The current standard will offer a wide range of choices depending on the context and culture in which we live. Being a disciple of Jesus – a follower of Jesus – is a very different call indeed.
We will all have a favourite Bible verse that speaks to us and I guess that mine change on a regular basis. However one verse sticks with me and I am aware that it is a favourite of many:
‘He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.’ Micah 6:8
It is an Old Testament reading and I like to think that it might have been a favourite of Jesus also. I have several Bibles but I like to keep one as my ‘working’ Bible. I have two on my desk that offer me a whole bunch of trimmings. One is an excellent study Bible and the other a great devotional resource; but my working Bible is the one that gets dog eared, sweat stained, underlined, highlighted and scribbled on. Maybe Jesus had special parts of his Scriptures highlighted and old Micah was one of them?
Certainly as a disciple of Jesus I see his justice shine through as I follow him along the road. I see him take time for an outcast woman so desperate for healing that she had faith enough to just touch the hem of his robe. ‘Who touched my clothes?’ Jesus asked. Who touches us today? Who is it pushing through the usual crowd of our favoured ones, just seeking to be touched, seen or heard among the throng?
I see kindness as I follow Jesus along the way. I see it in the way he called children to him in a time where little ones had little or no status. I see it in the crying out of a blind beggar and Jesus stopping on his way to simply offer him hope. Perhaps Jesus’ stopping and taking notice was the beginning of healing for a man who not only could not see; but others failed to see him also? People talk about doing random acts of kindness. There was nothing random about Jesus’ kindness, it was who he was.
As I follow after Jesus, I see a life of humility. For Jesus it wasn’t a matter of ‘look at me’ but ‘look at them’. It all began in the feed trough of animals in a stable and it ended on a rubbish dump hanging from a cross. In between he rejected popularity and power, instead choosing to follow another voice; a quieter but a greater one.
At the end of his life Jesus stood before the ‘powers’ of the day. He was called before the religious leaders who scorned him, spat on him and struck him. He was sent to the political power of the day in Pontius Pilate who had him whipped and then crucified in exchange for a bandit named Barabbas. His best friend denied him and the crowds who cheered him on Palm Sunday gathered for the execution on Friday. Predicting Peter’s betrayal Jesus promised: ‘but I have prayed for you that your own faith may not fail’. To those gathered at the cross: ‘Father, forgive them. They do not know what they are doing.’
Am I a disciple of Jesus or simply a Christian by current standards?
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