Tuesday of this week, I had an opportunity to go to a Redbird’s game. As I am sure all Memphians know, the Redbirds are a farm team for the St. Louis Cardinals. Going to the Redbirds game got me thinking about going to see the Cardinals play as a boy. Those memories inevitably brought back memories of Stan “The Man” Musial. I used Stan Musial as an example in a sermon a couple of years ago, so today I really don’t want to go into too much detail about his life. However, for those who are younger and have never heard of Stan Musial, I want to introduce him to my readers.

Stan Musial was a great baseball player. He played for the St. Louis Cardinals from 1941 to 1963, twenty-two years in the major leagues. He is one of the few players to play for the same organization his entire career. Stan had a 331 lifetime batting average and was elected to the Hall of Fame on the first ballot. He is recognized as one of the finest players of all time and as a role model for young people.

Using Stan as an example in that prior sermon was a great day for me in two ways: First, if you go to my office, you will see a framed memorial to Stan Musial. Danny Lee, who was here when I preached the sermon, went home between services, got it from his closet, and put it in my office. The second great thing about that day was that it explained a phenomenon that troubled me through raising four children. When any of our children played baseball, and especially our youngest, I would try to teach them how to bat. Their stance was never quite right. So, I would show them the proper stance. They never got it right, and their coaches uniformly told them I was not right. This made me mad because I just knew I was right.

In preaching that sermon, I realized that when I grew up in Springfield, Missouri in the 1950-60’s, every little boy eventually learned to bat like Stan Musial. Stan, however, had a very unusual batting stance. When I taught my children, I taught them the way I learned to bat. It was the batting stance I learned watching Stan Musial. Subconsciously, the right way to bat was the way Musial batted. You see, I was a disciple of Stan “the Man” Musial in baseball, and patterned my batting stance after his batting stance. Perhaps more importantly, he was a hero and a role model in other ways as well.

Message and Text 

Today in our blog, we are talking about discipleship. Our text is from Matthew Chapter 4. Hear the Word of God:

As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were 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. Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets. Jesus called them, and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him. Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed; and he healed them. Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan followed him (Matthew 4:18-25).

In my Facebook post earlier this week, our lesson is summarized in three phrases, “Hang out with me.” “Live with me.” “Act like me.” When Jesus calls us to be his disciples he is not merely asking us to believe he is the Son of God. He is asking us to pattern our lives after him. He wants us to become just like him, as he is the image of the invisible God.

Relationships: The Life of a Disciple

This is an exciting day. For months our staff and the pastors have been working on a kind of strategy for disciple making. Two years or so ago, Cindy went to Sheffield, England with Kent Hunter and brought back some ideas and a book which we began to read and discuss. Then, Kathy went to a mission meeting and brought back another book and idea. I began to think about how to bring these two ideas and others together in a way of being church designed for Advent. It all begins with relationships.

Notice that Jesus begins his ministry by calling people into a relationship with him. Jesus calls two, then the four who will be closest to him, and finally the remainder of the disciples. We know from the Gospels and Acts that the Twelve were not the only followers of Jesus. There were others, eventually as many as seventy disciples, 120 disciples,  and even as many as 500 people (see, Luke 10:1-23, I Cor. 15:1-6, Acts 1:12-15).

In our desire to read the Bible and to remember Jesus’ teachings, we can forget that the first thing Jesus did, and the thing he did from Day One through the Last Supper was to build relationships with his disciples. The disciples were called together as a community formed to accomplish the Great Commission. Jesus called disciples to make disciples. He does the same thing today.

Each sermon in this series has a symbol. Today’s symbol is a triangle that points up, in, and out. The Up, In, and Out represent three relationships that are essential for every follower of Jesus. There is our relationship Up with God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. There is our relationship In with the Christian community of which we are a part. There is our relationship Out as we share God’s love with the world.

There is no vital Christian life without all three of these relationships. We all need a relationship with God. We all need a community of faith. We all need to put our faith to work. No one gets to say, “I only need a personal relationship with God.” No one gets to say, “I only need a relationship with my Christian friends.” No one gets to say, “I only need to serve others.” We all need all these relationships all the time.

Up Our Relationship with God

Just because we all need relationships does not mean that some relationships are not more fundamental than others. In the Christian life, our relationship of trusting faith God the Father through Christ the Son in the Power of the Spirit is fundamental. The disciples did not come to Jesus saying, “How about we hang out together.” Jesus came to the disciples saying, “Come hang out with me.” This points to an even bigger point: We are not in charge of our relationship with God. God is in charge of our relationship with him. He gets to set the agenda, show is the way, and lead us to grow.

Children don’t come to parents and say, “I would like to be born.” Children almost never come to their parents and say, “I would like to grow up, teach me how.” Neither my brother nor I, nor any of our children, or any children I know of, came to their parents saying, “I would like to learn to do chores, can you give me some.” No child ever says, “I think you need to discipline me so I can grow up wisely.”

God has decided that he wants to grow a community that will look just like the relationship God has, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God has decided to make us a part of his family. He wants us to be his children. God has decided that he wants to help members of his family know how to love one another as a family. Therefore, God has said, “Come follow my Son who reveals me and is just like me.”

This following of God requires that we read our Bibles, learn more about Jesus, learn to talk sensibly to God in prayer, and learn how to bring God into every aspect of our day-to-day lives. To do this, like the first twelve disciples, we have to make time to just be with God. We all need prayer times, quiet times, etc.

Our Relationship with the Discipling Community of Jesus

Second, there is  our relationship between us and our Brothers and Sisters in Christ–the other members of our part of the family of God. There was never a time when Jesus was discipling anyone any way other than in a community. As Matthew tells the story, Jesus began by calling the inner circle of Peter, Andrew, James, and John. Later, Jesus called Levi, the tax collector, to join the fellowship. By less than halfway through Matthew, he has called the original Twelve: “Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him” (Matthew 10:2-4).

We know from Acts that Paul rarely traveled or ministered alone. He nearly always had around him, Barnabas, who helped disciple him, Silas, Timothy, Luke, Titus and others. Jesus discipled in a community. Paul discipled in community.  and we are asked to do the same.

We live in an individualistic culture. We sometimes think  we don’t need other Christians, but we most certainly do. If Peter, Andrew, James and John needed community, we do too. The names of the disciples (and perhaps especially the inclusion of Levi, Judas Iscariot, and others) bring us to an important point: The disciples did not get to choose who was in their community. Jesus did the choosing.

We live in a culture of church hopping and people looking for a “church that meets my needs.” I can almost guarantee you that Levi did not meet Peter’s needs.  (You can imagine how enthusiastic the disciples were about having an IRS agent as one of the disciples, someone who would know of any unreported fish sales.) In building a discipling group, God brings different sorts of people together with different interests, abilities, experiences, and backgrounds. He wants us to learn from one another. He does not want is all to be alike, of the same social class, etc.

Out: Our Movement Into the World

Finally, our life of Christian discipleship, our life of following Jesus, brings us into the world around us. Once again, this week I noticed something I never noticed before: Immediately after calling the disciples, we are told that Jesus went throughout the Galilee teaching in synagogues, preaching the good news of the Kingdom of God in the open air, healing diseases, and casting out demons. It appears that Jesus forgot to ask them to attend 10,000 Sunday School classes for years and years before doing something! Right from the beginning he had them with him as he ministered to others.

Americans have a naive idea that you must know a lot before you take on the job of being an active disciple in the world. Jesus seems to have thought that his disciples would learn what they needed to know as they spent time with him and watched him preach, teach, heal, share, pray, and the like. Therefore, right from the beginning he shared his ministry with them. Jesus knew that learning by doing is important, and he really believed in field trips. His three years of ministry was one long field trip for the disciples!

Being a disciple cannot be separated from doing the things that disciples do. Learning to be a disciple is a lot like learning to bat or learning any other skill: you won’t learn until and unless you do.

Christianity is not knowing who Jesus is, memorizing a few Bible verses, and learning three or four theological ideas. Christianity is a way of life. Furthermore, it is a specific kind of way of life: it is a way of life patterned after Jesus Christ and his way of life. It is a life of loving others, being a servant, sharing life together, discovering and using spiritual gifts, healing our broken world, and speaking truth into the darkness of lies. Being a Christian is learning to bear a cross now and again. We can only learn these things as we do them.

When I had been a Christian only a few weeks, one of our pastors called me into his office and asked me to lead a worship service at the Star of Hope Mission in Houston, Texas.  I had never given a testimony, taught, or done an altar call. I had four hours to get ready. Why he chose me to do such a thing, I will never know. But, he did the right thing. He could have done it himself better. Instead, he allowed me to learn by doing. In a lot of life, it is true: We learn best by doing. And, being a disciple is one of those things we learn best, in fact we only learn, by doing.

Copyright, 2015, G. Christopher Scruggs, All Rights Reserved