“‘Come, follow me.’ - Jesus in Mark 1:17”
“‘May you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.’” - first-century Jewish blessing
“Who are you following? Everybody is following somebody - or at least something. Put another way, we’re all disciples. The question isn’t, ‘Am I a disciple?’ It’s, ‘Who or what am I a disciple of?’ I know, I know; what I just said is akin to heresy in the modern world. We want so badly to believe that we - and we alone - plot our course, captain our ship, control our destiny. We aspire to lead, not to follow.
But, question: How is that working out for you? Do you ever feel that nagging ‘thought’ tug at the back of your mind: Is the life I’m living the life I most deeply desire? Is this it?” - John Mark Comer
“Powerful forces have a vested interest in our believing the myth (and it is a myth) that we are following no one at all. Many of the cultural liturgies that indoctrinate us daily - ‘Be true to yourself,’ ‘You do you,’ ‘Speak your truth’ - can be traced back to sources with a nefarious agenda. If ‘they’ (whether multi-national corporations, politicians, anti-democratic government agents, marketing departments, influencers who just want more followers, etc.) can make us believe that each person is a blank slate, just following the inner compass of our ‘authentic self’ in an upward march to happiness, then they can keep us blind to all the ways we’ve been ‘discipled’ - formed and manipulated - by their desires.” - John Mark Comer
“The modern church is facing a crisis of discipleship. It’s not that people don’t want to become like Jesus, or that people aren’t trying to become like Jesus. It’s that we don’t know how to become like Jesus. We need a pathway to formation for the modern era.” - Practicing the Way website
Mark 1:14-20
“…Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. ‘The time has come,’ he said. ‘The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!’ As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. ‘Come, follow me,’ Jesus said, ‘and I will send you out to fish for people.’ At once they left their nets and followed him. When he had gone a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John in a boat, preparing their nets. Without delay he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.”
“Imagine this: Your name is Simon. You’re a first-century Hebrew, likely in your late teens or early twenties. You run a fishing business in the Galilee, a string of villages in the north of Israel. Your life is pretty much mapped out for you. You do what your father did, and his father before him. Living under Roman occupation, there aren’t a lot of options. Keep your head down, be quiet, pay your taxes.
One day you’re waist deep in water, casting your net alongside your brother, Andrew, when you notice a man walking toward you on the beach. You instantly recognize his face. It’s him: Jesus, from Nazareth, just a few miles away. Everyone is talking about this man - he is saying and doing things no rabbit has said or done. Ever.
Here he is walking straight toward you. You make eye contact. His eyes sparkle like stars, like there’s a cosmos behind them. He radiates joy, but there’s no small talk: Come, follow me…and I will send you out to fish for people. You’re absolutely stunned. It can’t be. Not you. You immediately drop your nets, drag Andrew out of the boat (though he doesn’t need any coaxing), leave everything behind, and fall in step behind Jesus, elated to be in his company. Or in the words of the biographer Mark, ‘At once they left their nets and followed him.’” - John Mark Comer
Jesus was a rabbi.
Matthew 11:28-30
“‘Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.’”
What’s a disciple?
Upon accepting such an invite, a disciple’s entire life was organized around three goals:
- To be with your rabbi.
- To become like your rabbi.
- To do as your rabbi did.
“The greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heartbreaking needs, is whether those who…are identified as ‘Christians’ will become disciples - students, apprentices, practitioners - of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence.” - Dallas Willard
A way of life.
Acts 9:2
“… [Saul] asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem.”
Acts 19:23
“About that time there arose a great disturbance about the Way.”
Acts 24:14
“‘…I admit that I worship the God of our ancestors as a follower of the Way…’”
“The Way of Jesus is not just a theology (a set of ideas that we believe in our heads). It is that, but it’s more. And it’s not just ethics (a list of dos and don’ts that we obey or disobey). It is that, but it’s still more. It’s exactly what it sounds like - a way of life.” One way to paraphrase Jesus’ invitation to ‘follow me’ is to say, ‘Adopt my overall way of life to experience the life I have to offer.’” - John Mark Comer
Acts 4:13
“When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.”
Jesus was a rabbi.
What’s a disciple?
A way of life.
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