Learning to walk the paths of discipleship

By Patricia Kasten
Compass Associate Editor

"I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back, no turning back."

During the Easter season, the readings for Mass come from the Acts of the Apostles. In them, we hear about the first disciples of Christ living together, sharing the faith, spreading the Gospel and, in turn, making new disciples for Christ.

The word "disciple" means to be a follower, but also a student. It comes from the Latin discere meaning "to learn."

It is the role of a disciple to learn to be like Christ. In Luke's Gospel, the disciples ask Jesus to "teach us to pray." In response, Jesus taught them the Lord's Prayer, which is a fairly concise lesson on how to live a faith-filled life.

Becoming family

However, being a disciple of Christ means more than learning how to live faithfully. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains that "becoming a disciple of Jesus means accepting the invitation to belong to God's family, to live in conformity with his way of life" (no. 2233).

But how does one "become a disciple?"

The Bible gives some good examples:

• In John's Gospel, all Philip needed was to be told "Follow me" and immediately he went off and made a convert, Nathaniel (1:43-46);
  
  
• In Mark's Gospel, Simon and Andrew immediately left their careers when Jesus said, "Follow me and I will make you fishers of men" (1:16-18);
  
  
• And one of the most dramatic of all is the conversion of Paul (then a disciple of the Jewish rabbi, Gamaliel) on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-18).

The U.S. Bishops, in their 1990 plan for Evangelization, cited some of the Gospel stories of conversion, saying that "Jesus set the world on fire .... Each of these people, touched by Christ Jesus, responded to him and so became part of the story of salvation."

Most often, the path to discipleship is not quick or dramatic. It is, however, a process of learning and persevering. It is about asking the Lord, over and over, to "teach us to pray."

A more apt Gospel lesson for most of us might be that of the man born blind in John (9:1-41), which we heard on the Fourth Sunday of Lent.

Steps on the way

A miracle happens to the blind man - Jesus smears clay on the man's eyes, tells him to wash it off in the Pool of Siloam and he is healed.

This is the first step of discipleship: a personal encounter with Christ. It may not always be dramatic, but it is always personal.

In his first move toward discipleship, the man obeys Jesus. Further, he admits that he has been healed by Jesus. Though he does not, at this point, profess anything about Jesus' divine identity. The full lesson has not yet settled in. When questioned - asked about his faith in Jesus, if you will - the man merely recounts the events of the healing. When asked where to find Jesus, he replies, "I don't know."

In the next step, the former blind man is brought before the Pharisees, the teachers of the Jewish faith. When questioned, he again tells his story. This time, however, when asked what he thinks about Jesus, the man answers, "He is a prophet." To the Jews, a prophet was someone sent by God. So we see a growth in the man's faith.

In the next step, the man is again questioned by the Pharisees. This time, they accuse Jesus of being a sinner. The man refuses to judge Jesus, but asks his questioners if they "also want to become one of his disciples." At this point, the man born blind has made a decision - he wants to become a disciple of Jesus.

For this step forward in faith, the man is thrown out - excommunicated, if you will - of his faith community. It is a big price for his defense of Jesus. Jesus, realizing this, seeks the man out.

Jesus then asks a simple question: "Do you believe in the Son of Man?" The man born blind has reached the point of choice; he is ready to take the plunge. He is at the point where we stand at baptism, asked to profess his faith.

"Who is he, sir? Tell me so that I may believe in him" is clearly the question of one ready to learn.

When Jesus identifies himself as that Son of Man - "the one who is speaking to you" (again, the personal encounter with God) - the man makes his faith profession: "Lord, I believe." To call Jesus "Lord," a title reserved for God alone, means that the man has become a true follower of Christ.

Not as quick or dramatic as Paul being knocked to the ground or Peter's catch of fish (Lk 5:1-11), but it shows the process of discipleship. It mirrors our own path of discipleship: We meet Jesus, we hear about his power, we experience some of that power in our own lives, we grow in faith, we come to believe.

With that, we become part of God's family. As Pope John Paul II said about the laity, disciples become part of "the unifying bond between the Lord and his disciples, between Christ and the baptized: a living and life-giving communion through which Christians no longer belong to themselves but are the Lord's very own, as the branches are one with the vine" (Christifedelis laici, 18).

What next?

Once we have reached the same point of belief as the man born blind, what do we do?

We do as blind Bartimeaus did after his own cure (Mark 10:50); We "follow him up the road."

"We all have - and are - stories of faith," wrote the U.S. bishops, "for through the Spirit, the Gospel of Jesus Christ takes hold of us in the proclamation of his Word, and Jesus touches us in the celebration of his sacraments. When this genuinely happens, we are all set ablaze by his love."

This is how the early church was - especially after Pentecost - "ablaze with Christ's love." They were still growing in faith, still learning what it meant to be a disciple. But they were spreading the Good News as well, as the Lord was added "to their numbers, those who were being saved" (Acts 2:47).

That, to this day, is how to be a disciple. "No turning back, no turning back."

Sources: Catechism of the Catholic Church; "Go and Make Disciples at www.usccb.org;" Christifedelis laici at www.vatican.va