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Commentary on "Discipleship"
Day 3: Monday, June 1, 2009
Todays lesson is on two aspects of discipleship: Obedience and Loyalty. However, the two issues that need to be addressed today are the issue of loyalty, and one of the Ellen G. White quotes contained in the lesson.
Loyalty
The example of many of the disciples turning away from Jesus, particularly as His crucifixion neared, is given to show that many disciples have temporary lapses. Near the end of the lesson the following statement is made: “Many of us have had moments when our resolve to be disciples was at low tide, but as in the case of the apostles, this does not mean that we cannot overcome our temporary lapse. ”
A distinction must be made between apostasizing and having difficulty as a disciple.
One may lose his faith in Christ, while another may have many questions and doubts. However, one who has lost faith in Christ, an apostate, is one who has concluded that Christianity is not true. Often, this is a person who has overcome his difficulty with Christ by rejecting Christ. A disciple, while having difficulty with Christ, is not one who will reject Christ. The Christian with doubt, who believes in spite of the doubt, is as much a disciple as the next believer. This is a person with faith.
Overcoming a temporary lapse implies that a person once believed or practiced something, has given up that belief or practice, but can overcome the giving up. That is a choice one makes. This is different from a Christian who has fallen into sin. Christians fall into sin constantly, and these sins are something that can be overcome with the help of the Holy Spirit.
When Peter denied his Lord, he was sinning. He wasn't less of a disciple of Jesus, he was a sinning disciple of Jesus. Judas did not deny Jesus. Judas made a choice to be a traitor to Jesus. In Peters case, there was a temporary lapse, in Judas' case a decision had been made in advance to destroy the Son of God.
Loyalty is a quality of God. Only He is truly loyal constantly. He is loyal to Himself. 2 Timothy 2:11-13 is clear on our Lords loyalty:
The saying is trustworthy, for:
If we have died with him, we will also live with him;
if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us;
if we are faithless, he remains faithful—
for he cannot deny himself.
Denying Jesus, like Peter, is a sin. In denying Him, he denies us. However, if we are in Him, we will not lose our salvation, because He cannot deny Himself. Judas did not deny Jesus he betrayed Jesus. Judas was not in Christ, he was an unbeliever. Peter was a believer who sinned. One is hopeless, the other, hopeful.
Ellen G. White
A paragraph is quoted from Testimonies For the Church, volume 2, p. 178. Included in the quote are the following statements:
Follow Him in being forgetful of self, abundant in acts of self-denial ....
Jesus was never forgetful of Himself. He was always aware of who He was and what He was here for. He never had to deny Himself. The New Testament is not abundant in recounting Jesus' acts of self-denial. The scripture quoted above, from Timothy is crystal clear on this point: He cannot deny Himself.
He counted not His life dear, but gave it up for us all.
There is never an indication in scripture that Jesus did not count His life dear. By the time He reaches the Garden of Gethsemane before the betrayal of Judas, we see that Jesus held His life very dear.
Follow Him from the lowly manger to the cross. He was our example.
This is one of the fundamental errors of Seventh-day Adventism. Jesus is first and foremost our substitute. This is not something with which we can strike a balance. We do not follow Him from the manger to the cross as our example. A disciple definitely must become like his master, but not in repeating what his master has done. A disciple takes each moment of the day, being filled with the Holy Spirit, and acts in that moment by the leading of God. It is not so much, “What would Jesus do?” (WWJD), it is more “What would Jesus have me do in this moment?”
The Quarterly ends todays lesson with two questions.
If someone were to ask you, “How loyal are you to Jesus?” how would you respond, and why? What outward evidences do you give of your loyalty to Him?
Although the questions are technically good, in the context of Seventh-day Adventist teaching on identifying true members of God's remnant church, the answers that are often provided by members are things such as keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, avoiding certain foods, not wearing jewelry and similar items.
Focusing on external evidences of our loyalty to Jesus is like treating colon cancer with a topical ointment. Your skin may look good, but underneath is dead and dying. We must be found in Him in spite of what the world thinks. Yes, what the world thinks of Christ is of ultimate imporatnce, and my role in that should not be downplayed. But when all is said and done, the Judases will still be Judases and the Peters will still be Peters.
Summary
- Denying our Lord and betraying our Lord are not the same. We may be guilty of denying Christ at points in our lives, but we are not left without hope.
- Jesus cannot deny Himself. Scritpure in Timothy is crystal clear on this.
- Ellen G. White is viewing Jesus as a man. One cannot view Jesus as God and come to the same conclusions about Jesus' self-denial or how He did not count His life dear. When Ellen G. White makes these statements, her semi-Arian theology is showing through. Although the church would deny that that was her position, we are still left with these clear statements that contradict scripture.
- Jesus' life is what we are saved by, not our example of how to live. Disciples do emulate their master, but Christians are filled with the Holy Spirit and can have moment-by-moment guidance in their daily lives.
- Focusing on external evidences of being a disciple of Christ misses the important issue of dealing with the deadly spiritual cancer.
- Are you a Peter or a Judas?
*All scripture quotations are from: The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. 2001, Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.
Copyright 2009 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised June 1, 2009. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Glendale, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.
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