1. Disciples are those who have died in Christ

Have you died in Christ? Can you honestly say that you have given up your own dreams and desires for the Kingdom of God? Have you set down your own agenda at the throne of God, have you surrendered your best ideas to the Lord, do you regularly submit your life and ministry plans to Holy Spirit? Have you died in Christ?

  • “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20
  • “And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” Galatians 5:24
  • “If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” Colossians 3:1-3

When we first come into the family of God we find that we are citizens, so to speak. We find our belonging, our spiritual gifts appear, we practice our talents, we settle into each other and the Lord, we have our comforts and we are home. Then, Holy Spirit draws us into active service. Here we set aside our belonging, we give up home, we leave comforts behind, we settle into the Lord only so it seems, and our spiritual gifts and talents are put into service for the Kingdom of God. Our small possessions are packed into a duffel bag, we eat whatever we might be given, we sleep where the regiment takes us, and we gladly serve our King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Our priorities change once we are disciples. Welcome God to change your priorities.

2. Disciples know the Shepherd’s voice

There are many that would call to us but disciples of Jesus Christ know the voice of The Shepherd. I’ve recently heard it explained that back in the time of Christ the shepherds would place their sheep into the same sheepfold each night (along with the sheep of numerous other shepherds). In the morning each shepherd would come and would call out to his sheep and his sheep, not the others, would recognize their shepherds voice and would leave the sheepfold for the day with their shepherd. The sheep knew the voice of their shepherd and they would not listen or follow any other.

  • ““But if anyone obeys His word, God’s love is truly made complete in Him. This is how we know we are in Him: Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did.”” 1 John 2:5-6
  • ““If you love Me, you will obey what I command.”” John 14:15
  • “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.” John 10:27-28

Obedience is under-rated in our day and age. We don’t like to think about obedience as the way of Christ. Yet, how many people claim they know God but never respond or take courage unto the action or way or direct instruction of Holy Spirit? If you cannot hear the Lord, do not know the shepherd’s voice, then I would challenge you to think about what God last asked of you. Have you done that thing? How can we expect God to meet us in our lives if we refuse to join him in his life? Obey the Lord and you will come into knowing the voice of the Shepherd and the Shepherd himself. Listen for the voice of the Lord.

3. Disciples pick up their cross

What is your cross? Can you tell me? Do you know the particular cost of your discipleship to Jesus? I would assert that if you cannot tell me what the cost of following Christ is to you, both identifying and describing the cross you are picking up daily, then I would wonder if you are a disciple of Jesus. Because being a disciple is not about having everything beautiful, well, and good, it is about cost and sacrifice and seeing the bigger picture of God through you, and then gladly bearing all the troubles that come with being a disciple of Jesus Christ.

  • “And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” Luke 9:23
  • “Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?” Matthew 16:24-26
  • “And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life.” Matthew 19:29

Being a disciple will feel that you are losing your life. You may even feel angry that God has caught you with his love. There will be a sober-minded gut-wrenching realization that your life is not your own. You will come to understand that there is a bigger picture at hand, a grand adventure you are invited into, and a call from the Lord to take courage and to enter into God’s ways, God’s timing, God’s wisdom, and God’s ministry, all of which is not your own. It is terrible and awful and no good. And it is glorious and glad-hearted and life itself. Because you now have the Lord. And nothing else matters. Pick up your cross.

4. Disciples walk in the Spirit of God

Those who have spent time in the presence of God shine with the light of Holy Spirit. There is a countenance upon a disciple that reveals God. There is a manner and way, a movement of God within them that cannot be hidden. People are drawn (demons are repelled) to Spirit-led people. People share their deepest needs. Folks will weep unexpectedly. Others will spontaneously come to Christ. Still more, there will be healings and a new wholeness that will take hold in the lives of people round about these ones. Gladness marks disciples of our true Lord God, creator of heaven and earth and all mankind.

  • “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” Romans 8:14
  • “For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.” Galatians 6:8
  • “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” Galatians 5:22-24

It is well known by this time that going to church does not a disciple make. We are not christian because we attend church or bible studies, or tithe or help with church life. These things are easy for anyone to do and they are the wrong measurement. Rather, a life that walks with the Spirit of God, hearing, responding, submitted, surrendered and obeying the Spirit of God, our Holy Spirit, is the mark of the disciples of Christ. Walk in the Spirit.

5. Disciples take God seriously

What has the Lord been speaking to you about? Has God commanded something of you recently? Can you tell me the most recent compelling of Holy Spirit in your life? Disciples respond, are nimble in obedience, have a surrendered life, and are caught by the proper fear of God. Disciples take God seriously.

  • ““And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul,” Deuteronomy 10:12
  • “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” Proverbs 1:7
  • “Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” Exodus 20:20

This fear of God directs disciples, keeping them on the narrow path, ensuring that they do not ruin the things of the Lord, coming before the Lord each day in partnership with our living God. Disciples take God seriously. They give up house and home when instructed to do so. They give up jobs and livelihoods when ordered by the Lord. They loose off all that may distract them from walking with God. They look forward and not behind, moving ever deeper into the wild with God. Walk in the fear of the Lord.

6. Disciples feast on the Word of God

Disciples feast (to partake heartily) on the written Word of God, our scriptures the Bible, and disciples feast (to partake heartily) of the living Word of God, Jesus Christ himself. Disciples have both understanding of God and intimacy with God. Disciples know that God is their Saviour and their friend, both their holiness and their forgiveness, their righteousness and their grace. And, disciples know that this is Jesus. God is not a far off distant idea, not a philosophy, not a religion, but a person. Jesus, God himself, draws near to us and true disciples of Christ draw near to him.

  • “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” John 1:1
  • “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:14
  • “Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” John 6:35

Disciples do not talk about God as though he is in another room. Rather, disciples speak of the Lord as an intimate, as someone they know and who is with them at all times. Disciples are not looking for things from God, because they know that the prize is God himself. God is our solution. God is our provision. God is our wisdom. God is our healing. God is our gladness. God is our hope. God is our salvation. God. Know God.

7. Disciples bear much fruit

There is a multiplication that takes hold in the lives of disciples. With a longstanding faithfulness, tenacity, and face like flint unto the Lord and what has been commanded of him (the disciple) there begins to be revealed a compounding interest, a multiplication (not addition) that cannot be counted or understood by our human thinking. Disciples bear much fruit.

  • “By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.” John 15:8
  • “As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.” Matthew 13:22-23
  • “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” John 12:24

Fruit is the evidence of being connected to the vine (our true Lord) and of drinking deeply, surrendered fully, abiding completely. But, let us note that disciples do not make the fruit. Rather, the fruit is of the Lord as a result of the disciple surrendered, abiding, obedient and fully yielded to God. Seek the Lord.

8. Disciples Love

Disciples welcome the love of God to refine and mature them.

  • “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
  • 4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
  • 8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
  • 13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” 1 Corinthians 13

Abide in God. Let God love you more. https://cyndylavoie.com/2016/07/21/into-the-love-of-god/ Be sifted, corrected, chastened, challenged. Become the love of God. Nice is not the goal. Become Love. Toxic optimism is not the goal. Be Love. Happy with everyone is not the goal. Know love. Forgive your enemies. Pray for your country’s leaders (whom you may despise). Speak truth not flattery. Bless those you hate. Loose sin off of each other. Desire the best for those you judge. Bind up the wounds of the ones who are hurting you. Let your yes be yes and your no be no. Remain in love. https://cyndylavoie.com/2013/09/15/wrecked-by-love/

No Application with this one. Let God move you, convict you, heal you. Thank You Lord.

=>  One more lesson on Rules for Living and you will be finished Focus One

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