caleb!
i have been meaning to come over and say hi, introduce myself, thank you for stopping by my blog the other day. so, formally, hi. :)
before i even get to your question, i have to first ask you: where the heck did you get the picture of that high cross?!?! my hub and i love those celtic crosses, and we saw tons of them in ireland when we were there a couple years ago for our wedding and honeymoon, but you don't come across them in daily life here in the states, usually. did you take that yourself? it's a stunning cross and a stunning image. would love to know where you took it.
as for the disciple/christian question, i gotta go with kirsten on this one. ideally, they are one and the same thing. jesus asked his disciples to come along and follow him. so they did. they were christ followers AND disciples at the same time.
blessings on you, bro. good to meet you.
oh! and i almost forgot. you were asking me where in socal kirk and i were looking to move. the answer is in and around north orange county. we're applying for a spiritual formation program at talbot seminary, which is part of biola university in la mirada. my home church back in california is called rock harbor, which is in costa mesa. i grew up in corona, near riverside, which is where a lot of my family still lives. and i lived in fullerton before i moved out here to florida. so, yeah. in and around orange county, for the most part. :)
where in socal did you live?
Jessica-Please repost it or at least get all riled up again and throw in something. Your original was great I just didn't want it to sway others.
Kirsten-Today I was reading through Mathew and was reading about how easily Peter and the others just left their jobs and abandoned their "lives" for Jesus. How could they even know the full extent of who he is? It's crazy!!! Then we go right into that stepping out of the boat that has invaded so many of our conversations. It all comes to what you said about submitting to Him, putting ourselves under Him, and taking up your crosses daily (refer to best of Tozer ch.31). I like the way that you used content. Stagnant, boring, luke warm come to mind as well.
Mr Demar- I'm so happy to hear from you and look forward to hearing about the honey moon. I feel like you started to define the diffence very well and completely agree with it being a active thing. If your feeling bored than you aren'e pursuing a strong relationship with Jesus. I would love to get together and just have God talk sometime.
Christianne- I am honored to have you here. The cross came from googling celctic crosses, I wish I took that. When I was in Ireland I had no interest in God so I didn't pay any attention to the crosses. I wish that I had taken the picture!
I'll have to agree with you, Kirsten has a pretty good grasp on it as well as Demar (he's a very intelligent good man). I have some opinions that I will get into later and they could be way off but I'll share them anyways. It's my blog so I can write what ever I want!!! I love it!!!
I lived in Carlsbad, Encinitas, oceanside, and san clemente. I now have a very bad taste in my mouth over it and need to deal with that. I love Nor-Cal!!!
I look forward to hearing from all of you more and will post the sequel to this soon. Be blessed my friends.
I realized that when I deleted it, I highlighted itand just cut it, instead of pushing delete. Luckily I didn't copy and paste anything else today!!...
Here is my previously deleted comment!!
You see, that's where I think the problem is... There should be NO difference!!! If you want to see me get really fired up about something then we can have a conversation about discipleship... The disciples weren't even called christians until well after Jesus ascended, and when they were called christians it was derogatory!!! I think that if there is anyone who can be a "Christian" without being a disciple, they probably haven't moved past saying a prayer and thinking all of their problems will go away. Discipleship is not a prayer, or a cute Bible that looks nice on your shelf Monday through Saturday and "holy" in your hands on Sunday. Discipleship is life with Jesus and fellow believers, and bringing others along to do the same. Discipleship is where church really happens, where lives are changed, and where we have to come to terms with our brokenness, God's holiness, and our inability to do it without Him.
If you ask me, it's in discipleship that the rubber meets the road, and a life after Jesus starts to happen, and the opportunity is all around us. It's not so much about getting people saved as much as it is about guiding people in drawing closer to Jesus....
Oh, this is a topic that gets my heart racing!!! I'm passionate about it and there is little else that gets me this excited!! Discipleship is KEY!! It's Jesus' final commandment to His followers. "Go out and make disciples..."
He never told us to make Christians.
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