Diocesan
Life Columns
Bishop Paul V. Marshall
Bishop Paul's writes a monthly column for the Diocesan Newspaper, Diocesan
Life, edited by Communication
Minister, Bill Lewellis.
For more features from the life of our diocese, check Diocesanlife....ONLINE; and Bethlehem
News.
Discipleship is Not for Wimps
By Paul V. Marshall
[Diocesan Life, October 1996]
Like few others, our century has struggled to describe membership
in the church in a way that makes clear that every Christian has
important responsibilities by baptism into Jesus Christ. Historians,
500 years from now, may call that our greatest legacy.
Words, however, can trip us up. "Priesthood" and "minister," when
used as terms for general Christian living -- for example, "priesthood
of all believers" -- no matter how well meant and carefully sanitized,
bring to mind suggestions of separateness and specialness and wheel-spinning
arguments about who are the real ministers or priests of the church.
The church at large does not help this by its reference to "laity" as
an "order" for purposes of counting votes at conventions. ("Orders" exist
within and for the laos, the people of God.) The most confusing
and problematic idea of all is the occasional reference to confirmation
as "lay ordination," the ultimate clericalizing and confusing of
a simple idea: take your baptism seriously.
That simple idea is expressed in the one word used over and over
in the gospels: disciple. It is an unromantic, businesslike word.
My root identity in the world is that I have responded to God's
call and try to be a disciple, a follower, a student, of Jesus
the Messiah. It is important for me to keep that in focus.
My job, my ordained role, is one of stewardship of word and sacrament
for the sake of the church. That is my ministry in the church.
It can be taken away from me. The canons do take it away in large
measure when I reach the age of 72.
What no human power can give or take away is my knowledge of myself
as Jesus' disciple, baptized into his death and walking in newness
of life.
What comes to mind when I think of myself as disciple? A partial
and sketchy exploration of New Testament passages includes many
themes that intersect with the center of Christian believing. Disciple
turns out to be a marvelous word for who we are, and who we are
to become.
"Whoever would be my disciple must take up the cross and follow
me... The disciple is not greater than the master."
These two sayings of Jesus are for me the fundamental charter
of discipleship: not expecting to escape, but rather to share in
Jesus' offering of himself for the world.
"It is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the
servant like the master. If they have called the master of the
house Beelzebub, how much more will they malign those of his household." As
Stephen Carter reminds us in The Culture of Disbelief, and
an English scholar writes in Licensed Insanities, we probably
can expect it to get worse, not better, for believers in a post-Christian
culture. Discipleship is not for wimps. At this point what commends
the word disciple to us, is that nobody will fight to have this
distinction conferred on them.
"The maid who kept the door said to Peter, 'Are not you also one
of this man's disciples?' He said, "I am not." As it gets rougher
to represent Christ in the world, will I deny him when asked directly,
or in subtler ways, like with my checkbook or in the voting booth?
"The disciple whom Jesus loved." Most scholars now believe that
John meant us to imagine ourselves as that disciple. Remember that
discipleship is not only about gritty mission, it is about being
loved as no other people are loved.
"Now there was at Joppa a disciple named Tabitha, which means
Dorcas. She was full of good works and acts of charity." In the
Acts of the Apostles we are reminded more than once that discipleship
is open to all. That many of the "stars" of the New Testament narrative
are women is beyond argument.
"Jesus then said to the Jews who had believed in him, 'If you
continue in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know
the truth, and the truth will make you free.'" It is not just any
old truth that makes free. (The truths of algebra I always found
particularly unredemptive.) The truth we seek is to be found in
the word of Christ. Do I structure each day so that I can hear
that truth, or am I too busy with other truths?
"From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must
go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief
priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.
And Peter took him and began to rebuke him, saying, 'God forbid,
Lord! This shall never happen to you.'" Every generation has its
own temptations to make Christianity safe, attractive to behold,
and pleasant to experience. How often do we duck our ministry to
keep religion pleasant?
"And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, 'Lord,
do you want us to bid fire come down from heaven and consume them?'" With
shame I recognize the part of me that would like to be the cosmic
cop. Some days it comes out when I drive. Vengeance is much better
left to God, for everyone's sake, particularly mine. Disciples
have other fish to fry.
"Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them
in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo,
I am with you always, to the close of the age." An uncompromising
demand, accompanied by a limitless promise. Pray that we hear and
heed both in this diocese.
"As he was now drawing near, at the descent of the Mount of Olives,
the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise
God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen." No
small part of discipleship is worship, corporate and private. Whom
and how we praise shapes us more than we might recognize.
One could go on and on, as these are only about a tenth of the
occurrences of "disciple[s]." They demonstrate that it is a robust
word, inclusive of all Christians, and instructive about the mission,
agonies, temptations, and glories of the Christian life. God helping,
I'll be one too -- every day.
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Index)
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