The Great Omission
While I was working on this post, it struck me that Acts favors the word "disciple" to describe followers of Jesus (30 uses), as opposed to "believer" (13) or "Christian" (just 2). I notice that most of us today prefer the latter terms, perhaps because they sound less impressive or presumptuous. To my ears "disciple" sounds like an lofty title, fitting perhaps for a few very wise and godly people I know, but not to a half-hearted screw-up like me. "Believer" sounds like it might include those of us who aren't the best or most devoted followers of Jesus, but who can sign our names to the Apostles creed or some other list of doctrine. (Real Live Preacher thinks this is a very modern and un-biblical understanding of belief.) And "Christian" sounds like someone who goes to church on Sunday and doesn't say words like "fuck".
I know that none of these definitions are very good ones, but I've been thinking specifically about the term "believer" recently. Based on a quick look through Acts, it seems like the early church used "believer" and "disciple" more or less interchangeably. This makes me think that it is a mistake to distinguish between having faith in Jesus and following Jesus, between being a believer and being a disciple. (I think James would agree.) So I was surprised and pleased when I found much the same thing expressed on the dust jacket of Dallas Willard's delightfully titled new book, The Great Omission:
The last command Jesus gave the church before he ascended to heaven was the Great Commission, the call for Christians to "make disciples of all the nations." But Christians have responded by making "Christians," not "disciples." This has been the church's Great Omission.The book itself is a collection of previously released essays and sermons, and may be a bit repetitive, particularly for those who have already read some of Willard's books. I haven't read it myself, so I won't recommend it. But I love this idea that discipleship, not doctrine, is the essence of Christianity.
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15 comments:
Quoting Jacob:
But I love this idea that discipleship, not doctrine, is the essence of Christianity.
Me too! I don't think that I could stand being a Christian were it centred around doctrine. Discipleship at the heart of following Christ is so much more fulfilling, rewarding and any other redundant term you want to add on to the end of this (now) bloating comment. Hooray for following Christ through learning to be like Him, instead of following a structured façade that tries to mimic the same!
ℓ℮
i want to be a disciple.
Thank you very much...
Your words are encouraging.
Read on.
when I hear the word disciple I think of someone who is identified by what they do and who they try to follow and be like as opposed to a believer who need not do anything but believe to earn such a title.
I think the idea of a disciple is good. It's much more meaningful and perhaps much more representative of who we are meant to be as believers in Christ.
Disciple does sound scary to the modern ear though... too bad...
ps: I approve of the choice you made in this post... I think it was a good choice. :)
I'm glad you approve.
Thanks for bringing this book to my/our attention, Yacov. Willard's the sort of writer for whom one of these cut+paste book assemblage thingees could really be effective. He's got such a wide and deep sense of Christian life that we folk who are only able to read snippets of Divine Conspiracy here and there between the cresting undulations of daily life really need a way into his thought processes. This really looks helpful, and the blurb you cited is particularly beautiful/haunting/provocative.
yes. I laughed.
I agree that we should be/make disciples... I am not so sure the church has failed at that, though. Sure, there are many lukewarm Christians, but I saw a ton of "disciples" in the strongest sense of the word here in India.
I guess the obvious question is... can you be a disciple but not a believer? (the Indian Ghandi comes to mind).
Good point, Jens. A slap on the wrist for Willard, for making a generalization about Christians. I'm a little suprised some of my other readers haven't commented on this.
I'm not completely sure what the answer to the obvious question is. From what I hear, it was precisely the un-disciple-ly-ness of "believers" that turned Ghandi off religious Christianity. One could argue that Ghandi demostrated a far deeper and more meaningful belief in the teachings of Jesus than do most "believers". I think Jesus would respect that.
But some will argue that correct doctrine is, if not a sufficient condition for Belief, then certainly a neccessary one. I don't have a very good response to this. At least, not a Biblical one.
i've been paying attention lately to what people say when they are asked what it means to be a Christian. There are some weird answers. (I do know, however, that it is something that is hard to sum up in a number of words, so omissions are not always reflective of what is actually in someone's heart...)
Anyhow, so I've read people saying things like "to be Christ-like in an imperfect world"
"to be accountable to the bible"
"acknowleding one's sin before God"
"acting in certain ways within society... loving your neigbor"
Most of these are from Geez magazine in case anyone want to pin me for plaigerism.
But yeah, so what ever happened to Christianity being about a relationship with God? That's what I thought it was about.. but as far as I've read in this magazine it hasn't been mentioned. And reading Donald Miller's "Searching for God knows what" has reminded me that we often leave out the most important part of faith - relationship.
Seriously... so what good is it if you "believe" and are hence a "believer" but don't have a relationship? What good are a whole bunch of rules and lifestyle choices and guidlines about how to live if it's just that, a lifestyle, and not a relationship.
hmm...
Hey Michigan...
"Relationship" is easier for some people than others, unfortunately. Some of us just don't feel interaction, or emotional closeness with God... (whether this is through our own flaws, or God's choices, or personality types, etc.) For those of us who want to be Christians/believers/desciples/whatever but struggle to have a back-and-forth relationship, it falls back on lifestyle, loving others, trying to obey the word of God, etc...
PS Do I know you? Trying to figure out who you are.
First, touché Jakester on catching that generalization. I suppose, in my "defense", I probably give Dallas the benefit of a doubt because he's Dallas... and a frickin' phenomenologist... and he's far far less generalistic (new word, I know... I just made it up) in his books. Also, he's just so dang loveable, I couldn't fault him for anything. He quotes Nabakov in his books, for goodness sake!
Second, I also would caution a too easy capitulation into the "personal relationship with God" thang. That idea as we understand it is a 19th century Anglo-American construction. Not to say that it isn't true, but that there is a lot of value in believing, even if we don't feel that we have a relationship with God, as Jens points out. I think we need to allow for extremely generous readings of both "belief" and "relationship", and the more generous we are in those readings, the more we'll see that they overlap. A great example of someone who thought on the margins of both belief and relationship was Kierkegaard. A disciple in the most hardcore and heartbreaking sense of the word -- appealing to an absurd leap into the unknown. That's faith for him. The absurd faith that we have a relationship with the unseen, unknown God -- and perhaps not a "relationship" in the way we might conceive of it... and perhaps not a "faith" in the way we might conceive of it.
Good old relationship with God.
I guess I tend to minimize this aspect of Christianity because it doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I am one of those Jens refers to; I don't feel like I interact with (much less have an intimate relationship with) God. For this reason I hope that this relationship is not central to Christianity.
Is discipleship (sans relationship) merely rules, guidelines, and lifestyle choices? Perhaps. I would point out that they are exceedingly good rules, guidelines, and lifestyle choices. And I mean good in the sense that they have dramatic and tangible good effects, both for the disciple and those s/he interacts with.
Whether the separation of relationship and discipleship (or doctrine and discipleship) is Biblical, I'm not sure. [Jeff: I'd be interested to hear more about the development of this idea.] But I do believe that discipleship by itself is meaningful, radical and world-changing. Given the choice, I would rather see everyone in the world become a true disciple of Jesus Christ than develop a personal relationship with him. (Although I say this without having experienced such a relationship first-hand.)
But I hasten to add that I do not think relationship with God is of no value. I am glad for (and often envious of) those who experience it, and in general, the effect it has on their lives seems to be predominantly(though not exclusively) positive. But it seems to me that being a believer/disciple/Christian is neither sufficient nor necessary for having such a relationship.
Interesting, Jake;
I think that it is necessary for one to have a relationship with Jesus/God in order truly to be a disciple. By definition, one cannot be a disciple if there exists no relationship between the master & disciple, student/teacher or follower/followed. Now, I believe that being a believer by no means necessitates having a relationship—in fact, one might truly posit that Satan is a believer in Christ—but I do not think that the same holds in reverse. Furthermore, I would hasten to add that the terms "believer" and "disciple" should indeed not be used interchangeably, by the very nature of what the terms actually mean. You can believe & not follow; yet you cannot follow without belief.
A good point, LE. There are of course various definitions of "disciple", just like "believer", "relationship", etc., and such words never mean precisely the same thing when a deity is involved as they do in everyday usage.
Personally, I think it is possible to be a disciple of someone without having a personal relationship with them (one might claim to be a disciple of Kant, Gandhi, Kurt Cobain, or whomever) although I'm sure it helps. Perhaps the word was not used so broadly in the first century, but I think we can all agree that Jesus uses it at least a little bit figuratively - it's just a question of degree.
It seems to me that the words "believer" and "disciple" are used interchangeably in the Bible, at least in the book of Acts. This leads be to suspect that (as Real Live Preacher argues) "believer" meant something quite different back then than it does now. It seems that to Luke (as well as to James and John, among others) one cannot be a true believer without being a disciple. Whether these writers believed that what some of us call "a personal relationship with Jesus Christ" is a co-requisite to belief and discipleship is another question.
Fun facts: The words "relationship with God/Christ" don't appear in the NIV New Testament ("relationship to God" appears once, in a negative light). "Know God/Christ" (the exact meaning of which is of course debatable) appears a total of seven times and, intriguingly, always in the context of obedience/discipleship. "Fellowship" with Jesus or the Spirit (which could also be understood in various ways) is mentioned five times, generally in the opening or closing of letters, and with little clarifying context. Are there other words in the Bible that might express the concept of relationship with God?
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