ON FOLLOWING JESUS
True Christian discipleship involves Scripture and its presentation of the person of Jesus, who was and is the Living Word—the “logos”—of God. This doesn’t mean other books or content cannot be part of our discipleship, but the Bible has to be; disciples of Christ cannot be made without the words and work of Christ to form them.
Disciples follow, following requires taking steps, and taking steps means something has to motivate us. Ideally, this “something” is a positive call or pull (i.e. Jesus’ invitation to “Come, follow me,” our love for God because of his love for us, an opportunity to grow in faith and godliness, etc.) rather than a negative one (guilt, peer pressure - yes, even as grown adults - self-protection against looking or doing something stupid).
In reality, our motivation for discipleship will probably be a combination of the two; the key is to find someone else (or a group of someone elses) with similar desires and motives (mixed as they might be) to walk with as beggars showing each other where to find bread. These are our people—hungry and willing to lead or be led to the “goods.”
Learning to cultivate beauty is an aspect of community discipleship.
Jesus has a goal for our discipleship, that we would grow to obey everything he has commanded us (see Matthew 28:20), which fills no small syllabus, particularly when we know he’s concerned with how and why we obey, too.
There is purpose to the sanctification process, and in many ways, the sanctification purpose is the process (or at least a large part of it). As author Jerry Bridges writes in The Discipline of Grace,
“Sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit in us whereby our inner being is progressively changed, freeing us more and more from sinful traits and developing within us over time the virtues of Christlike character. However, though sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit in us, it does involve our wholehearted response in obedience and the regular use of the spiritual disciplines that are instruments of sanctification.” (94)
In other words (and as Paul encouraged Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:7),
“Train yourself to be godly.”
The responsibility to train is ours, but not ours alone (or even with just one other person). That’s because Jesus’ Great Commission and Paul’s admonition (and frankly anything else you’ll ever read in the Scriptures and along with the Holy Spirit’s work) ultimately have everything to do with building Christ’s Church.
Discipleship is a means, not an end. The better (and biblical) end can be found in Colossians 1:28, which says,
“Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ.”
Who is “we” in this passage? “We” are the Apostles, whom Jesus appointed to lead the Church he is building and to whom he gave its kingdom keys (see Matthew 16:18). And what is the goal of the Church? To proclaim Christ, so as to one day present everyone mature in Jesus (which should answer why, if your pastor preaches from the Scriptures, his Sunday morning sermon is and should be worth your time).
Jesus’ command to “follow me” was the call to follow him as part of his Church being built, not apart from it.