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My awesome daughter, Gemma, is eight months old. She is absolutely the greatest part of our lives and my wife and I find something new to laugh at as she makes fresh discoveries everyday. ”What can I put in my mouth? Can I move my hands like that? Is that the dog making funny sounds? What else can I put in my mouth?” Lately, G has been pulling up on the furniture to stand up, mostly to grab for the forbidden remote control or iPhone or something else too valuable to get baby slobbered, which are apparently the vary things that attract said baby slobber. Nonetheless, this latest discovery has been interesting to watch. She puts so much effort into accomplishing her goal and it makes me wonder what is going on in her head. I imagine it goes something like this: forbidden object spotted, army crawl to the couch, figure out how to get from my stomach to my knees, reach up as hiiiiiigh as I can and grab on tightly to as much material as I can, pull with all my strength and try to avoid the head bust if I slip, now that I’m semi-up work my feet to where they are underneath me, whew… now to that remote!
A couple of thoughts about this whole process of watching my daughter learn to stand and walk make the wheels in my head rotate a little faster. Firstly, it is ironic how she always wants the things she cannot have. If I put one of her toys, decked out in all sorts of colors, shapes, noise-making devices, and all other supposed baby-attracting bells and whistles, up on the couch, she will look at it with half a glance and then look for something else that is more interesting and usually, more forbidden. Why does she work so hard to pick up something that she knows she will get in trouble for grabbing, chewing, consuming, or playing with, especially when her dad has given her a toy that was made for her to play with and enjoy in all its fullness? Secondly, I do not expect her to walk on the first attempt at a step. I have no doubt that soon she will be hauling on all two’s going ninety-to-nothing, but I know that it will happen with many falls, scraps, bruises, and scars to vouch for her accomplishment, and I will be proud of every single attempt that she makes. The craziest part is this makes scary sense to most of us. Do we not go after things we know our Father has forbidden us to chase with laborious effort and a crooked smile? Do we not skip over the great blessings and gifts that He gives us only to run to things that feed our sinful nature and lead us into destruction? At the same time, the Father loves our every attempt at the next step, whatever that step may be. We will undoubtedly stumble and fall and sometimes we might get scrapped up or even scarred, but with each fallen attempt we are one step closer to getting it right. But also undoubtedly, our Father is proud of every single step. He is good. He is loving. And He calls us His own. He looks on us as proud parent looking upon his child learning to walk, looking past the falls and bruises to the end result. His love overcomes us, overwhelms us, and sustains us. Let us chase after the good things our Father puts in front of us, learning to walk in His ways and in His truths, overcoming the failed attempts by getting back up and taking another step, eventually to run towards Him with all of our effort going ninety-to-nothing.
Several months ago, I went fishing for the first time in a long while.
This was mostly because the guys I work with are outdoor enthusiasts, much like myself, however, they lean more toward the fishing/hunting aisles at Academy whereas I roam the camping/kayaking/outdoor sections. I enjoy doing most anything outside and have recently picked up hunting as a hobby, partly to join in the badgering of my co-workers and partly for the experimentation of a new sport. The talk of hunting in our office is probably on the top 5 Frequently Talked About topics and so I couldn’t help but loading up and jumping on the old bandwagon.
Fishing is up there too, but not anywhere close to hunting. Something happened a few months back that boosted fishing in the rankings. I never really paid attention to the conversations on the matter because fishing to me is… well its boring.
Maybe this is due to my memories as a kid making a fishing pole out of a long stick, rolling up Frosted Flakes mixed with Big Red into little pieces as bait, and hiking back to the little tank behind my grandparents house in the country. The construction of this rod was pristine, as I had whittled the bark bare with my trusty Swiss Army (thanks Mac), carving a loophole in the end, and even using duck tape for the grip. As I put my homemade bait on the rusty hook at the end of the line I thought to myself, “This is gonna be great. I’m going to catch the big one!” For the next hour I stared with intent at the mocking red and white bobber, ready to yank the heck out of the rod the moment it went under. Either all of the fish in the pond were brilliant and knew this was some sort of trick, or possibly they all could not stand the taste or smell of Big Red Frosted Flakes, or God forgot to put fish in this tank where fish should naturally be. At the end of that hour I found myself thinking, “The best part of fishing is building the pole. Maybe I could go back and make another rod….”
Nonetheless, fishing has never really been my thing. So when the guys at the office started rambling on about there fishing adventures, I never really paid much attention. This changed, however, with the addition of one adjective.
Kayak fishing!
This culmination of two completely separate activities, one of which I absolutely loved and the other that I hated with equal enthusiasm, somehow struck a melodious chord in my outdoorsy soul. I thought that this was something that I needed to try. I could handle fishing with the guys as long as it was coupled with paddling out on my kayak and the sound of waves breaking out on the banks.
And a strange thing began to happen at the office. Kayaks began to show up everywhere. I was being asked what kinds of kayaks were good? Which ones sucked? Which ones could track well? Which ones had good storage capacities? Kayaking jumped to the top of FTA list in a matter of days, and I loved it. By the end of the week, our whole staff had kayaks in the backs of their trucks and had made plans to kayak fish within the week.
One day, I decided to go out with them and give this newfound sport a try.
I packed my kayaking gear in the back of my Xterra, threw the boats on top, and headed for the lake. One of the guys I worked with lent me a rod and reel because, naturally, I did not own one. We met at the lake and unloaded our massive boatloads of gear. As we put in and began to paddle to the far cove, I found myself so far enjoying kayak fishing. We spread out in the cove and began casting. A few of the guys had several lines dropped in the water and their rods were in custom rod holders attached to their boats. This impressed me as I fumbled around with the one rod I had, trying to figure out how to make the little worm look real as I violently shoved the hook through its fake head. After making sure the weight was at the end of the line, the hook was properly attached, and the “real-looking” fake worm was in place, I began to cast it out and finally sort of got the hang of the motion. I began a contest with myself to see how far out I could cast the hook. After thirty minutes or so, and not even a nibble, we paddled to the next cove hoping more ambitiously hungry fish were ahead. To no avail, the fish remained full and refused to take the bait. At one point I thought I had one when I was reeling it in and my pole started to bend. I pulled and reeled as your suppose to (at least on Wii fishing), and my kayak began to move towards the fish. In my head I thought that it was the big one from back in the day that I always planned on catching, but as I moved closer I realized that my big fish was really a big branch right under the surface of the water that my hook was caught on. That remained to be the most excitement I had all day. We paddled back in and despite not catching a thing I actually had fun kayak fishing.
A few weeks after that adventure, I was at a prayer gathering with a few others and God was really speaking to us and drawing us closer to him. I was praying for a friend of mine who has a ministry that reaches out to several communities across Central America and God began to speak clearly to me what to pray for him. God was pressing on me to pray for my friends “burden,” which sort of confused me. I kept saying to God, “No Lord, you say that your burden is light and your yoke is easy. How can I pray for you to increase his burden? It just does not make sense.” Then God began to assure me that this burden was not a bad thing, although it was both necessary and heavy.
And then almost immediately, God took me back to that memory of fumbling around with the fishing lure. He highlighted in my mind the weight at the end of the line, and I suddenly realized what God was saying to me for my friend. The weight is necessary to catch fish and without it the hook is completely useless. It has nothing to make it sink. For my friend, God was showing me that Christ is the bait and the hook and the reason to fish in the first place. But there has to be weight on the end of the line to make the hook sink. What the Spirit was teaching me was that God sometimes allows our hearts to be burdened, to be heavy, and to feel weighty for the sake of the Gospel. It is not burdensome. It is certainly not condemning. And it is not to load us down with worry, regret, anxiety, or whatever else. Jesus does say, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”1 But I believe God does let us feel pain for other people. He allows us to be touched and moved by the broken hearted. He gives us hearts to feel pity and mercy for other people. And he allows us, in a sense, to be burdened in order to bare each other’s burdens. He gives us the heart, or the weight on our heart, we need in order to go out and cast our line and fish for the sake of the Gospel.
As I told my friend what God was showing me, he shook his head in agreement and was deeply moved by what God was saying to him. He was affirmed in his calling and encouraged in his spirit.
What is God putting on your heart? What areas is he weighting, not weighing, you down in order for you to cast your line in HIS name?
1 Matthew 11:30.
Some call it The Great Commission. Others say it is Jesus’ Famous Last Words, which is strange considering Acts 1. Regardless of what people call the passage, the final verses in the Gospel of Matthew are ones of which we should pay close attention.
Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” - Matthew 28:16-20.
This is a relatively popular passage, especially in evangelical circles. We love to put parts of it on t-shirts and coffee mugs and bumper stickers and use it as a slogan for our upcoming mission trips and outreach events. But how many times do we stop and meditate and marinate on the concepts Jesus is saying? I mean, there is so much going on in this passage, not to mention that these are some of Jesus’ last words before leaving earth. Let’s dive into this text and reflect on some things Jesus says.[i]
So everyone goes through the awful death of Jesus. Three days later, the stone was rolled away. The women had already seen Jesus and told the guys that he’s going to meet them up on the mountain. There is a rumor circulating that Jesus’ body was stolen by his disciples, which they knew was entirely untrue,
and they are wondering what exactly they are going to see on top of this mountain.
They make the journey to Galilee, climb the mountain, and there he is.
When they saw him, they stopped in their tracks and worshiped him.
What did that look like? I honestly have no idea. I don’t know if it they counted to three and sang a song together, or prayed, or if they bowed down, or raised their hands, or if they only raised one hand because they thought two hands would be too distracting to others. All the same, the bottom line is they worshiped. It would be incredible to know what that looked like but the fact remains, we don’t know.
But some doubted.
Some of the guys simply could not wrap their minds around Jesus resurrecting from the dead. Did they lose their ‘disciple’ status for that? NO. They just didn’t think this thing that was happening in front of them was possible – something just wasn’t right about a guy coming back from the dead.
Then Jesus says, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”[ii]
The word, “authority,” is the Greek word, exousia. Everything on heaven and on earth – which is, in the Jewish mindset, everything, everywhere, all places both in this world and in the heavenly realms – Jesus has control. His power to control all of this was with him throughout his entire life, through he chose not to rule by force.
“The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all. The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands.”[iii]
Everything is in Jesus’ hands.
Jesus has a way of turning things upside down. In his day, there was this superpower that ruled a good chunk of the world called the Roman Empire. They held the authority everywhere they went. Their way of authority was coercion. They simply forced people do what they wanted them to do because if they didn’t, that person or group of people, would get the living daylights beat out of them…literally. Death was a completely reasonable option for dealing with people who wouldn’t do what the Roman Government wanted them to do.
So Jesus comes along and says, “I have all authority.” Jesus’ way of authority was not coercion; it was not force. He did not come with a sword and an army, but with a towel. He did not come on a chariot and a white horse, but on a donkey. He did not come triumphantly into the world in a shiny castle, but with humility was laid in a manger inside a stable. Jesus’ way of authority, or exousia, is through servanthood, not coercion.
Jesus even said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.”[iv]
His kingdom is not of this world. The word world is the word kosmos in Greek. It is this earthly world we live in.
Coercion forces people to live a certain way. Most of the time, that way is unnatural and uncomfortable for those people. Jesus said, “My way is from a different place. It is not of this kosmos. My way is not to push people around, but to find those who are being pushed around and help them back to their feet.
Then Jesus says perhaps his most famous post-resurrection words; “Therefore go and make disciples.”[v]
The word, “Go,” here is an imperative verb in the aorist tense. This means a few things for us. The fact that it is an imperative means that it is a command, not a suggestion. Jesus commands us to go. The same is true for the word, “make disciples.” In the Greek, there is also this idea that we are already going. So literally, it could be translated, “having gone keep making disciples.”
All of us are already moving in certain directions. We all have circles of friends with whom we interact and experience life together. It is not like we stand still in an ever-moving world. Jesus knows that we are already going so he says, “As you go make disciples.”
Making disciples, or mathetes, carries the idea of Talmudim, in the Hebrew Scriptures. A Talmid was life long students who followed everything that his teacher did. His whole life was dedicated to learning the ways of his teacher—learning how to live a certain way of life.
Humility is a main factor in this. You know what a good disciple would never say? He would never say, “I know all the answers.” That would put him above his teacher and would be the ultimate offence. It is so contrary to the western way of learning in which a student must know all the right answers and fill in all the blanks in order to be in good standing with the teacher. The first century, Middle-Eastern way of thinking is exactly the opposite, encouraging students to ask more questions, have less answers, and to not even worry about the blacks. Central to understanding discipleship is this idea of saying, “I don’t have the answers. I don’t know.”
Many times in sharing our faith, our greatest fear is what? Not having the answers. We think we are suppose to know it all and wonder what will happen if we don’t know all the answers that someone asks us? We think we need to know everything there is to know before we can tell people about Jesus. There is a great statement that every Christian needs to memorize. It’s complex and deeply theological. It is, “I don’t know.” You can’t be a disciple if you have everything together and you know all the answers.
So Jesus says to go (or having gone) and make disciples of all the nations. The word nations is the word, ethnos. People many times take this verse and slap it on a t-shirt and go on a mission trip to the other side of the world. There is nothing wrong with doing that but I think there is something way deeper here that we can get from this.
Ethnos means people not like you. People who live differently, look different, and are different than you.
So what is Jesus saying? Go and make disciples of the people who aren’t like you.
Jesus assumes that in our going, we come across people who are not like us. He reasons that we are in circles and have connections with people not like us. He’s saying, here, to the people of the first century, “You have it completely backwards.” They believed the savior would come to save them and them alone. It was this idea of, “Rescue us. Save us. Redeem us.” The religious people of that day even had a slang word for the nations that they often used. They called the other nations that were not like them, “dogs.”
Jesus turned that idea upside down. It wasn’t, “Hey guys, avoid those people with everything you have because they are unclean and are pretty much equal to dogs!” It was, “Alright guys, go and hang out with those people who are not like you. Don’t avoid them. Engage them! Talk to them. Don’t walk away from them, but try to get closer to them.”
If you spend all of your time with people who are just like you, you never engage the ethnos. If all you do is hang out in the Christian circles and go to Christian clubs and only participate in Christian events, you cannot get closer to the ethnos. If you never get away from people just like you, then you cannot make disciples.
Jesus even prays that we not disengage from the ethnos. He says, “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.”[vi]
Jesus prays for his disciples. He does not ask God to take them out of the world, but that God would protect them from the evil one. The intention was never, “I’ll take all of you and put you over here so that you will never have to deal with anything and you wont be infested by the heathens of the world and you’ll never ever deal with sin or sinful people again.” It was always, “Hey, I am going to put you into this heathen crowd and let you show them what I look like.”
This might come as a shock to some, but it is perfectly okay to be in the presence of “the bad people.” It is alright to be around someone who is smoking a cigarette, or someone drinking an alcoholic beverage, or someone who uses inappropriate adjectives. It is even okay to be at a place where those smoking, drinking, descriptive-word-using people hang out with no intention of distributing religious tracks or shouting turn-or-burn fraises from a loud speaker. We are to engage people not like us. And yes, other people will talk about us. We will risk damage to our religious reputations. We will be the point of interest during gossip sessions at the prayer meetings and people will question our morality and ethics and even our backsliden hearts. And all of that is perfectly okay.
There is an interesting concept I noticed in the fifteenth chapter of Luke. The first few verses say, “Now the tax collectors and ‘sinners’ were all gathering around to hear [Jesus]. But the Pharisees and teachers of the law muttered…”[vii]
Notice the different people in these few verses. Jesus is with the public outcasts. The-people-who-must-not-be-named. These people are completely opposite of those whom Christians would expect Jesus to be around. And yet, “these people” are the ones gathered around Jesus.
And the Pharisees and teachers of the law muttered.
Which brings an interesting question: do outcasts, sinners, and people not like you flock to you? Do people whom society runs away from want to hear the things you have to say? Do the religious people and Sunday school teachers mutter about you? If the answer is yes, you may look more like Jesus than many people think.
So Jesus says that as we are going, we are to make disciples of people not like us. Then he says two things to do: baptize them in the name of the Father and of the son and of the Holy Spirit and teach them to obey everything he has commanded.[viii]
The word “baptize” is the word, baptitzo, and literally means to immerse or submerge. In evangelical circles we would define this verb, to dunk. In many churches that practice baptism by immersion, the pastor or dunker says something about baptism being a tangible picture of Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection. Water is like death, being immersed into it is like being buried, and we are raised up to walk in newness of life. It is an illustration of the death of our old self and the resurrection of our new self. And what are the words we use? “I baptize you, _________, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
This passage could be a literal demonstration in which Jesus tells us what to do: “Say these words whilst dunking new believers.” Nonetheless, I think there is something more here.
In John 17, the same prayer as mention earlier, Jesus prays for every believer that will ever exist. He prays for unity between them. He says, “Let them be one as I and the Father are one.”[ix]
There is this perfect unity that exists within the Trinity: Father-Son-Holy Spirit.
Three-in-one.
The Holy Trinity.
One God, yet three separate entities.
All different rolls, yet all the same One, Triune God.
So there is this perfect relational flow that exists within the Trinity; three parts that are all in relation to another, all the same God.
This brings up and interesting idea.
We were created in whose image?[x]
God’s.
Our creator created us to be like him. How many social networking tools do we use on a daily basis. How many friends do we have on MySpace? How many times a day do we check FaceBook? We talk to people via Instant Messing, SMS text messaging, and video chat rooms. Most everyone we know has a cell phone and many of us have unlimited texting. We have blogs, Twitter, Bebo, and whatever else just came out in the last few minutes that you spent reading this. The fact is that we are the most well connected generation ever to exist. We can hardly exist outside relationships. We can’t wait to get home to check our comments, posts, messages, or who wants us to be a pirate? Or a ninja? We can’t stand it when we get a text in class or in a meeting and we are unable to check it. We are close to death whenever our phone dies or, God forbid, is lost or broken.
The bottom line is we were created to be in relationship with each other.
We were created to be in relationship with our God.
When Jesus says to baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, maybe its not just a suggestion of what to say when you baptize someone. Maybe it is an instruction to show the people around us what living relationally means. Maybe it is an order to immerse these people in a Trinitarian community. Maybe Jesus is saying to show them what it is like to like in a community of people that love God, love each other, and love other people. A community who lives in this relational flow with each other, doing life together, embracing hardships as a group, crying when ones hurt, rejoicing when one is glad, and trudging through the most difficult situations life throws at a person.[xi]
I have experienced this first hand. Several years ago, Jade and I met a girl. She had lived a life of drugs, sex, and running off chasing after everything under sun. She met Jesus, began to experience life-changing grace and became one of our really close friends. We took her into our community, which at that time was our small group of our friends trying to do life together, and loved her through a lot of tough times. There were moments where she would slip up and fall back into some of the old things that use to drag her to the very bottom pits of despair, yet we still showed her love. And there were times when I wanted to be completely done with her altogether. But God, in relation with all of us, showed us how to love her as we loved each other. We accepted her in her loneliness. We accepted her when she slipped up. We accepted her when she was completely out of life. That was awfully difficult to do and I would argue that it is only through the grace of God that we are still close friends to this day. We helped in her seeing life from a new perspective. We lived life with her and helped her get back on her feet again. And she helped us see life from a new perspective (and helped us learn patience, love, and Christ-centered understanding along the way). That is immersing someone into a Trinitarian community—a relationally based family living out the things that Jesus said.
So Jesus says to make disciples, baptizing the ethnos in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything he has commanded.
Jesus uses the word, didoxo, which means to teach them how to live as one says to live. In other words, don’t leave them hanging. Don’t just introduce them into this community, but teach them how to be apart of this community so that they will be able to go and make more disciples.
What does it look like for the Shalom of God, which is when everything is as it should be, to come into someone’s life? What does it look like for the Shalom of God to rest on a community of believers? Demonstrating to each other how to live the way Jesus taught us to live? That is what Jesus is saying to do. “Look, immerse these people who are not like you into a world that is focused entirely on me, and teach them how to live the way I taught you to live. It’s a better way of life! It is not about not breaking a lot of rules. It is about living in a way that changes the whole entire point of living itself.”
When we go on our “mission trips” or try to build relationships with the lost, people tend to ask, “So when do we bring up Jesus? When is the right time to bring the gospel to them?”
I started reaching out to these freshmen boys a few years ago. I met them at school a when they were in seventh grade, and over time, something connected between us. Gradually, I started hanging out with them, taking them out to eat after football games, and just sitting with them when I visited the high school. I had no agenda for these boys. I wasn’t trying to get them to come to my church, and I wasn’t trying to “save them.” I was doing what I felt like Jesus clearly said to do: LOVE THEM.
Several months into this new relationship that had developed with these boys, I was asked the question, “So have you told them about Jesus?” It was a question that I wrestled with for a few weeks. I had not presented the gospel to them, and honestly, I didn’t want to. I didn’t even feel like I should, which was a little disturbing, considering I am a youth pastor and that is pretty much my job. After doing some study, and much dialogue with a few friends, I started to understand something. In thinking about the question, “when do I share Jesus with these boys?” the answer I came up with was I already AM. The truth is that I am sharing Jesus with these boys. I give them food when they have no money. I give them a ride home when their parents are doing something they think is more important. I talk to them when their world comes crashing down. I was telling these kids about Jesus in the things that I was doing.
So the issue isn’t, when do we share Jesus with these people? The issue is what are we saying about Jesus to these people? What are we saying we believe about God? If we are not hanging out with the ethnos, we are saying exactly what we believe about Jesus: that he cares about people like ME, but doesn’t have time for people like you. Or maybe worse, Jesus looks at them with the same look we give them when we see them.
It isn’t when we tell them that is important, but what we are saying. It is what we are communicating we believe about Jesus. How are we communicating the gospel in the way we live? What are we saying that we—as believers, followers, Christians, disciples—believe about Jesus in how we live and interact with the world, the nations, the ethnos?
When you hang out, study, lead a group, party, eat, reach out, engage, etc., what are you saying about Jesus? What are you teaching about Jesus?
Jesus sums everything up by saying, “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”[xii]
EGO METH HUMON EIMI! Which literally translates, “I with you am!”[xiii]
Central to being a disciple is that we do not have to fear. Jesus says I am with you, always, even to the very end of the age. In the Jewish world, forever isn’t even a concept that you would talk about because no one can understand forever. A good Jew would never say anything about forever because it is uncertain. Jesus says with certainty, I am with you now, and will be with you till the end of the present age. In other words, as far as we can possibly see, I will be here with you.
We have nothing to fear because he is with us.
This is an interesting and brilliant way to end the Gospel of Matthew. In the very first chapter, it is said, “‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’—which means, ‘God with us.”[xiv]
Immanuel—God with us. Matthew’s gospel has sort of this inclusion statement about Jesus. He introduces Jesus as God with us, and brings us back to the same things at the very end. “Surely I am with you always.”
***
THOUGHTS:
A disciple is someone who is done pretending. They are done acting like everything is ok. They are done pretending like they have it all together. They are finished thinking that they have all the answers to all the questions.
Making Disciples is asking other people to step into community with you so that both of you don’t have to go it alone. A disciple is past trying to figure things out and desperately desires God to put back the broken pieces of your life.
In making disciples, who is your ethnos?
Are you in circles of people not like you?
Are you immersing them in a Trinitarian community that longs to see the love of Jesus restore lives?
Are you living in fear? Or allowing the truth of the gospel to rest in you with no fear?
Remember, Jesus is with us always, to the very end of the age.
[i] Some of the ideas in this chapter are completely original to me. Most however are things I have heard taught or picked up on by someone else who was probably way smarter than me. I cannot remember who all of those people were so I give credit to anyone reading who thinks their idea is in this chapter.
[ii] Matthew 28:18.
[iii] John 3:31,35.
[iv] John 18:36.
[v] Matthew 28:19.
[vi] John 17:15.
[vii] Luke 15:1-2.
[viii] Matthew 28:19.
[ix] John 17:21.
[x] Genesis 1:27.
[xii] Matthew 28:20.
[xiii] This is Exodus 3 language. With ego eimi there are several drawbacks to all the times God is with his people.
[xiv] Matthew 1:23.
Mathetes – What does it mean to be called a disciple, or to become a disciple? Who can be a disciple?
It means literally, student or pupil, but it is not as we view students. Mathetes was similar to the Jewish idea of Talmudim – the scribes that would follow a certain Rabbi around everywhere he went in order to learn to live as he lived. He would learn from practically every single thing that his rabbi did, or taught.
Being a disciple meant a life of radical self-denial. The kind of lifestyle was not unlike that of a slave. It was a lifestyle of abandoning life as you knew it – into following this teacher, with no place to stay, no financial security, no idea that everything was going to work out to your advantage, just to learn a whole new way of life.
In the Gospel of Matthew is a story about a life-changing experience involving a certain tax collector who encounters Jesus.[i]
In the first century, there was a tax collector’s booth on the edge of the city of Capernaum. This city was in the middle of the trade route running from Damascus, in the Northeast, to the Mediterranean Sea, and passed right through Capernaum in the Galilee region. Rome put a tax on all produce and goods brought into the city by venders. This tax, obtained by hired tax collectors, worked as sort of a sales tax to the vender. The tax collector would add a surcharge to that tax and keep it for himself.
So lets say there is this peddler. We will call him Frank.
Frank sells pomegranates. He is from the North and is planning on hawking his slightly over-ripened produce inside the metropolis of Capernaum.
After traveling many miles, Frank pushes his wagon to the edge of the city where he comes to the tax collector’s booth.
In the window is a clean-shaven guy with bags under his eyes and a smug look on his face. We will call him Morgan.
Morgan holds out his hand to Frank and says, “Two cents per pomegranate, pal.”
Frank, having twenty five pomegranates in his little radio flyer, shells over a couple of quarters while making a smart remark about the tax being a rip off and passes through the little gate to enter the city.
Meanwhile, Morgan flips one of the quarters into the more-money-for-Rome jar and then drops the other one deep into the pocket of his Outer Tunic.
At the end of the day, Morgan takes the tax jar to the governor’s office down town, fills out the necessary paper work, and collects his stipend for the days work. He smiles as he strolls out with a fat check from Rome, a pocket full of change, and the number of the cute clerk behind the reception desk.
So in the story in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus comes into Capernaum, which is the town he lives in and heals a paralytic man. Everyone is astounded.
Meanwhile, on the edge of the city is a guy named Matthew, a tax collector sitting in his tax collector’s booth.
Matthew is a Jewish man working for Rome. He probably reported directly to Herod Antipus.
For a first century Jewish person to have anything to do with Rome was a terrible offence.
Matthew probably felt betrayed by his own people, and even worse, he felt like he betrayed them.
Everyone hates him and his only “friends” are the other tax collectors, like Morgan.
Everyone he sees considers him a traitor to his people.
He is publicly disgraced and probably heard mocking and snickering everywhere he went, along with colorful nouns and adjectives and not-so-nice-non-verbal communication aimed at in his general direction.
So Jesus walks up to Matthew sitting in his tax booth, looks him in the eyes, and says, “Follow me.”[ii]
The Greek words for “follow me” are akolouthei moi. This means, in the physical sense, “to follow” but the metaphor behind it means, “to be guided by.”[iii] It is saying, not only follow me here and now as we go, but let me guide the way you live. This is not a one-time thing. This is a whole change in lifestyle. Jesus is saying, “Let me guide you in a new way of life.”
And so Matthew got up from his tax collector’s booth and followed Jesus.
In the very next verse, Jesus is having dinner at Matthew’s house. It is interesting that Jesus says, “Follow me,” and then they walk over to Matthew’s house. Maybe Jesus already knew where he lived. But I like to think that Jesus says, “Follow me,” and then, “Let’s go eat at your place. Where do you live?”
Either way, Matthew finds himself in his dining room with Jesus of Nazareth and a whole slew of other characters as well.
There is much significance in the idea of eating a meal together in the first century, Jewish culture. In the Old Testament, it is customary to separate the best portion of the meal and put it on a plate as an offering to the Lord. The same is true for the priests taking a sacrificial meal together—the best portion of the sacrifice or offering goes to the Lord.
But even for the commoner, the belief is that God is present in the very act of eating a meal.
He has a permanent place at the table.
Now, God is a holy God.
The opposite of holy is unclean, and because God is a Holy God, there cannot be anything or anyone who is unclean at the table. If there is, then you are in direct opposition to God, and therefore, detestable to him. Remember, God is at the table. This is why the Jews in the Bible go through strenuous washing rituals and tedious cleansing ceremonies, especially if a meal was involved.
So here, if we look around Matthew’s table, there is Jesus (a rabbi who the Pharisees are still trying to figure out),
his disciples (who were probably freaking out because they were in a tax collectors house),
the tax collectors and sinners (who were probably more concerned with the food than anything else),
and finally, to make things interesting, a handful of Pharisees.
The Pharisees note the melting pot of people around the table and decide they should inquire to Jesus’ disciples about the shady rift-raff with whom this rabbi is eating. They have a comprehensive set of rules that explain each of the laws in the Torah in exhaustive detail. This is called the Talmud, or the Oral Torah. They are concerned with inappropriate relations and associations because of ritual cleanness and their set-in-stone belief that they cannot be around anyone who is unclean.
They ask the disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with these people?”
The underlying tone suggests that they are, in a round about way, accusing Jesus of being ceremonially unclean because of his close contact with these “sinners.” For them, this is a very big deal. And because the disciples’ teacher is doing this, and that they are following him in this, the disciples are involved in this uncleanness on some level.
Jesus overhears their questioning and responds with this proverbial saying.
“Its not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.”[iv]
I don’t really get sick that often. This works out for me because I also don’t really enjoy going to the doctor. Last year, however, I somehow managed to catch some weird version of the flu that completely knocked me out of the swing of normality. At first, I just felt bad—a dull pounding in my head and my body was achy all over. I was not that concerned because of my idiotic mindset that I could overcome sickness by using brainpower. A few days later, I was motionless on my couch with every inch of my body in pain, inside and out. After trying to convince my wife that I was going to be fine, she loaded me up in the car and took me to the doctor.[v]
Healthy people have no need for a doctor.
Sick people need doctors.
Jesus’ point, as simple as it is, is that he associates with those who are sick because they have a need to get better.
They will respond to an offer of help.
Those who are healthy do not seek treatment.
Interestingly enough, those who think they are healthy do not seek treatment or help.
Jesus is saying, “I have come to heal those who want to be healed. I have come for the sick. And if you do not have a need to be healed, or if you think you do not have a need to be healed, I have not come for you.”
Then Jesus quotes a scripture from Hosea,
“I want mercy, not sacrifice,”[vi]
and then tells then to go and learn what this means.
Then he tells them, “I have not come to call the righteous, but the unrighteous.”
***
Jesus quotes this same scripture a few chapters later in Matthew’s Gospel.[vii]
One day Jesus and his disciples walk through a field of grain on the Sabbath. The disciples are hungry so they begin to eat some of the heads of grain.
The Pharisees see this happen and are outraged.
So they confront Jesus saying, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.”[viii]
Once again, the Pharisees are referencing a law from the Talmud on what not to eat on the Sabbath. What the Pharisees are referring to here is the fourth commandment in the Decalogue in Exodus, chapter 20. Along with the commandment to keep the Sabbath holy, the Jews dedicated a whole section of the Talmud to discussing all different kinds of dos and don’ts of the Sabbath. It is called Shabbat. The entire seventh chapter is dedicated to agricultural work. The Pharisees know the Oral Torah well, and so when they see the disciples’ eat the grain, they see harvesting, which is unlawful to do on the Sabbath.
Jesus cleverly responds to their accusation by using the very thing that the Pharisees pride themselves on—the Bible.
He says, “Haven’t you read the part in the Bible where David and his buddies were hungry?”
Catch the magnitude of this response.
The Pharisees study the scriptures a lot. As a kid, they go to school to learn the scriptures and have first five books memorized by the time they are ten years old. The really smart ones go on to the next level of schooling to learn and memorize the rest of the Hebrew scriptures and grow up to be the Pharisees that Jesus is talking to.[ix]
So Jesus is essentially saying to the ones that know the scriptures better than anyone else,
“Haven’t you read the bible?”
“Haven’t you read the stories about David? I mean, those are like the most popular stories in the scriptures. Don’t you guys know those stories?”
“Let me refresh your memory. David and his buddies were hungry and they went into the house of God. The only food that was there was the consecrated bread, which was only for the priests to eat.”
This was called the Bread of Presentation and is described in Leviticus 24, which, remember, the Pharisees would have memorized by the time they were ten.
God instructed the priests to bake twelve loaves of bread on the Sabbath and set it on the golden table in the tabernacle in two rows, along with some incense, as an offering to the Lord. They did this regularly, Sabbath after Sabbath, to represent the covenant between the Lord and the Israelites.[x]
In the book of Exodus, the writer describes how the tabernacle should be set up. Chapter 25 describes this table. God instructs the priests to “put the bread of the Presence on this table to be before me at all times.”[xi]
So the Table of the Lord was a Holy Place—perfectly set up before God.
The table is apart of the tabernacle, the Holy tent of meeting.
It is the place of worship.
It is the place where they meet with God.
So the priests would set out new loaves each Sabbath, and they would eat the loaves from the previous week in a holy place and they were considered sacred.
And only the priests were allowed to eat the bread.
This was a very sacred, holy thing.
So back to the story in Matthew 12.
Jesus says, “Haven’t you guys read about David and his buddies?[xii]
“Let me remind you what happened. David went into the temple to the priest and said, ‘I’m here on official king’s business. My men are going to meet me at a certain place. Do you have any food here? I need some bread.’ Then the priest says, ‘I’m fresh out of regular bread, but there is some week-old Sacred Bread that has been replaced by fresh, hot Sacred Bread.’ Then David takes the Sacred bread to his men and they eat it.”[xiii]
So Jesus is like, “Remember Leviticus 24? That bread is just for Aaron and his descendents. And David broke that law so he and his friends could eat. The priests broke the Sabbath by letting David take the Sacred Bread and they were not guilty of any sin.
“Do you remember that?
“Or have you forgotten that part?
“If David and his boys can do it, me and my boys can do it.”
Then Jesus quotes Hosea 6:6 for the second time.
“I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”
Then he says, “If you understood what this meant, then you wouldn’t have bashed my boys. The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
Let’s try to understand what Jesus is saying here by taking a closer look at this passage in Hosea 6.
Hosea is writing to an eighth century BCE audience. The Assyrian superpower is about to come and wreck shop on Israel. Hosea warns the people that the Assyrians are coming as the divine punishment for not keeping the exclusive demands of God.
“Come, let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence.”[xiv]
This is not resurrection language. “Third day” simply means that in a short time, the Lord will restore his people. The word, restore, in Hebrew is the word hayah. This means to restore death to life.
“Let us acknowledge the Lord; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth.”[xv]
The words, press on, in Hebrew is radaph, meaning to pursue him and his righteousness with everything one has.
So Hosea is calling the people to return to the Lord, saying the Lord will restore us from death to life so we as his people should pursue him and his righteousness.
“What can I do with you, Ephraim? What can I do with you, Judah? You love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears.[xvi]
“Therefore I cut you in pieces with my prophets, I killed you with the words of my mouth; my judgments flashed like lightning upon you.”[xvii]
The words, cut you to pieces, in Hebrew are chatsav, and literally means to cut into little pieces. It is in the prophetic perfect tense, which means it is saying that these events will certainly happen, though they have not happened yet. The idea is, “I will cut you into pieces,” and, “I will kill you with words.”
And then comes our verse.
“For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offereings.”[xviii]
The word, mercy, is hesed, and means faithfulness, goodness, kindness, mercy, or steadfast love.
The notion is that God desires obedience in mercy over a worship ritual. He does not hate the sacrifice.[xix] But to him, it is not about the object of worship. It is about the state of mind of the worshipper. It is not even about the act of worship itself. It is the heart of the person acting out in worship.
If the worshiper comes with a repentant, obedient heart, it is a pleasing aroma to the Lord.
How many of our worship services on a Sunday morning are filled with ritualistic sacrifice?
Do we not go through the same routines week in and week out?
How easy is it to walk into church, sing the songs, greet those around us with a handshake and a smile, sit quietly taking notes during the three points of the sermon, to finally stand at the end looking around to see if anyone goes down to the front to make a decision?
How much of our “worship” is only a burnt offering sacrificed in pure, apathetic routine? We worship because it is what we are suppose to do on Sunday mornings.
God desires hesed.
He delights in mercy,
in the loving kindness of which we treat him and the people around us,
in the faithfulness we show him,
in the goodness of our hearts,
in the steadfast love that we receive from him.
Being in the right state of being is key to worship.
It is central to discipleship.
So Jesus says to the religious leaders, the ones who know the Bible better than anyone else,
“If you understood the scriptures when it says, ‘I desire hesed, not your stupid cycle of sacrificing without the right heart,’ there is no way that you could sit there and bash my boys for eating some stupid grain on the Sabbath just because it is the Sabbath. For I, the Son of Man, am the LORD of the Sabbath.”[xx]
***
Back to the story about Matthew the tax collector.
Matthew is sitting in his booth one day and Jesus says, “akolouthei moi.”[xxi]
Then he walks out of his booth and follows Jesus.
They go to his house and have a meal together.
He follows him and watches him do all of this amazing stuff.
He hears him teach with an authority that is not of this world.
He is a mathetes.
A student, a life leaner, a disciple… and then comes chapter 10.
“Jesus called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness. These are the names of the twelve apostles:
first, 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…”[xxii]
Matthew the tax collector was chosen to be one of twelve of an elite group, hand picked by Jesus himself, that would take his message to the ends of the world.
Matthew went from being hated and alone to one of the greatness.
Jesus thought he was great.
Thoughts:
Where are you? Are you like Matthew?
Hurt? Broken? Abandoned by your people? Or have you abandoned your own people?
Do you wonder how you’ll make it through the week? Are you alone? Stressed? Do you feel like everything is weighing down hard on you??
Jesus is here and is saying to you, “akolouthei moi.”
In no way does Jesus say, “Join me and all your troubles will be over.”
It does not get easier. In some instances, it is harder. But isn’t it better to have someone on your side that will say, “Back off my boy, he is mine! Step away from my girl, she is mine!”
Or are you the Pharisee who is quick to condemn?
You need to hear Jesus when he quotes scripture. God delights in mercy, not in ritualistic sacrifice. If all you are doing is being religious, go somewhere else. I don’t want your worship. I want a repentant heart, a heart of mercy.
Or do you think that you will never amount to anything? Jesus says, “akolouthei moi, follow me.”
“I am calling you to something great, something world changing.”
Where are you??
What is God calling you into?
Follow him.
[i] Matthew 9:9-13.
[ii] Verse 9.
[iv] Matthew 9:12.
[v] Several days later, I was all better. I did miss a good friend’s bachelor party though. Nonetheless, thanks to my wife for forcing me to go to the doctor.
[vi] Hosea 6:6.
[vii] Matthew 12:1-8.
[viii] Verse 2.
[ix] http://wolkorea.multiply.com/reviews/item/49.
[x] Leviticus 24:5-9.
[xi] Exodus 25:30.
[xii] This story is in 1 Samuel 21 by the way.
[xiii] My version of the story in 1 Samuel 21.
[xiv] Hosea 6:1-2, emphasis added.
[xv] Verse 3, emphasis added.
[xvi] Verse 4.
[xvii] Verse 5.
[xviii] Verse 6, emphasis added.
[xix] Leviticus chapter 1 is all about burnt offerings. It repeatedly states that the Lord is pleased with the aroma of the offering.
[xx] Roughly Matthew 12:7-8.
[xxi] It means “follow me”.
[xxii] Matthew 10:1-3.
Making Disciples..
i will have the final edit of this up in a few weeks. here is what i got so far.
Matt 28:16-20
16Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.
continue reading on the next page.
