Tag Archives: servanthood

Discipleship and the Planet Pluto

There has been a lot in the news lately about the historic NASA mission of the New Horizon’s spacecraft to visit the planet Pluto. This grand piano sized satellite traveled faster than any other earth space craft at a speed of 30,800 miles per hour. At that fastest speed of any known space craft it still took New horizons 9.5 years to cover the 9 billion miles to the dwarf planet. The radio signal from New Horizons to earth to let us know that it had arrived and was functioning took 4 hours and 25 minutes to make the trip of 9 billion miles, and that signal was traveling at the speed of light.

Why all the statistics? Well, besides being a Jesus follower, I also am a nerd [and I mean that with all affection and positiveness.] It’s fascinating to me the amount of time, energy, money, and hard work that it took to achieve this historic achievement.

Something like this doesn’t happen over night. It takes serious commitment and time. To travel through space, endure extreme cold, and radiation, takes careful planning and resoluteness.

Nine and a half years, think about that. What are you committed to for nine and half years? Once New Horizons was launched and began it’s journey there was no turning back. There were all kinds of obstacles and deterrents, but the commitment to go was one way.

This mission to Pluto has brought to the surface, once again the discussion about colonizing the planet Mars. With our best technology and planning and commitment, it is said that if it can happen, those that go, are going with the knowledge that it is a one way trip. If they reach Mars, if they are able to build a sustainable living on Mars, there is no coming back. The technology simply doesn’t exist to get them back to earth. It is a lifetime commitment. Once they lift off, the world behind them, there is no turning back. It will be a one way trip into the unknown.

This led me to reflect on our discipleship journey. Following Jesus is all about commitment. Yet it seems that many in the post modern church have made commitment a dirty word. Why do we think that following Jesus is any less of a commitment than what it takes to build a space craft to travel nine billion miles? Why do we think that discipleship is a journey, in which we have all kinds of options, that our opinion is important, that we chose if it is convenient, and give attention to if we have nothing better to do?
Where do we see Jesus invite his disciples to focus on him for one hour a week and then spend the rest of the week critiquing whether they felt entertained, energized, equipped, and enabled to go about doing what they want to do the rest of the week?
In fact we see the exact opposite:
Matthew 16:24 “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
Matthew 7:13-14 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”
Luke 14:33 “In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.”
Matthew 22:37-39 “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Our Jesus is looking for people who are all in.

Our Jesus is looking for people who are all in. Our Jesus is calling people to give their all. Our Jesus expects 100% of us 100% of the time. Our Jesus is presuming commitment.
In a conversation that I with a disciple this week, we were sharing our ideas about trusting in Jesus rather than fighting for control in our lives. We ended our time by encouraging one another and reminding one another that there is a reason that most of the time the commitment to journey with Jesus is called the “practice of discipleship.” The mistakes, not withstanding, do not weaken our commitment on the journey to be more like Jesus today than we were yesterday.

Hillsong produced a song back in 2013 entitled “Christ is Enough” that uses the lyrics from an old hymn. “I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back, no turning back. The world behind me, the cross before me, no turning back, no turning back.” Video for Christ Is Enough by Hill Song

We all need to be encouraged/challenged in our discipleship. I have decided to follow Jesus. The world behind us, the cross [dying to self] before us. No turning back, no turning back!

Suggested Dusty Discipleship practices…

1. Do a spiritual inventory, how is your commitment level to Jesus? Is there anything you are not doing that you should be doing?
2. Click the link above and listen to the song, Christ Is Enough, and talk with Jesus, reaffirm to Him that he is your reward and all that you will ever need.
3. Challenge “convenience” thinking in your life. Listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit in your life that commands your commitment and obedience.

As always, I look forward to journeying with you, as we are covered in the dust of our Rabbi, Jesus!

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Discipleship and Servanthood at 3 am

It’s 11:30 pm. I’ve been wanting to sleep since I got up this morning. It’s also shift change. A brand new, wide awake nurse comes in to introduce herself, tell us what the rest of the night holds, and to check vitals on my son. I push aside the desire to pretend I’m asleep aside. I listen to her story. I make eye contact. I thank her for keeping the night watch. I put her first.

It’s 3 am. My son needs me. So I get up. I help. I comfort. Ignoring the fact that he is my son, he hasn’t done anything to deserve it. Of course, he hasn’t done anything to not deserve it. I put him first.

It’s 4 am. The nurse comes in to check my son’s vitals. My body says roll over. My mind screams, why check vitals in the middle of the oh-dark-thirty morning? So I get up. I help. I engage. I put her first.

I share this with you, not for human praise. I don’t want it. I am not perfect. Far, far from it.

I choose to live out my discipleship by serving. Jesus served me when he put me first, when he went to the cross.

I lie back down, I utter a prayer, “thank you Jesus, for making me first in your life.”

I fall asleep knowing that I am loved, and that is why I love. I fall asleep knowing that God’s comfort for me is found in Him and that is why I comfort others. I fall asleep being held by serving hands that have served me many times over, and that is why I serve.

To many my words may seem trite. To others, too touchy/feely. But the disciple-who has come to the part in the journey of “being” with the Trinity, understands that the “being” informs the “doing.”

Left to our own motivation, if it were up to my good intentions, serving would happen when it was/is convenient.

In a world distracted by Satan with busyness, servanthood becomes optional. In this world the servanthood of discipleship becomes something we can do if it is easy, fun, low commitment and is convenient to our schedule.

Jesus does not call us to a convenient discipleship.

If a journey of comfort [as the world defines it] is what you seek, then do not follow Jesus.

If serving others is an option for you to choose, you do not follow Jesus.

Jesus is not interested in fitting into our schedule. Jesus is the schedule. His kingdom come, His will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

Rick Warren is fond of saying that “God is more interested in your character than in your comfort.” There is truth there.

A cursory reading of the Bible finds that the people God chooses to use, are rarely called to a life of comfort and convenience.

By following Jesus, will you know comfort? Yes. Will the comfort our Rabbi grants to us match the worldly definition of comfort? Most likely not.

By following Jesus, will it be convenient? Not unless we learn to “be” in Christ on the journey.

If you are interested in being just a good person, by all means, please continue to occasionally don the towel of servanthood, when you feel like it and it is convenient.

If you are, if I am, interested in being a disciple of Jesus, being covered in the dust of our Rabbi, then servanthood is a way of living out our “doing” because our character has been shaped by the time spent “being” served by our loving Lord.

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