14th Lesson: Discipleship According to God's Own Heart

Leadership belongs to God, and the discipleship was given to us.

John 6:44 (NKJV) “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.”

Introduction.

"Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you "(Matthew 28: 19-20).  

The Leadership is the Lords and the discipleship Jesus Christ gave to His followers. When Jesus started His ministry He recruited those whom He chose to make His disciples. He called them and said: “Follow me”. What does it actually mean ‘follow me’? 

Objectives of this subject:

1. Understand the difference between who the leader is and who the follower is.

2. Christ’s ministry here on earth and his heavenly ministry after his ascension. 

3. The command that He gave to the disciples. 

4. Ministry Jesus gave to the disciples at Pentecost. 

As disciples we ought to teach to observe all things whatsoever Jesus commanded the Church to do.

Reflecting on these verses: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you "(Matthew 28: 19-20). 

We can analyze carefully, exegetically; and we will realize that this text of Matthew 28 is differential within Sacred Scriptures because it has singularities that no other passage contains as it talks about the discipleship. From a small passage spoken to us within few lines we can extract powerful revelations that ware given to us by our Lord Jesus Christ. 

Exegetical  means: exegesis. a critical interpretation or explication, especially of biblical and other religious texts. — exegetic, exegetical, adj. 

First, we will study this text in order to understand it in relation to the practical teachings that it offers us in relation to discipleship as a human ministry and leadership as Divine ministry. 

The text in Matthew 28 where Jesus gives the command: "Go"; makes a link, a connection. The bond that connects two specific historical moments, involving the people of God. It is the link, meaning the connection, which connects the end of human ministry to the beginning of the spiritual ministry of Jesus Christ. 

 The link that connects the completion of Christ's atoning work with the onset of discipleship. 

 The bond that makes the disciples into apostles. 

 The link that connects the conclusion of the Gospels and the beginning of the apostolic acts. 

 The link that begins the history of the Church. 

 The link that puts into practice all the precepts received and absorbed by the twelve throughout the three years in which the human ministry of Jesus developed.

Jesus was in Galilee, with his disciples, about to close the human stage of his discipleship ministry: he won, he consolidated lives; performed miracles and wonders as Mathew describes it:

- He healed a leper, the servant of a centurion, the mother-in-law of Peter; and He quenched a storm and drove out demons (Matthew 8);

- He healed a paralytic, a woman with a stream of blood, two blind and one mute (Matthew 9); He healed a man who had one withered hand (Matthew 12); He walked on the sea (Matthew 14);

- He multiplied bread and fish (Matthew 15);

- He was transfigured with the disciples (Matthew 17); He healed a lunatic (Matthew 18);

All these wonders were counted only in the Gospel of Matthew, not to mention other miracles that Jesus accomplished without them being recorded in the Gospels. The Apostle John states it this way: John 21:25: “And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen.”

But the human ministry of Jesus is not only of miracles. The Lord Jesus, as a born leader, was also concerned with building the Body of Christ, which is the Church; with a solid Doctrine based on the Father’s Word (which should be a concern of every disciple). He cared about making wholehearted disciples, he cared to consolidate and train them, and he also trained them as successors who would put His teachings into practice generating new disciples afterwards.

Throughout the three years of His human ministry, Jesus Christ formed these disciples; which I call the First Christian Theological Faculty of history, where he himself was the ecclesiastical and the teacher who brought an innovative teaching and unlike anything people had seen at that time. A practical teaching that broke with all traditionalism and put in check the religious system of the time.

He practiced everything He taught. He left an example that never had been seen before. The teaching was basically simple, but very profound and many times too hard to achieve by many that heard Him. In its essence broke with all the superficiality present in the teachings of the scribes and the Pharisees, setting a pattern of eternal and immutable values that should guide the lives of all who desire to follow Him. 

Through these teachings, Jesus signs the spiritual principles of the Kingdom of God, the Celestial Constitution. It is for this reason that every time the Pharisees tried to accuse Jesus according to Jewish traditions, Jesus was a step ahead demonstrating that all complexity of the Law was insufficient and superficial in regards of the ethical and moral standard of God’s Kingdom. These teachings were offered free of charge in common places like mountains and beaches; throughout the villages where He passed by. They were received through teachings, prophetic sermons, and parables.

Returning now to the text of Matthew 28, after suffering the terrible vicarious death on the Cross, bringing redemption to mankind, Jesus was resurrected and reunited with his disciples, who in a few minutes would become the first Apostles of the Church. Jesus' concern now was to transfer the human ministry to his disciples; to transmit to them the last instructions before ascending to Heaven so they could begin their spiritual ministry.

The "go and make disciples of all nations" puts an end to the human ministry of Jesus. It transfers to the new apostles the responsibility of maintaining the exact legacy that Jesus structured, based on the same principles, same laws, and the same values. The apostles take on the work of discipleship that gave birth to the Church; and the Lord Jesus, takes the lead. Jesus instructs the disciples to remain in Jerusalem:

"Stay therefore in Jerusalem, until ye be clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24:49). This order was basically simple: They needed Baptism with the Holy Spirit, since it is the Spirit, the agent of all and any work. We can consider that the power of the Holy Spirit through the Church is the strongest feature of the book of Acts of the Apostles (where Jesus' prophecy was fulfilled). 

For this reason, I began the chapter affirming that the "go" is the link that connects the conclusion of the Gospels to apostolic acts, for if we analyze the book of Acts itself, we will conclude that it is a continuity of the Gospels in order to be connected to them through the "go".

The Holy Spirit is able to change lives. It is the power of the Spirit in the life of Jesus that authorized him to preach the Kingdom of God and to execute signs. The same power of the Spirit (Acts 2) transferred the same authority to the disciples. Therefore, Jesus is the greatest stereotype of a full life, filled with the Spirit and empowered by the Spirit. The presence of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Christian directs his actions, his thoughts, his words and his choices; or at least they should drive. For this reason, leadership belongs to the Lord.

The Lord Jesus, now in the heavens, assumes his spiritual ministry: to intercede for us at the right hand of the Father (according to Rom 8:34) and to rule through a reign which is equally spiritual for an hour, but which, in the future, prophecies, will be a physical reign, which will extend to all peoples, languages, races, tribes and nations.

"And he shall reign forever in the house of Jacob, and his kingdom shall have no end" (Luke 1:33)

A spiritual government to overcome the limitations of human leadership.

As it is written in the title of this chapter, discipleship (human ministry) has been given to us, but leadership belongs only to the Lord. In the next lesson we will explain why…

Until then, may the Lord Jesus be with you.  

Blessings on to you all. 

Antonina Penner.

A. PENNER PUBLISHING.

 Discipleship according the heart of God

ISBN NUMBER:  978-0-9881063-2-1