Jun 21, 2024 Discipleship In a Difficult World – Words of Grace Blog – June 21, 2024
Every generation of Christians since Christ has had its challenges to discipleship in the world. Christians have not always been aware of these challenges, and so, have not faced them with faith and in faithfulness to Christ. Some, being aware, have made the decision to simply stay away from as many challenging situations as possible. Others have been overwhelmed by the hardship, and the outcome has not been good.
There is another way. By God’s grace we can be faithful disciples of Jesus in a difficult world.
This summer at Grace Community Church, we are talking about discipleship from the Gospel of Mark. No discussion of discipleship would be complete without talking about the difficulties we face in being faithful to Christ in the world.
Discipleship is sometimes presented as a peaceful and easy experience with Jesus. But Jesus himself said to his disciples that our peace comes not from avoiding trials and tribulations (in fact, he promised we would have them), but from knowing that he has overcome the world. We can be of good cheer in the knowledge that he is with us to the end.
Jesus also gave us each other to help our discipleship. This summer we will come together on Sunday evenings (June 23, 30 and July 7, 14) for this purpose. These gatherings will be conversations for mutual encouragement toward faithful discipleship in the difficult and pressuring situations we face in our generation. We have three goals in mind for these discussions.
We aim to be faithful to Christ. The joy of our souls when we meet Jesus face to face will be to hear him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” In all things, we strive for this. Outcomes are in his hands. Faithfulness is what he calls for from us.
We aim to be the light of Christ. We are in the world with Christ in us. Our faithful obedience and representation of Christ as the way, the truth, and the life is a testimony of his grace and goodness to the world. Faithful witness is essential to discipleship.
We aim to be helpful to each other. We are not private, isolated disciples. We walk with Christ together. We have an opportunity to help one another think through the many challenging situations we face and to discern what obedience and witness to Christ looks like in each one. We need to be together for conversations and prayer to do so.
I hope you will join us for these four Sunday evening sessions on discipleship in a difficult world. We will meet at 6pm in the Chapel.
I’ll see you Sunday morning to worship Christ and to hear his word from the Gospel of Mark.
-Scott