“A Christian disciple is a follower who is learning
from Another”
(This blog is being written to
clarify my earlier blog entitled Disciples of Christ Are Made Not Educated. A respected brother in Christ commented that
he was concerned that what I had written might cause, an “imbalance to correct an imbalance.” My response/clarification follows.)
Forgive me if it sounded like
“learning was unnecessary or optional.” Quite the contrary, but I was
attempting to emphasize that spiritual learning is always dependent on and
reliant upon the personal interpretation of and indwelling presence of the Holy
Spirit. “And Jesus said to him, “Blessed
are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but
My Father who is in heaven (Matthew 16:17).”
My purpose in writing “Disciples
of Christ Are Made Not “Educated” was that true learning is relationally
dependent and derived from the presence of and participation with the person of
Jesus Christ (John 15:5). The Greek word
for disciple, “mathetes,” implies
both a "learner" and a "follower." The point that I was
making is a "learner" can be both one who assimilates data, and/or a
relational learner who is learning from Another in a personal context of
relationship not just academic information. The New Testament concept of
"follower" tends to have more of a personal emphasis that is more
relational than informational.
I referenced the Apostle Paul statement
in 2 Timothy 3:7, “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of
the truth.” Academic learning alone was never intended by God to be the sole
of foremost means of knowing Him.
My
critics commented; “Recipients of the Letter to the
Hebrews had neglected learning (education) in the fundamentals of the faith.
This retarded their spiritual maturity and hindered their potential for
disciple-making (Heb. 5:12-14).” I disagree. Let me explain why.
Paul was admonishing believers in
this passage of scripture that they had lost sight of personal participation
with Christ, which was the focus of my blog, Disciples of Christ Are Made
Not “Educated, “Christianity is
real and genuine Christian disciples share what they know through participation
with Christ, not just what they know intellectually about Christ. We do not
know simply through educational learning (2 Timothy 3:7), but through His
abiding presence in us (cf. John 14:7), and this goes beyond ”the fundamentals
of education.”
Paul’s admonishment in Heb. 5:12,
is that a teacher is not just an informational professor who instructs
others. A true teacher of the gospel of
Jesus Christ is one who is responsible and leads through example, sharing out
of experiential knowing of Christ relationally, not just learned theological
head knowledge. A responsible Christian teacher has learned to “respond”
to “Christ’s ability” which is what it means to be responsible. A disciple is a relational learner who is
learning from “Another,” referred to as a follower of Christ. A Christian teacher is one who has been
taught by God, “listening under” the Holy Spirit, which is the New Testament
understanding of Obedience.
Many Christian teachers today are
teaching from a flawed theological premise due to the fact they have not
understood New Testament grace and are endeavoring to present the Gospel
through the “eyes” of an Old Covenant understanding. Jesus reminds us in John 14:26, “But the
Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach
you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.”
Neither Paul writing to the
Hebrews, nor Jesus quoted in John’s gospel are referring to a “book learning”
or “educational learning” but rather a relational learning that can only be
realized as we encounter God for ourselves and choose to rely on Him. Paul
seems to chide the Jewish believers of Jerusalem saying, “For though by this
time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first
principles of the oracles of God” Heb. 5:12.
Christians now and then had
apparently gone backward into a novice spiritual mind-set which was hindering
their spiritual maturity. They were
acting like immature students who were dependent on an instructor to tell them
“what to believe” and “how to do it;” relying on hand-me-down information, or a
secondary sense of “living by the book.”
Paul challenged them to press on into the obedience of faith (Rom.
16:26) rather than the hopeless reliance of legalistic, law-dependent instruction
for which religion is famous. Faith is
always relationship-oriented, being dependent and receptive to what the Spirit
of Christ is doing in us and acting in response to the direction of His Spirit,
not just being psychologically focused on a written script or approved
ecclesiastical belief system.
The “first
principles of the oracles of” (Heb.5:12) are not just elementary biblical
information that we are taught from studying our bibles or listening to sermons,
but are better understood as the foundational understanding of Christ as our
life choosing to be relationally dependent on Him and Him only!
Paul continues with a new
analogy, but continues to chide their spiritually juvenile behavior, “and
you have come to need milk and not solid food” Heb. 5:12. Mature Christians should be able to “digest”
both “the pure milk of the word” as well as the “solid food” of spiritual
“taste” which is based on the finished work of the cross. Spiritual immaturity is largely due to the
fact that believers have been malnourished relying on second-hand “spoon
feeding” rather than “growing up and
taking their place at the table” in Christ. This is largely due to the fact
that believers then and now have been taught to rely on “book religion” or on
what “clergy” has taught them and have not learned to be “followers of Christ”
in an intimate relationship that is personal. You have heard it said, “It’s not “what” you
know but “who” you know.” “A Christian disciple is a follower who is
learning from Another.”
