IS THE CHURCH ‘DISCIPLES’?
NO, PAUL TELLS US OTHERWISE.
IS THE CHURCH ‘DISCIPLES’?
NO, PAUL TELLS US OTHERWISE.
JAN LILLEBY
I HAVE OVER SOME TIME OBSERVED VARIOUS voices shouting up about this matter, in that they often try to say that we must be ‘..Disciples of Jesus and thus following Him….’
You find much of it on YouTube, unfortunately.
The thing is, from the time Paul wrote Ephesians and Colossians – 63-67 CE – this concept of discipleship is all gone.
In other words, from the time that God revealed to Paul the Mystery body, the ‘one new man’ (Eph. 2:14, 15) – he used other terms for followers/believers in Jesus: saints, and ‘faithful in Christ Jesus’.
The original Greek for disciple is mathetes. That term is not found in Ephesians and Colossians.
Checking the Gospels, we find without a doubt that being a follower or a disciple of Jesus, was entirely literal. They followed Him…by physically being together in ministry. He was teaching them to become His followers in the meaning of ‘taking up His cause’ after He had ascended into heaven. They should continue the teaching/preaching which Jesus had performed while in ministry in Israel. And they did. They even went on and healed the sick…as they had been taught by Jesus.
That is why we find the word ‘disciples’ multiple times throughout the four Gospels and Acts, they were mathetes – the Lord’s literal followers…and continued the ministry from where Jesus left it.
THE REVELATION OF THE MYSTERY
ALTERED THIS CONCEPT
But this altercation was not made in a fanatical manner. Paul just found it natural to call the believers for ‘faithful’ and for ‘saints’ – since he knew very well that one could not ‘follow’ Jesus like the disciples did when He was here on earth.
We, the believers in our time, cannot SEE Jesus with our eyes and observe Him doing things, for instance – healing the sick or casting out demons. Neither can we receive any daily personal instructions directly from Him, and so on and so forth. Because this is what it was like, to be a disciple, mathetes, and be drilled in doing ministry for the Lord.
Just for kicks, I clipped in an AI-generated info in this matter, which I think is right on the spot,
Øverst i skjemaet
“The specific word "disciple" (Greek: mathetes) does not appear in the text of Ephesians or Colossians. However, the concept of discipleship—living as a committed follower of Jesus—is central to both letters, where believers are referred to by other terms.
Paul uses different terminology in these letters to describe what it means to be a disciple:
Saints and Faithful (Ephesians 1:1): Paul addresses the recipients as "saints" and "faithful in Christ Jesus," which is functionally synonymous with being a disciple.
Beloved Brothers and Faithful Ones (Colossians 1:2, 4:9): The believers are referred to as "faithful and beloved brothers".
Mature in Christ (Colossians 1:28): Paul describes his goal as
presenting every person "mature in Christ," which is the aim of discipleship.
Rooted and Built Up (Colossians 2:6-7): Paul explicitly calls them to live in Christ in the same way they "received Christ Jesus the Lord," which is a direct reference to discipleship.
Discipleship vs. Belief: While some theological perspectives differentiate between a "believer" (one who is saved) and a "disciple" (one who follows closely), Paul’s letters to Ephesus and Colossae treat the two as the same—believers are called to walk in a manner worthy of their calling, which is the essence of discipleship.”
Yes – it is correct, that of being ‘functionally synonymous with ‘disciple’, - but of course very differently from when Jesus walked together with His twelve. And the church must in no way copy this narrative. For we have been given the apostle Paul as tutor and chief guide.
We are the flock of international Jesus-believers in His absence, and we observe what Paul has written to us in Ephesians and Colossians. We can find the Grace Gospel only in those two epistles.
The four Gospels are only historic writings and contain no particular doctrine of faith to the church dispensation.
Jesus was a teacher to the Jews only, see Mat. 15:24 and Rom. 15:8.
Only Paul was sent to us Gentiles and became our tutor and guide in the faith.
This concept of discipleship was entirely misunderstood a few decades back, when the known movement of “What-Would-Jesus-Do” – came on; they even held mass-meetings in Washington DC – and their ideal was to ‘be like Jesus’ – go heal the sick, cast out demons, and so forth. Their believers often had a leather bracelet on their wrist with the letters WWJD carved in. This movement can be found reviewed in Wikipedia if you wish. They entirely oversaw the Biblical truth of PAUL BEING OUR CHIEF TUTOR.
Eph. 1:1-10 is one passage we need to repeat to ourselves,
«1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are at Ephesus and who are faithful in Christ Jesus:
2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,
4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love
5 He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will,
6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.
7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace
8 which He lavished on us. In all wisdom and insight
9 He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him
10 with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth. In Him”
Gracepano.com
