True Discipleship: A Point of Full Surrender

It appears to me that Christ is working with his body; he is growing it in him and showing it how to fully rely on him. It all starts when we begin by developing a face, that is to say choosing Christ and his higher calling. "Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold" by C.S. Lewis there is a great line, "How can they (the gods) meet us face to face, Until we have faces." Exactly! Until we the spirit takes us completely and we become not ourselves, but a reflection of Christ, how can we truly know God in that intimate way? Once he takes us, we have a face.

Then once that has happened God takes us to a point of full surrender. In the words of a dear friend, "All I want to do is get closer to God, to know him more." We say, I want to do his will and that took rendering everything that I was, am, or could ever be on my own. My goals, ambitions and desires are with Christ. I will let the spirit guide me and walk for me. He is the message and I, the body, am his words.

The beauty of it all is that God doesn't need us to do his will; rather he wants and desires this relationship with a soul that was unclean and unworthy, but now is redeemed and cleaned by the blood of Christ. Paul writes, "And we, with our unveiled faces reflecting like mirrors the brightness of the Lord, all grow brighter and brighter as we are turned into the image that we reflect, this is the work of the Lord who is Spirit" (2 Corinthians 3:18).

It needs to be realized that we are Christ in God's eyes. We don't behold his image, or contain it in a jar, but we reflect it. That is the beauty of what he has done for us. Bonhoeffer says, "What we do is either for Jesus, or against Jesus," That should be taken as, things are black and white. We must gather together and glorify for the glory of the Lord.

Bonhoeffer also said, "I have community with others and I shall continue to have it only through Jesus Christ. The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is vital between us." What I've come to realize is that friendship is more or less superficial. We relate to others based on a class we are taking, or something little that seems major in life at a specific major.

However, what happens when we have more than that? when we have a friend that is based on the love that comes from nothing shy of a Messiahship that has been gained by the price Christ, the intercessor, paid. What we have then is not a friendship, but a bond in the body of Christ.

C.S. Lewis would say we are need-love beings. We need love, people, intellect, interaction; however, God is a gift-love being. He gives it without a desire for anything in return. It is with no conditions and it is impartial. He loves us. Because he loves us he gave his only son. Do we need that much? He loves us, and he GAVE. Wow!

Through all the chaos of life I try to remember, "For God is not a God of disorder but of peace, as in all the meetings of God's holy people." (1 Corinthians 14:33). Need more be said? We are always at peace in Him. Psalms 23 is summed up well by Lucado. He says (paraphrased by me), God gives us rest from everything. endless wants, weariness, worry, hopelessness, guilt, arrogance, grief, fear, loneliness, shame, envy, doubt, and most of all, homesickness, because "I will dwell in the house of my Lord forever." (Psalms 23:6). If home is where the heart is, and my heart is with Christ. Then home is in heaven and everywhere I am because He is with me.

God is great always and forever. To God be the glory for what he has done and what I know he will do. Remember, "You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open for us. He did not intend to" (C.S. Lewis).

Also, to be a disciple, one who will spread the good news, means great things; some, Luther included, would argue, it is not what we can or cannot comprehend, but rather we should plunge into a state of Bewilderment. "Bewilderment is the true comprehension. Not to know where you are going is true knowledge."

"It is nothing else than bondage to Jesus Christ alone, completely breaking through every programme, every ideal, every set of laws. No other significance is possible, since Jesus is the only significance. Beside Jesus nothing has any significance. He alone matters." (Bonhoeffer)