Chapter 2
What is Intentional Discipleship?
Listen
Read
And He said to them [Peter and Andrew], “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Immediately they left their nets and followed Him. And going on from there He saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and He called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed Him. (Matthew 4:19–22)
When two sets of brothers heard Jesus calling them to follow Him, they did precisely that. We don’t know how well they understood what was ahead for them or what it would mean to follow Jesus, but what is evident by their actions was that they were serious and intentional about going with Jesus wherever He went; they were the first intentional disciples. As they went with Jesus, the journey changed their relationship with God and their purpose in life.
What does it mean to be a disciple?
Before I explore how to be intentional as a disciple of Jesus, I need to define our terms. What does the word “disciple” of Jesus mean? That depends on who you ask.
To find out how the ordinary person might answer the question, I queried that repository of all human knowledge, ChatGPT, to find out what conclusions it had come to after trolling the internet and training on all the data sources it has archived and processed (so far).
The query I typed into ChatGPT was, “Explain what it means to be a disciple of Jesus to someone who knows nothing about Him or Christianity.” ChatGPT came back with this:
Being a disciple of Jesus means following the teachings and example of Jesus Christ, who is considered the central figure in Christianity. It involves embracing principles of love, compassion, and faith, as outlined in the Bible, and striving to live a life aligned with these values.
To the degree that this answer reflects consensus in our modern world, we can conclude being a disciple of Jesus is generally understood to be an issue of imitation. In this view, disciples of Jesus live their lives consciously seeking to embrace and live by the principles of love, compassion, and faith as exemplified in the life of Jesus. While this is admirable, it doesn’t answer the next question, why imitate Jesus?
Discipleship is about more than imitation
For generations, people have also imitated the Buddha, the prophet Mohammed, or any number of spiritual leaders in the world’s religions. While it is good for humans to strive for worthy and admirable ideals exemplified in the lives of others it all ends up being a matter of human striving. We would all be better people if we did that but is that all that discipleship to Jesus turns out to be?
The point we want to make is that being a disciple of Jesus is more than striving to become a better person by living up to the high standard He set. Answering the call to come and follow Jesus ultimately turns out to be the pivotal step we must take to become part of the new creation that will ultimately end with a new heaven and new earth (Isaiah 66:22; 2 Peter 3:13) and the restoration of all things promised by the ancient prophets of Israel (Acts 3:18-21; Romans 8:21).
For Paul, following Jesus was not about adding something to our lives; it was about starting over.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, He is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (2 Corinthians 5:17).
Jesus' ideal is not merely a high standard of virtue, pure motives, or sincere love for God and others. Jesus shows us in His life what it was that the sovereign creator originally intended for humanity. Jesus, the second Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45-49) is nothing less than the beginning of the restoration of humanity to the sovereign creator’s design and purpose.
For those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that He might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom He predestined He also called, and those whom He called He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified. (Romans 8:29–30).
One day I was on a long walk thinking about all of this. I began to try to put into words what I was starting to see about Jesus and my relationship with him. The following statement came out of that time of prayer and I think it gets to the heart of the issue of identity and purpose regained through discipleship to Jesus.
I have been created as the image of God. As a disciple of Jesus, I am being restored to my responsibility, authority, and power to manage the good purposes of God on earth as in heaven.
Some people imitate others because they want to pretend they are something they are not. But this is backward thinking. We don’t imitate Jesus because we pretend to be something we’re not. We imitate Jesus because He shows us how to live as the people we were created to be.
Jesus is the prototype human
Jesus' human life is documented in the gospels. As we become intentional disciples of Jesus, He teaches and empowers us to live as He lived and, therefore, to live as God always intended for humans to live. What we see in Jesus is the prototype human life as it is restored in proper relationship with the Creator and function in the creation.
The Bible declares that God is love but Jesus shows how this love was intended to be implemented in the real world through those who are His image. From the beginning it was the Sovereign Creator’s plan to bless and care for creation through us. When Jesus loved individual people, He was delivering the Father’s grace and mercy directly to them through the tangible things He said and did for them.
The Bible promises that, by the power of Jesus’ Spirit living in us, we can learn to love as Jesus did. Learning to love like Jesus translates into doing the works Jesus did. The goal of the gospel of the Kingdom was for Jesus to restore humans to their responsibility, authority, and power to do the works God originally intended for us to do in His created world.
What is Intentional Discipleship?
In this book, when I talk about Intentional Discipleship, this is what I mean:
In your relationship with Jesus, learn from Him what only He can teach you about who God is, who you are, and how to live your life as the sovereign creator intended.
That is a short statement, but if I unpack it you will see why it is so important to focus your attention on Jesus. Let’s go through this definition phrase by phrase.
The first phrase is “in your relationship with Jesus.”
The distance between the first disciples and ourselves does not change the fundamental disciple-relationship every generation of believers should expect to have with Jesus. This is a profound realization and is the key to reorienting your life around Jesus. It is an idea I believe was assumed by the New Testament writers.
This is why Paul wrote “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)
This statement by Paul is not talking about striving to live up to an ideal or to follow the example of a noteworthy dead person. He is talking about a relationship with a real person that is characterized by intimacy and faithful obedience. The life Paul lived was possible because Jesus lived in him.
Because of this relationship, modern disciples of Jesus reorient their lives to do with Jesus precisely what the first disciples did with Him; we worship Him, we listen to His voice, we learn from Him, and we minister with Him to others.
The second phrase is “To Learn from Him (Jesus).”
Everything in the lives of the first disciples was reoriented around the presence and reality of Jesus in their lives. At first Jesus was physically with them; after his resurrection and ascension he was the Spirit of Christ within them. (Romans 8:9-11)
My goal in this book is to help you make the mental shift from Jesus on the periphery of your life to Jesus at the center, as the true and genuine source of your life. Jesus isn’t an option; He is a necessity. He provides the only way for you to become what you were created to be, and empowered and equipped to do what you were created to do.
Because of the gift of Jesus’ indwelling Spirit coupled with the resources of the scriptures and the community of Jesus’ body, every disciple of Jesus has the same opportunity to be discipled by Jesus, to hear from Him and to learn from Him, just like the first disciples.
What was said about Peter and John in Acts 4 could be said of you as well if you set your heart to learn from Jesus as they did:
Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common [people], they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus. (Acts 4:13).
The third phrase is “About Who God Is.”
Everyone has some idea or mental picture in mind when they hear the word “God” but the mental picture often is not what the Bible means. According to the Bible this dissonance isn’t a surprise. While the Bible itself acknowledges that all of humanity is aware of God it doesn’t mean people understand Him or know what He is really like.
For example, in his letter to the church in Rome, Paul said,
For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. (Romans 1:19,20).
Paul also referred to the universal human awareness of God when He spoke to the philosophers and city leaders at the famous Areopagus in Athens, Greece.
[God] made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward Him and find Him. (Acts 17:26,27)
However, Paul’s speech wasn’t merely to point out that everyone has an awareness or reverence for the divine. He went on to say,
What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. (Acts 17:23)
What did Paul proclaim to them? Did He lecture them about a new philosophy? No, He told them about Jesus. The audacious claim of the Bible in the face of past and present religious pluralism is the claim that the most accurate revelation of the true God is a person, and His name is Jesus.
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days He has spoken to us by his Son, whom He appointed the heir of all things, through whom also He created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and He upholds the universe by the word of his power. (Hebrews 1:1,2)
Consider Jesus’ own words, passed along to us by one of His disciples, John:
Jesus said to Him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know Him and have seen Him.’ … Philip said to Him, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.’ Jesus said to Him, ‘Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? (John 14:6,8)
I don’t know what ideas about God are in your mind as you come to this book, but you will better understand who God is after looking more closely at His Son, Jesus.
The fourth phrase is “About Who We Are.”
Another mystery most people struggle to understand is the one about themselves. Confusion and self-doubt are common feelings most people in our culture struggle with. We are told that we are the result of mindless evolutionary forces and random chance. As many people in our culture are beginning to realize, this story of human origins doesn’t give us much to go on when trying to find meaning and purpose.
Jesus shows us what a real human life looks like. When we look at Him carefully, we catch a glimpse of what the Sovereign Creator had in mind when He launched His creation project and we see the goal God has in mind for us if we follow His son, Jesus.
The Bible is the story of how the Sovereign Creator took action to address the betrayal and rebellion in the garden of Eden to restore His plan for a good creation managed by His human image-bearers under His authority and equipped with His grace and power. In and through Jesus, the creator has done everything necessary to put the creation, and humans as essential participants, back in order and restored to His original purposes. This is who you really are.
The last phrase is “How to Live Our Lives as the Sovereign Creator Intended.”
Non-biblical worldview assumptions and cultural confusion did not cripple Jesus as they often do us. However, Jesus promised that those who followed Him would experience freedom to live the kind of human life the Sovereign Creator intended. He said,
If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. (John 8:31,32)
This freedom is freedom from the power of sin and death, but it is also the freedom to live a new life of power and purpose.
For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:3-7)
The rest of this book will explore what Jesus wants to teach us about living a life with God from which a lifetime of relationship with the Father and ministry with Jesus will naturally flow.
Here are some questions for consideration and discussion.
Imagine yourself with Simon, Andrew, James, or John, and Jesus walks into your life and says, “Come and follow me.” What is your response?
What is your experience of hearing the call to follow Jesus?
What is a challenge for you from this chapter on Intentional Discipleship?
Chapter 2 Daily Scripture Readings
How to spend some quality time listening to what Jesus would like to say through the scriptures:
In preparation, acknowledge the Lord’s presence and love for you and settle yourself before Him (in your mind and heart).
Read the day’s text carefully; take your time.
Reflect on what you have been reading with a listening ear – what word, phrase, or sentence speaks to you from the text?
Now, talk to the LORD about what you hear from this text. What has Jesus stirred in your heart?
If you were with Him walking from one Galilean village to another, what would you say to Him about this?
Chapter 2 - Day One: Mark 5
Chapter 2 - Day Two: Mark 6:1-29
Chapter 2 - Day Three: Mark 6:30-56
Chapter 2 - Day Four: Mark 7
Chapter 2 - Day Five: Mark 8-9:1
There are two ways you can go deeper with this material, if you are finding this helpful.
First, read How to get the most from this book. I offer some suggestions about how to do more than skim the pages and move on with minimal impact.
Second, read How to use this book with a small group. This material was formed and proven in a small group setting that has been very effective at helping participants engage with Jesus at a much deeper and transformative level than is typical in our churches today.