There is one thing that we can never forget about disciples of Jesus and that is that they (we) are human.
When a person surrenders their life to Jesus they don’t become perfect. They don’t become infallible. They don’t become superman or superwoman.
Disciples of Jesus are not all-powerful.
In Matthew 17:16 listen to the powerless condition of the disciples. It says, “And I brought him to Your disciples, and they could not heal him.” The disciples could not heal the demon possessed boy. That does not make them bad or faithless; it makes them human.
There are five things that are true of all disciples of Jesus that show they are human.
Disciples of Jesus are ordinary.
Matthew 12:1
At that time Jesus went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat.
Luke 22:45
And He rose from prayer, He came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow.
Disciples get hungry.
Disciples get sleepy.
Disciples experience sorrow.
Disciples of Jesus are ordinary people who serve an extraordinary God.
Disciples of Jesus can be fearful.
In Matthew 26:56 it says that all of Jesus’ disciples left Him and fled. They fled out of fear of being arrested.
In John 20:19 it says, “On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews.”
The disciples were fearful that they, like Jesus, would be arrested and executed so they ran away and hid. And these are the guys that the Jewish leaders said stole Jesus’ body. They were hiding out of fear, not because they were trying to fake a resurrection.
Disciples of Jesus are tempted.
In Luke 17:1 Jesus says to His disciples, “Temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come!”
Everyone is tempted. Disciples of Jesus face temptations just like everyone else. In fact, as disciples we are going to be faced with more temptations because Satan attacks us more. Why does Satan attack disciples more? Because we belong to Jesus. And he hates Jesus and everyone connected to Jesus.
Disciples of Jesus struggle.
In John 6 Jesus shared some very hard teachings and many of the disciples left and stop following Jesus at that point.
In verse 60 it says, “When many of His disciples heard it they said, ‘This a hard saying; who can listen to it.’”
In many cases I hear people talk about not feeling close to God because they are struggling with some area of their lives. Listen, struggling is not bad. Struggling means that I am not giving in. Struggling means I am fighting, not just giving up.
We have to remember we are in a war and war means struggle.
In Philippians 2:12 Paul says to “work out” your own salvation with fear and trembling. Paul is not saying work for your salvation. He is saying that to follow and obey Jesus is a struggle. Being a disciple of Jesus is hard. It will hurt and be painful at times because being a disciple is a struggle.
In Matthew 26:41 Jesus finds His disciples asleep in the garden. He says to them, “The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
Disciples of Jesus are weak.
We don’t have the physical or spiritual strength in our own natural human resources to follow and obey Jesus as He requires. If we could, Jesus would never have had to come and die for us on the cross.
Remember Romans 3:23 says we have all sinned and come short of God’s glorious standard.
Everyone is either a sinner or a recovering sinner. Sinners, even the recovering ones, cannot obey God in their own strength.
Zechariah 4:6 says, “Not by might, not by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord of Hosts.”
God knows we don’t have it in our natural selves to obey Him so He graciously gives us as His disciples the Holy Spirit.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about acknowledging that we as disciples of Jesus are human. We are:
Ordinary
Fearful
Tempted
Struggling
Weak
We don’t need to pretend that we are all-power or all-knowing or all-loving or have our lives all together. We have an All-Power, All-Knowing, All-Loving God who does have it all together so we don’t have to and we can depend on Him.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about being authentic and transparent.
Disciples of Jesus don’t have to change the world. We just have to be fully surrendered to Jesus so He can change the world through us.
Disciples of Jesus don’t have to pretend to be something we are not or cannot be. We only have to be the people that God created us to be. He will enable us to accomplish His will when we humble ourselves before Him.
The world doesn’t need to see what you and I can do. They need to see Jesus. The world will see Jesus in the life of His disciples when we, Jesus’ disciples, admit we are human and let Jesus fill us with His Spirit.
As a Human Connected to Jesus Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls
Joe
Sunday, December 28, 2014
Sunday, December 21, 2014
Disciples of Jesus Grow Up
We all start out physically the same - we are born as babies.
We all start out spiritually the same - we are born as babies.
John 1:12 says, “But all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God.
1 Peter 1:3 says, “Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation.
We start out being born as babies but we have to GROW UP both physically and spiritually.
Disciples of Jesus grow up.
It begins with being born.
John 4:1 says, “Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John…”
Baptism is the outward symbol of being born again. So baptism is like birth and just as all people start with birth, so all disciples of Jesus start with birth.
Then as disciples we have to learn.
Matthew 11:1
When Jesus had finished instructing His twelve disciples, He went on from there to teach and preach in their cities.
Jesus teaches.
Disciples learn.
The word disciple means “one who sits at the feet.” In Jesus day disciples would literally sit at the feet of their teacher as he taught.
Jesus used a variety of methods to help His disciples to learn.
He used:
Scriptures
Illustrations
Modeling (He showed them truth)
Jesus had formal times when He taught His disciples and He used informal spur-of-the moment situations to teach them.
Jesus wanted His disciples to learn.
Jesus also wanted to take them a step further, He wanted them to understand.
Mark 4:34 says, “He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to His own disciples He explained everything.”
Jesus used parables or stories to communicate truth to the crowds. But to His disciples Jesus explained the meanings of the stories so they could gain a greater understanding.
Jesus wants us as His disciples today to learn, but to go deeper and understand what He is telling us.
The disciples of Jesus got their deeper understanding from having Jesus reveal that understanding to them. We as disciples of Jesus today get our deeper understanding from the Holy Spirit as He works in us and reveals truth and wisdom to us.
Understanding comes as we hear God’s Word, have the Spirit give us understanding and we then live that revealed truth out in our everyday life.
That brings us to the fourth thing that we need to do so we can grow up - Abide in God’s Word.
Jesus says in John 8:31, “If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples.”
What does it mean to abide in God’s Word?
It means to:
Read it
Study it
Memorize it
Mediate on it.
But abiding in God’s Word most of all means to live it!
We can read, study, memorize, and mediate in and on God’s Word, but if we don’t obey God’s Word, we are not abiding in God’s Word.
When someone comes to me for counseling, I tell them up front that what I am going to use to counsel them is God’s Word. It has to be the authority of how to live for a disciple of Jesus.
Then there is one more element in a disciple growing up.
That element is found in Acts 6:7. It says, “And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.”
The last element in disciples of Jesus growing up is to GROW.
All healthy living things grow. If you and I are healthy disciples of Jesus, we will grow.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about disciples of Jesus growing up.
We will all grow at different rates. But we all need to grow.
Paul in Ephesians 4:11-16 writes to encourage the church in Ephesus to grow.
Paul writes:
And He gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
The goal in growing up is to grow up and be like Jesus.
Everything involved in following Jesus and being His disciple is about becoming like Jesus. So when God’s children grow up, He wants us all to be like Jesus.
All the big words we use in the church like salvation, justification, and sanctification really mean to grow up and be like Jesus.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is ultimately about being like Jesus.
What makes Christmas so awesome is that God gave us the Role Model for what we are to be when we grow up.
So in a few days when we celebrate Christmas we are celebrating the coming of our Savior and our Lord and our Role Model. God could have just told us what He wanted us to be, but He loved us enough to send the one and only Son of God. Jesus lived so we could see how we are to do everything and then He died to pay for our sin and then He rose from the dead to overcome our sin.
May we celebrate Jesus and grow up to be like Him.
Growing and Celebrating as We Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls
Joe
We all start out spiritually the same - we are born as babies.
John 1:12 says, “But all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God.
1 Peter 1:3 says, “Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation.
We start out being born as babies but we have to GROW UP both physically and spiritually.
Disciples of Jesus grow up.
It begins with being born.
John 4:1 says, “Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John…”
Baptism is the outward symbol of being born again. So baptism is like birth and just as all people start with birth, so all disciples of Jesus start with birth.
Then as disciples we have to learn.
Matthew 11:1
When Jesus had finished instructing His twelve disciples, He went on from there to teach and preach in their cities.
Jesus teaches.
Disciples learn.
The word disciple means “one who sits at the feet.” In Jesus day disciples would literally sit at the feet of their teacher as he taught.
Jesus used a variety of methods to help His disciples to learn.
He used:
Scriptures
Illustrations
Modeling (He showed them truth)
Jesus had formal times when He taught His disciples and He used informal spur-of-the moment situations to teach them.
Jesus wanted His disciples to learn.
Jesus also wanted to take them a step further, He wanted them to understand.
Mark 4:34 says, “He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to His own disciples He explained everything.”
Jesus used parables or stories to communicate truth to the crowds. But to His disciples Jesus explained the meanings of the stories so they could gain a greater understanding.
Jesus wants us as His disciples today to learn, but to go deeper and understand what He is telling us.
The disciples of Jesus got their deeper understanding from having Jesus reveal that understanding to them. We as disciples of Jesus today get our deeper understanding from the Holy Spirit as He works in us and reveals truth and wisdom to us.
Understanding comes as we hear God’s Word, have the Spirit give us understanding and we then live that revealed truth out in our everyday life.
That brings us to the fourth thing that we need to do so we can grow up - Abide in God’s Word.
Jesus says in John 8:31, “If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples.”
What does it mean to abide in God’s Word?
It means to:
Read it
Study it
Memorize it
Mediate on it.
But abiding in God’s Word most of all means to live it!
We can read, study, memorize, and mediate in and on God’s Word, but if we don’t obey God’s Word, we are not abiding in God’s Word.
When someone comes to me for counseling, I tell them up front that what I am going to use to counsel them is God’s Word. It has to be the authority of how to live for a disciple of Jesus.
Then there is one more element in a disciple growing up.
That element is found in Acts 6:7. It says, “And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.”
The last element in disciples of Jesus growing up is to GROW.
All healthy living things grow. If you and I are healthy disciples of Jesus, we will grow.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about disciples of Jesus growing up.
We will all grow at different rates. But we all need to grow.
Paul in Ephesians 4:11-16 writes to encourage the church in Ephesus to grow.
Paul writes:
And He gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
The goal in growing up is to grow up and be like Jesus.
Everything involved in following Jesus and being His disciple is about becoming like Jesus. So when God’s children grow up, He wants us all to be like Jesus.
All the big words we use in the church like salvation, justification, and sanctification really mean to grow up and be like Jesus.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is ultimately about being like Jesus.
What makes Christmas so awesome is that God gave us the Role Model for what we are to be when we grow up.
So in a few days when we celebrate Christmas we are celebrating the coming of our Savior and our Lord and our Role Model. God could have just told us what He wanted us to be, but He loved us enough to send the one and only Son of God. Jesus lived so we could see how we are to do everything and then He died to pay for our sin and then He rose from the dead to overcome our sin.
May we celebrate Jesus and grow up to be like Him.
Growing and Celebrating as We Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls
Joe
Sunday, December 14, 2014
Disciples Depend on Jesus
When Jesus called Peter, Andrew, James, John, and Matthew to follow Him and be His disciples Scripture said they left what they were doing. Peter, Andrew, James, and John left their fishing business. Matthew left his tax collecting service. They depended on Jesus for everything.
Disciples depend on Jesus.
This meant that for these first disciples they physically followed Jesus around all over Judea, Galilee, and at times Samaria. They depended on Jesus for what they needed to live.
What does it mean for us as Jesus’ disciples in the twenty-first century to depend on Jesus?
First it means that we live and operate under Jesus’ authority.
Matthew 10:1
And He called to Him His twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every affliction.
Jesus gives the twelve authority. He gives them His authority over both spiritual and physical forces.
In Matthew 28:18 we are told that Jesus has all authority on heaven and earth.
When I try to live and minister based on my human abilities and resources I am very limited. I can only accomplish what is possible through my human abilities and resources.
When I live and minister based on Jesus and His authority, then I am not limited. I am depending on Jesus, not me.
Matthew 19:26 Jesus says, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
God can accomplish whatever He sets out to accomplish. Nothing is impossible for God. He is all-powerful, all-knowing, and always present. He is not bound by time or space or any of the limitations as we as humans are.
Disciples operate under Jesus’ authority .
Another aspect of depending on Jesus is believing the Bible, God’s Word.
John 2:22
When therefore He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
The disciples believed the words that Jesus spoke. They believed the Old Testament scriptures because they saw that they revealed the truth about the Messiah, Jesus.
In a culture that does not believe in absolute truth, we as the disciples of Jesus must proclaim and live out the absolute truth of God’s Word.
It is not just about knowing God’s Word. I have met people who know God’s Word in detail, but don’t really believe it. We as Jesus’ disciples must make the Word of God the foundational authority for everything we do.
The Word of God is described in Hebrews 4:12 as:
Living
Active
Piercing
Discerning
As Jesus’ disciples we have to let the Bible do that in our lives every day.
A third thing it means to depend on Jesus is not to depend on rules and traditions, but to depend on relationship.
The disciples of Jesus were criticized by the religious leaders for not following the Sabbath rules. They picked grain and ate on the Sabbath.
The disciples of Jesus were criticized by the religious leaders for not washing their hands (my mother used to get on to me about that one) in the way the rules required it to be done.
The disciples of Jesus were criticized by the religious leaders for not fasting according to the rules.
Jesus’ response is found in Matthew 12:8. He says, “For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
Depending on rules, rituals, regulations, or traditions is like the man who built his house on the sand. When the storms of life came, the house didn’t stand. If our lives are built on rules, rituals, regulations, or traditions, our lives will not stand.
But if, like the man who built his house on a rock, we build our lives on the Rock, Jesus, then when the storms of life come we will stand.
When Jesus came, He followed the commands of God not the rules of men.
Jesus taught and demonstrated how to follow God’s commands. The disciples learned to depend on Jesus, not be bound by the law.
God created us to have order and structure to our lives. Order and structure produced by man-based rules will only give an outward appearance of order. Lives that are ordered and structured by depending on Jesus will be lives filled with inward hope, peace, and joy. They will have real order.
I remember going to help a friend buy a car one time. We got to the car dealership and he asked me to pray with him about what kind of car to buy. My friend began to pray and he asked God to show him in detail what kind of car to buy. He even asked God to tell him what color car to buy. When he had finished praying I asked him if he thought God really cared what color of car he bought. He told me that no, God didn’t really care what color the car was, but that he wanted to bring everything to Jesus, even the trivial things. That way, he knew and Jesus knew that he was depending on Him for everything.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about following Jesus as a disciple. Disciples depend on Jesus by living and ministering under Jesus’ authority. Disciples depend on Jesus by believing God’s Word and living in obedience to it. Disciples depend on Jesus by living based on their relationship with Jesus, not based on rules.
Depending on Jesus will not always be easy but will form us into the image of Jesus and that is the goal of the Father: for us to be like Jesus.
Depending of Jesus to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls
Joe
Disciples depend on Jesus.
This meant that for these first disciples they physically followed Jesus around all over Judea, Galilee, and at times Samaria. They depended on Jesus for what they needed to live.
What does it mean for us as Jesus’ disciples in the twenty-first century to depend on Jesus?
First it means that we live and operate under Jesus’ authority.
Matthew 10:1
And He called to Him His twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every affliction.
Jesus gives the twelve authority. He gives them His authority over both spiritual and physical forces.
In Matthew 28:18 we are told that Jesus has all authority on heaven and earth.
When I try to live and minister based on my human abilities and resources I am very limited. I can only accomplish what is possible through my human abilities and resources.
When I live and minister based on Jesus and His authority, then I am not limited. I am depending on Jesus, not me.
Matthew 19:26 Jesus says, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
God can accomplish whatever He sets out to accomplish. Nothing is impossible for God. He is all-powerful, all-knowing, and always present. He is not bound by time or space or any of the limitations as we as humans are.
Disciples operate under Jesus’ authority .
Another aspect of depending on Jesus is believing the Bible, God’s Word.
John 2:22
When therefore He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
The disciples believed the words that Jesus spoke. They believed the Old Testament scriptures because they saw that they revealed the truth about the Messiah, Jesus.
In a culture that does not believe in absolute truth, we as the disciples of Jesus must proclaim and live out the absolute truth of God’s Word.
It is not just about knowing God’s Word. I have met people who know God’s Word in detail, but don’t really believe it. We as Jesus’ disciples must make the Word of God the foundational authority for everything we do.
The Word of God is described in Hebrews 4:12 as:
Living
Active
Piercing
Discerning
As Jesus’ disciples we have to let the Bible do that in our lives every day.
A third thing it means to depend on Jesus is not to depend on rules and traditions, but to depend on relationship.
The disciples of Jesus were criticized by the religious leaders for not following the Sabbath rules. They picked grain and ate on the Sabbath.
The disciples of Jesus were criticized by the religious leaders for not washing their hands (my mother used to get on to me about that one) in the way the rules required it to be done.
The disciples of Jesus were criticized by the religious leaders for not fasting according to the rules.
Jesus’ response is found in Matthew 12:8. He says, “For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
Depending on rules, rituals, regulations, or traditions is like the man who built his house on the sand. When the storms of life came, the house didn’t stand. If our lives are built on rules, rituals, regulations, or traditions, our lives will not stand.
But if, like the man who built his house on a rock, we build our lives on the Rock, Jesus, then when the storms of life come we will stand.
When Jesus came, He followed the commands of God not the rules of men.
Jesus taught and demonstrated how to follow God’s commands. The disciples learned to depend on Jesus, not be bound by the law.
God created us to have order and structure to our lives. Order and structure produced by man-based rules will only give an outward appearance of order. Lives that are ordered and structured by depending on Jesus will be lives filled with inward hope, peace, and joy. They will have real order.
I remember going to help a friend buy a car one time. We got to the car dealership and he asked me to pray with him about what kind of car to buy. My friend began to pray and he asked God to show him in detail what kind of car to buy. He even asked God to tell him what color car to buy. When he had finished praying I asked him if he thought God really cared what color of car he bought. He told me that no, God didn’t really care what color the car was, but that he wanted to bring everything to Jesus, even the trivial things. That way, he knew and Jesus knew that he was depending on Him for everything.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about following Jesus as a disciple. Disciples depend on Jesus by living and ministering under Jesus’ authority. Disciples depend on Jesus by believing God’s Word and living in obedience to it. Disciples depend on Jesus by living based on their relationship with Jesus, not based on rules.
Depending on Jesus will not always be easy but will form us into the image of Jesus and that is the goal of the Father: for us to be like Jesus.
Depending of Jesus to Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls
Joe
Sunday, December 7, 2014
Disciples Practice Spiritual Disciplines
People who are disciples of Jesus practice spiritual disciplines.
The word discipline means training that develops self-control, character, and efficiency.
A disciple, then, is a person who, as he follows Jesus, allows Jesus to put certain disciplines in his life that will produce self-control, godly character and God-honoring works.
I want to focus on three disciplines that are mentioned specifically in the Gospels in relationship to the disciples of Jesus.
Luke 19:37
As He was drawing near - already on the way down the Mount of Olives - the whole multitude of His disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen.
Disciples worship Jesus.
We think of worship in terms of music and singing. But the word translated worship in the New Testament means to bow and kiss the hand of one out of reverence.
Worship is not just music. It is a an act of a person’s will to surrender to Jesus as Lord, serve Jesus with all that they have, and obey Jesus no matter what.
The acts of private and corporate worship help us to be disciplined or trained to live our lives in worship of God 24/7.
Disciples pray.
In Luke 11:1 Jesus was praying. When He had finished, His disciples asked Him to teach them to pray.
Jesus then gives them a model prayer. He didn’t intend for this prayer to be simply repeated. It was a model to help us to know what to pray for.
Jesus instructs His disciples to pray that God’s name will be honored. Jesus says to hallow God’s name. To hallow means to purify something. We are to purify God’s name by not using it in a common or profane way. We are to always honor and glorify God’s name because His name is who God is. We are to honor God. That has to be our first priority and out greatest desire.
Disciples are to pray for God’s kingdom to be established. Our goal as disciples is the establishing and growing of God’s kingdom. We are not to spend time or effort growing our kingdom.
Disciples are to pray for their daily needs. When we pray for our daily needs, it demonstrates our dependence on God, not ourselves, for everything we need. In 2 Peter 1:3 we are told that God has given us all we need to live a godly life. Praying for our daily needs shows that we believe all we need is found in Him. We are given freedom to pray for what we “need”, not what we might “want”.
Disciples pray for forgiveness of our sins. Disciples are not perfect, sinless, got-life-all-together people. Disciples are like all other human beings - sinners. Two things distinguish a disciple of Jesus from a person who is not a disciple.
First, disciples are forgiven because we have acknowledged our sin, repented of our sin and asked God to forgive us. The second is that we then become recovering sinners.
So, yes, disciples still need to seek God’s forgiveness.
Then disciples turn around and forgive.
How could we not forgive others? What we did in rejecting Jesus and making our own selves God is much worse that what anyone could ever to do us. When I compare what God has forgiven me for as compared to what I have been asked to forgive others for, it is the difference between asking someone for a penny or asking someone for a trillion dollars. My sin is the trillion dollar forgiveness.
Disciples pray to overcome temptation.
We are going to face temptation. We cannot avoid it.
Hebrews 4:15 says that Jesus was tempted in every way that you and I have been tempted, but He overcame all of the temptations He faced.
On my own, I will not overcome the temptations I face, so I need to pray so that Jesus’ power to overcome is enabling me to overcome. If I depend on my strength I will fail and let temptation lead to sin and sin leads to death.
There is another thing that Jesus taught His disciples to pray for that is found in Matthew 9:37-38. It says, “Then He said to His disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.’”
The harvest is God’s. We don’t make the harvest; God does. God gives us the privilege and responsibility to “harvest the harvest“. As Jesus’ disciples, we need to pray for more disciples to go and reap the harvest so more disciples can be produced.
Disciples serve.
When Jesus fed the five thousand and the four thousand, He blessed the bread and fish, He broke them and then He gave them to the disciples and they served the people.
The word serve in the New Testament means to execute the command of a superior to meet the needs of another.
According to Matthew 20:28, Jesus came to serve and He wants His disciples to follow His example.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about letting Jesus form spiritual disciplines in us. The purpose is that we can exercise self-control, develop godly character, and effectively serve God.
Our ability to practice spiritual disciplines comes from the Spirit filling, enabling and controlling us. That only happens as we apply the truth of Luke 9:23: denying self, taking up our cross daily, and following Jesus.
Spiritual disciplines come only by surrendering everything to Lord Jesus.
By Godly Discipline Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls
Joe
The word discipline means training that develops self-control, character, and efficiency.
A disciple, then, is a person who, as he follows Jesus, allows Jesus to put certain disciplines in his life that will produce self-control, godly character and God-honoring works.
I want to focus on three disciplines that are mentioned specifically in the Gospels in relationship to the disciples of Jesus.
Luke 19:37
As He was drawing near - already on the way down the Mount of Olives - the whole multitude of His disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen.
Disciples worship Jesus.
We think of worship in terms of music and singing. But the word translated worship in the New Testament means to bow and kiss the hand of one out of reverence.
Worship is not just music. It is a an act of a person’s will to surrender to Jesus as Lord, serve Jesus with all that they have, and obey Jesus no matter what.
The acts of private and corporate worship help us to be disciplined or trained to live our lives in worship of God 24/7.
Disciples pray.
In Luke 11:1 Jesus was praying. When He had finished, His disciples asked Him to teach them to pray.
Jesus then gives them a model prayer. He didn’t intend for this prayer to be simply repeated. It was a model to help us to know what to pray for.
Jesus instructs His disciples to pray that God’s name will be honored. Jesus says to hallow God’s name. To hallow means to purify something. We are to purify God’s name by not using it in a common or profane way. We are to always honor and glorify God’s name because His name is who God is. We are to honor God. That has to be our first priority and out greatest desire.
Disciples are to pray for God’s kingdom to be established. Our goal as disciples is the establishing and growing of God’s kingdom. We are not to spend time or effort growing our kingdom.
Disciples are to pray for their daily needs. When we pray for our daily needs, it demonstrates our dependence on God, not ourselves, for everything we need. In 2 Peter 1:3 we are told that God has given us all we need to live a godly life. Praying for our daily needs shows that we believe all we need is found in Him. We are given freedom to pray for what we “need”, not what we might “want”.
Disciples pray for forgiveness of our sins. Disciples are not perfect, sinless, got-life-all-together people. Disciples are like all other human beings - sinners. Two things distinguish a disciple of Jesus from a person who is not a disciple.
First, disciples are forgiven because we have acknowledged our sin, repented of our sin and asked God to forgive us. The second is that we then become recovering sinners.
So, yes, disciples still need to seek God’s forgiveness.
Then disciples turn around and forgive.
How could we not forgive others? What we did in rejecting Jesus and making our own selves God is much worse that what anyone could ever to do us. When I compare what God has forgiven me for as compared to what I have been asked to forgive others for, it is the difference between asking someone for a penny or asking someone for a trillion dollars. My sin is the trillion dollar forgiveness.
Disciples pray to overcome temptation.
We are going to face temptation. We cannot avoid it.
Hebrews 4:15 says that Jesus was tempted in every way that you and I have been tempted, but He overcame all of the temptations He faced.
On my own, I will not overcome the temptations I face, so I need to pray so that Jesus’ power to overcome is enabling me to overcome. If I depend on my strength I will fail and let temptation lead to sin and sin leads to death.
There is another thing that Jesus taught His disciples to pray for that is found in Matthew 9:37-38. It says, “Then He said to His disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.’”
The harvest is God’s. We don’t make the harvest; God does. God gives us the privilege and responsibility to “harvest the harvest“. As Jesus’ disciples, we need to pray for more disciples to go and reap the harvest so more disciples can be produced.
Disciples serve.
When Jesus fed the five thousand and the four thousand, He blessed the bread and fish, He broke them and then He gave them to the disciples and they served the people.
The word serve in the New Testament means to execute the command of a superior to meet the needs of another.
According to Matthew 20:28, Jesus came to serve and He wants His disciples to follow His example.
Raise the Roof and Remove the Walls is about letting Jesus form spiritual disciplines in us. The purpose is that we can exercise self-control, develop godly character, and effectively serve God.
Our ability to practice spiritual disciplines comes from the Spirit filling, enabling and controlling us. That only happens as we apply the truth of Luke 9:23: denying self, taking up our cross daily, and following Jesus.
Spiritual disciplines come only by surrendering everything to Lord Jesus.
By Godly Discipline Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls
Joe
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