The Cost of Discipleship

One of the many statements I remember from bible studies in college is this: “The Christian life is not difficult; it is impossible. Our bible teachers would always remind us of it. Soon enough I found myself quoting the same line over and over – sometimes with a deep awareness of its truth in relation to the reality of grace, to encourage fellow believers; at other times, carelessly and without the least bit of reflection, and I’m quite sure, much to God’s dismay, selfishly as an excuse to legitimise my disobedience and perennial delay in taking up my cross and facing my responsibilities and sufferings as a Christian.

In those moments when I’m tempted to take the easy way out – or more appropriately, the coward’s way out – I foolishly tell myself that it is of no use to try. What’s the sense of trying when you are aware beforehand of its impossibility? Why, when all efforts are in vain? But that’s just me in my disillusioned state, in a frame of mind that interprets falsely the doctrine of grace.

We are I’m sure familiar with this passage:
Luke 9:23 – Then he said to all, "If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

We’ve heard and read it countless times, perhaps even since our childhood, when we had our first exposure to Christian Living, when we were too young to grasp its relevance in our lives. And then later on in theology courses, which, admit it or not, was discussed in a too academic fashion. We hear it in church, in bible studies, in group discipleships.

We’ve heard is so many times we sometimes think we’ve understood and internalised everything, all that there is to it, every word of it. Afterall, it’s just one passage in Scripture. Sure our brains may have understood, but what we think our minds have grasped, our hearts might not have absorbed; until such time that God teaches us yet again through hard, disappointing and painful life experiences.

The mind and the heart absorb things by different modalities. God speaks to our minds through His Word, but He impresses these words and teachings to our hearts through the circumstance we find ourselves in - through those instances which God authored and allowed. That is why in my opinion, for one who has committed oneself to the cause of Jesus, it does not make much sense to live a cloistered life devoted solely to doing a hermeneutics of biblical texts. No, I am not dismissing it as mere triviality. I only wish to point out that without a hermeneutics of the self – achieved by coming into contact with the “world”, for one cannot know the self directly – for what purpose do we intend interpretation of Scripture to be? Mere head knowledge? I hope not. (Not unless one wishes to seriously get into the discipline of theology. I’m sure it would be of much help)

The reason why I felt the need to briefly discuss the dynamic link between God’s Word and our circumstances is because that is what I have personally been learning and experiencing at the moment. God has been discipling me both ways. Nevertheless, I will only write about what I have been learning from the Word; I will leave the other (i.e., the circumstances I am in) as a subject for future blog entries. No I will not attempt to come up with a detailed account of how God has been profoundly teaching His word in my life experiences.

Going back to my original subject, the verse (Luke 9:23) I quoted above has been a recurring theme in my quiet times, in the bible studies and discipleships I frequent since early last year. Perhaps it is because of its centrality in the Christian life that it seems an inevitable passage to reflect on. Early last year, someone suggested that I read Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s book, The Cost of Discipleship. The subject of which, is of course the same verse (however, if I’m not mistaken, he used Matthew’s version). I never really got to finish the entire book but of what I have so far read, one of his most striking assertions is this:

“The only man who has the right to say that he is justified by grace alone is the man who has left all to follow Christ. Such a man knows that the call to discipleship is a gift of grace, and that the call is inseparable from the grace”

Of the many things this assertion evokes, what I think he wants to communicate are the principles of justification and sanctification. Justification , on one hand, refers to our status before God. It points to the reality of our forgiveness by the work of Jesus in the cross. By being justified through Christ, we have been credited the same righteousness as His and have been given a spotless, blameless record of sinlessness. Sanctification, on the other hand, refers to the process of becoming like Jesus Christ. It is the same as the principle of discipleship which we know of. Sanctification is the result of justification not otherwise. (refer to Ephesians 2:8) Therein lies suffering – in the process of sanctification.

To those who have decided to take the call seriously, we know that suffering is inevitable. In the Gospels, we find Jesus describing specific instances of suffering which we are to anticipate. In John 16:33 he says, “In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world."

At this point, why don’t we go back to that widely-quoted, evocative phrase: take up your cross. Often misconstrued by those who dwell on the secular plane, I would like to clarify that ‘taking up one’s cross’ is not a matter of ‘self-inflected pain’. It is, more importantly, about these two words: surrender and abandonment. It is about obedience – “come follow me” , Jesus teaches.

I say that it is about those two abstract words – surrender and abandonment – because taking up one’s cross is not simply a matter of what this mental image conjures: picking up a cross from the ground, carrying it and following the One who leads. Nope. It obviously involves much much more than what that visual imagine suggests.

What helped me realize the seriousness of this cost and the difficulty which it entails is through a passage in Jeremiah which, for all its simplicity, profoundly spoke to me. It says:

Jeremiah 13:18 – Come down from your throne; From your heads fall your magnificent crowns.

If we juxtapose this verse with the phrase ‘take up your cross’, I’m sure you have by now conjured the image of the ‘cost of discipleship’. Surrender and abandonment begins to take form and shape and we now have something to refer to. So let’s take up this juxtaposition:

Cast your crowns + Take up your cross (and then Come follow me)

Either of the two seem like a senseless feat. A difficult command to obey. How much more if we seriously consider to take the combo?

Let us reflect on this in the context of Medieval times – the reign of kings and queens. Imagine yourself as a king or a queen forced by circumstances to cast your crowns. Imagine the disgrace, shame and humiliation you would experience in having to lay down what is precisely the very source of your domination, pride and honor.

And who would calmly surrender without a sure moment of defeat? Much less, relinquish a crown and abandon a thrown without any attempt at fighting a courageous battle or two?

No it isn’t easy if only because everything else is at stake. It isn’t easy because you know that in relinquishing your crown and leaving your throne, you exchange your power, strength and control for helplessness, weakness and uncertainty. The command is indeed costly.

We are hundreds of years away from the Middle Ages; much more, a thousand years away from the time of Israel’s first kings and queens. However, we haven’t advanced much with respect to inclinations to those who have long ago preceded us. The same pride that prevented these rulers to voluntarily fall their crowns is the same pride that prevents us from taking the cost of discipleship seriously.

And here I realise that very impossibility of living the Christian life, compounded by the pressure of a morally and spiritually corrupt world that perpetually hails and preaches the ‘egoism of the self’ (to borrow Levinas’ term).

But then again, I am not completely dejected or discouraged. I remember Jesus Christ and I am once again filled with his Spirit, hopeful and encouraged despite it’s impossibility, because the Christian life isn’t about succeeding in the quest for perfection but an endless opening and re-opening of oneself to the workings of His grace; because it is about giving up for the One who gave all without counting costs; because it is about what God can do, can change, can re-work and can make of one who would only so much as take a little step towards fulfilling that call.

I have only to remember what is termed in theology as ‘descending Christology’ and again my passion for Christ burns. I have only to fix my gaze and intently observe that one King who gave it all up for me and for the rest of humanity; that same King who was once garbed in colorful robes, rightfully owns the crown and throne of heaven and earth, who out of great love, decided it was time to go – to leave the throne, to take off majestic robes and relinquish a crown to enter the history of a humanity unaware of its desperate need for forgiveness and salvation.

God made man. From the glory of heaven to the harsh conditions of earth.

I ask myself further, is there any other king who abandoned a majestic kingdom for a humble carpenter’s dwelling? Or a king who gently washed the feet of those who, in reality, were supposed to serve him? Or a king who chose the company of those in the margins of a much too prejudiced society?

Is there any other king who was scorned and condemned to die the most humiliating of deaths and suffer the most excruciating of pains – scourged, nailed and pierced? No he didn’t even make attempts at verbal retaliation not because he simply accepted defeat but because he knew that his lowest was at the same time his highest; that the weight of his suffering is the very height of his glory.

More, is there any other king who in his dying moments, uttered a thoughtful prayer for the same souls who jeered and called for his death?

All these because he loves. I cannot help but wonder why isn’t everyone convinced of this love declaration sealed with blood, coupled by acts of sacrifice? Why is there doubt as to the sincerity of a passion that moved One to subject the sacredness of life itself to the brutality of human hands?

Now we are saved, forgiven - justified. For those who believe, we know that salvation is free; we only have to receive the wonderful gift. But the tag price for the One who gave isn’t cheap.

His and ours – the Crown, the Cross. The Cost of Discipleship.

Jesus Christ is those ‘two words’ personified.

***

It is good for a man to bear the yoke from his youth.

Let him sit alone and in silence, when it is laid upon him.

Let him put his mouth to the dust; there may yet be hope.

Let him offer his cheek to be struck, let him be filled with disgrace.

For the Lord's rejection does not last forever;

Though he punishes, he takes pity, in the abundance of his mercies;

He has no joy in afflicting or grieving the sons of men.

-Lamentations 3:27-33