Follower or Disciple?

Sadly, the word disciple has become a cultural buzzword. As the Christian denomination "Disciples of Christ" moves further and further left in their ideology and more and more people want to be seen as "spiritual" rather than "religious," it has become far more acceptable to be a follower of Jesus rather than a disciple of Jesus. 

Here are my thoughts on this: 

1) Jesus had both followers and disciples. 
 -Some of Jesus' followers were likely just following along for the miracles and to see the cool stuff that Jesus would do. These followers fell away when Jesus' teaching got tough (John 6:60 - not all the translations make the distinction here between follower and disciple, but some of them do).
-Some of His followers became disciples: the 3,000 that listened to Peter at Pentecost who became the first Christians. 
-Some "followers" followed Jesus for nefarious purposes, i.e: the Pharisees who followed Jesus just to see if they could trip Him up, whom we're told Jesus could see their evil hearts. 

-The disciples were not perfect. How often did Jesus get upset with them for being knuckleheads? But they believed Jesus was who He said He was and they confessed it with their mouths. Even then, they are still not perfect; Peter still denies Jesus, Judas betrays Jesus, and they all are "sifted like wheat" by the enemy. But they stick with it; they surrender their lives to God's plans for their lives, even when it results in persecution and death for many of them. 

2) Jesus does not call us to make followers. He calls us to go and make disciples. (Matthew 28:19-20)

Are you a follower of Jesus? Or are you a disciple of Jesus? 

Disciples do more than just pray a prayer of salvation and come to church once in a while to check out what Jesus is doing. 

Disciples live a life of intense intimacy with Jesus, living each moment and each encounter in the same way Jesus would, the way Jesus taught us how to. 

Disciples surrender to God's plan and purpose for their lives. They strive to accomplish the things God wants to do through them and to be prepared to move in the directions that God wants to move them. 

Disciple is not a bad thing. We are called to be disciples and make disciples. 

More than anything, I want to be faithful to that call. And I want people to know that I am more than just a follower. 

I am intimately engaged in God's work within my surrendered life and I am striving each day to be a disciple of Jesus: to absolutely be a reflection of who Jesus is. And I want to actively make others into the same.