THE FIRST STEP BACK

If one wished to make discipleship to Jesus the most important thing in their life, what should they do? If they wish to leave the constraints of religious performance and external conformance behind, how would one proceed?

I would encourage you to stay away. Really, I encourage you to stay away.
If you can, you probably should.
Genuine disciples simply can’t stay away.
They have nowhere else to go.

If you are comfortable in the garb of religious clichés, Christian morals and church doctrine determined by those with the most authority and influence, you should stay there, for discipleship will be for you a burden and an immense disappointment. See: Matthew 13:44-46 for example.

If you just can’t stay away, then you have made the first step toward genuine, inner transformation where the work must be done. But let’s be clear, you have to do something. Discipleship is not passive, it is active. But the active part is not in the area of trying to obey Him, being righteous or perfect. Leave all hope in that direction behind. We aren’t striving for obedience; we are putting effort into becoming a certain kind of person for whom obedience becomes spontaneous. We do that by doing the things within our power, which will enable Him to do what He has been waiting to do all along; change every aspect of our entire person into one fully functioning human being. While we have a part to play in this transformation process, we will never trust our part. Remember, we are learning to Trust Christ, the essence of the good news of the Kingdom.

If the idea that you have to actually DO something to enable God to do something else in your life appalls you, you have hit a major obstruction to further development. If you want transformation to simply strike you like lightening in the midst of a church service, then retreat silently into your Christianity and religious observances. If that is your idea of discipleship, you will never have a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, necessary, as Jesus said to enter the Kingdom of the Heavens. You will have a righteousness that is defined by external performance of religious activities and nailing down the corners of your pristine doctrine.

If you are willing to embark, to move beyond this initial roadblock into making being with Jesus learning to be like Him the most important thing in your life, take a walk. Really, take a long walk. Leave the technology (all of it) behind and settle this issue for at least today. Will I make following Jesus the most important thing in life? It is the most important decision you will make every day of the rest of your existence, which will never end.
Will, I today, choose discipleship to Jesus as the single most crucial aspect of my life?
TO BE CONTINUED…
On your next walk: Learning the language of the Kingdom.