Making DisciplesShembull

Positive Response

Disciples who know they have been chosen by God for a purpose must express a desire to be discipled or trained, and also display a teachable spirit.

In Biblical times, when a teacher extended an invitation to follow him, it did not mean, “Come see me once a week for a couple of hours.” Discipleship meant that a young person would invest themselves in learning everything there was to learn about their teacher's beliefs. Eventually, a student would be exactly like their teacher. 

Many masters would impose heavy burdens on their disciples, such as religion lays on people. This makes people walk around with a guilty conscience all the time—a sense of not being or doing enough. But Jesus did not do that to His disciples. 

Jesus’ invitation, by Matthew’s account, went like this: “Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Jesus is a different type of Master; His yoke brings rest, but one has to take it, for He will not impose it on us.   

Jesus Himself said He cannot do anything but what He sees His Father doing. If Jesus depends that much on His Father, then you and I need to do the same. A proud spirit is an unteachable spirit because it wants to go out and do what it feels—it knows it all already. Not Jesus. He waits to hear and see what the Father wants to do, then He acts. Peter had a hard time learning this from Jesus. Peter’s spirit, Paul’s spirit, and our spirits have to be humbled to come to the same place where our Master was, conducting business in perfect unity with the Father. 

Just as a marine makes a decision every day to train to be a marine, a disciple of Jesus has to get up every day willing to take His yoke and walk with Him. A disciple must be able to learn from all experiences because our Master uses everything for our good, to make us more like Him. A disciple also needs to trust the Teacher—even when He is quiet. 

A competent disciple of Jesus, who understands he or she has been chosen, is one who then chooses to live in perfect unity with the Father, just like Jesus did when He was here on earth.  

Are you ready to take His yoke?