See also Discipline

Definition
Following a leader or teacher,
any believer in Christ, ie one of the 12 disciples

As a child we are full of trust – we trust our parents, our siblings, our teachers at school.
We have to literally look up to them as they are bigger than us and know more than us and we respect them. Our parents can protect us, feed us and shelter us. We are innocent in our trust for and of them. What they impart to us moulds us for who we are in life. If we grow up in a household that votes for one political party, then there is a tendency for us to vote for that party. When we are about to purchase our first car, we may be guided to buy the kind that our father approves of and have you ever heard the sayings that sons have a tendency to marry girls like their mother and girls someone like their father?

All this happens of course when the family scene is the ‘normal’ one and the confusion of multiple parents and siblings does not rob us of our initial innocence and trust.

Discipleship is much the same. We follow the teachings, the guide lines, the ‘plumb line’ and the example that Jesus set.

• If He, in all that agony on the cross could ask His Father, our Father, to forgive those who had put Him there, to me that is a tremendous example of love and forgiveness and we should aspire to follow Jesus example. (Not that I do it all the time, but He is working on and in me!)

• If Jesus had so much compassion that He raised a widow woman’s son from the dead and restored to her the only child she had, I want that kind of compassion!

• If Jesus says to me, through reading the Word of God, the Bible, to pray for those who curse me and say all manner of evil against me, as a disciple, I need to do just that.

• If Jesus says to me to pray for the sick, as a disciple, I need to do just that.

• If Jesus teaches to look out for the widow and orphans, I need to do just that.

• If Jesus says to me to love others as I love myself, as a disciple, I need to do that.

And what’s more, I need to do all this willingly and without the desire to gain anything for myself!

It is only as I submit myself daily to the discipleship of Jesus that I am discovering I am doing all this without being aware of it! Out of the life time learning about discipleship, I am finding that it’s not a drudge to do all this, the joy that comes from helping people, from serving people as a disciple is enough to set my feet to dancing at times and I am overwhelmed by the joy that floods into me!

As a disciple it does not mean my life is perfect! Far from it. But Jesus loves me enough to keep teaching me patiently, day by day, hour by hour, about the life of following Him as my “Leader and Teacher.” I am both a ‘disciple’ and a ‘disciplined’ one.

Because “Disciple” and “discipline” come from the same root word, the idea of discipline being an important part of a soldier etc, is he/she is being disciplined in order to be both a good disciple of and defender of the country he/she serves. A bad disciple of a good country brings that country into disrepute around the world. In the same way a person claiming to be a follower and representative of Jesus can bring either good repute or disrepute on Him. To be a good disciple (follower and representative of) a country or Jesus, one has to be well disciplined, “practicing what we preach.”

Luke 6:46-49 “But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’ and not do the things which I say? Whoever comes to Me, and hears My sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like; He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock. But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation, against which the stream beat vehemently; and immediately it fell and the ruin of that house was great.”

As we are being changed be being a disciple of Jesus, we are letting ‘Our light shine’ we are reflecting through our style and manner of living that we are disciples of Him who died for us.

The following are the words of Jesus Christ in the Gospel of Matthew (NKJ version.)

Matt 10.32
IF ANYONE PUBLICLY ACKNOWLEDGES ME AS HIS FRIEND, I WILL OPENLY ACKNOWLEDGE HIM AS MY FRIEND BEFORE MY FATHER IN HEAVEN. BUT IF ANYONE PUBLICLY DENIES ME, I WILL OPENLY DENY HIM BEFORE MY FATHER IN HEAVEN.

Matthew 10:24-25a
“A DISCIPLE IS NOT ABOVE HIS TEACHER, NOR A SERVANT ABOVE HIS MASTER. IT IS ENOUGH FOR A DISCIPLE THAT HE BE LIKE HIS TEACHER AND A SERVANT LIKE HIS MASTER.

Prayer:
Father, it is hard to come under your discipline at times. But I know that you want the absolute best for me and without submitting to your discipline, I cannot fully be your disciple. Help me please to trust you more with my life so that as you work in me, I will reflect your nature in the way I live. And thank you Father, that you love me too much to leave me like I am!