Discipleship - Jesus begins to teach us
Discipleship – What is the first lessons Jesus gave?
Using Luke as our base book of scripture, we see that after Jesus started His ministry, He prayed then began to teach.
Matthew 5 thru 7 is the Sermon on the Mount. It shows as the first time Jesus taught his disciples.
So let’s get started!!
We start with the beatitudes which can be found in Matthew 5:3-12 and Luke 6:20-23.
Why do we care about who is blessed and who isn’t? What a way to start teaching everyone that wishes to follow Jesus!! So do we pick the blessing we want and go for it? Or do we need to consider all of the blessings and try for all of them?
Last we I received a few emails, and phone calls about the lesson. One person said “The whole topic scares me. Why? Well, it's simple, really. I'm afraid of what God wants of me! I'm also spiritually lazy. Its okay to show up to church and fellowship with my church friends. It's okay to praise and pray for things and people. It's good to receive Communion every week and to get the pastor's blessing. But... be an actual disciple? Oh, now, sister, that's asking way too much! Am I the only one who is terrified that God might actually want some sort of commitment from me?”
Sure enough most of us have those thoughts. I know I did at the start. Just check out Matthew 6:34 "Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.” So let us move on to the finding out what it is a disciple is. If we know what Jesus has defined and the lessons He taught, then as Mt. 6:34 says – we can handle it because nothing, yes NOTHING will be more than you can handle. No matter what skills you have or don’t have, no matter what energy level you have, no matter what physical limitations you may have; no matter the type of finances you may or may not have – you will succeed, because GOD is on YOUR SIDE!!
But the answer is further into Jesus’ first lesson on that hillside. So what did Jesus start with? The Beatitudes! Blessed be… How are we supposed to interpret these?
We can look at them in 2 lights: 1) as benefits you can see in those you minister to and 2) benefits you may or may not experience.
First let’s just start with getting to know the benefits of being a disciple. How many of you take a job with out know the benefits? You want to know about salary and other benefits and you even want to know the hours you will work, RIGHT? It’s amazing but here is Jesus telling you about the benefits of being a follow of God. So with these potential benefits (see Mt 5:3-12 or Luke 6:20-23) is it worth taking the job? I want to be pure in heart so that I might see God. I want to be comforted when I mourn, I want lots of these to apply to me. It brings great comfort to me to know that God has a benefit plan for me. Yes it can mean that I will be persecuted and reviled, but don’t the benefits of seeing God make it all worth it?
I love the next passage in Matthew. Jesus wants you to take the job. You were born to follow God and Jesus. So let us follow Jesus and go forth and set our light on a hill! (see Mt 5:17-20 or Luke 14:34-35) That is what this study is trying to get those reading it doing – helping you see God’s will and following it so that those around you can see your light shine forth. It may be subtle, but change will happen.
Remember Jesus said He was going to start by teaching His disciples and they were to train more who would train more and so forth. I don’t know about you all, but I haven’t had a mentor like Jesus to train me to be a disciple. Have you? Share your wisdom if you have. Or maybe I have and wasn’t ready to listen. I have gone to many churches that I thought were Christ-centered, but then again there were weaknesses… there are always weaknesses. Nothing is perfect in God, but we must try.
Read over the Sermon on the Mount this coming week. (that would be your homework). Use Matthew and read chapters 5 thru 7. There are lots of things there for us to read and take in.
Please send your comments to alycekeener@yahoo.com. I tend to read that email at least every other day, I am trying to read it daily, but don’t always make it. Anything you write will not be shared with anyone unless you give me permission to do such. I will honor your privacy.
Also if you don’t have a Bible or want to read a different version
you can go online to biblegateway.com
and read away.
alyce