Re-centering on Discipleship

The New Year is a traditional time to reset and recenter. If there’s any good that comes out of New Year’s resolutions, it is the spiritual recentering on God and God’s desires for us. Of course, it’s a good thing to start a new discipline of exercise or diet, but these will be shallow if not rooted in God’s desires for us.

God always desires us to grow as disciples of Jesus. In God’s eyes, we aren’t so much “members of St. John’s” but “members of the body of Christ.” We aren’t “volunteers” but disciples following Christ. We serve God and neighbor because that’s what disciples do!

The New Year is a good opportunity to recenter on discipleship. This means de-centering, moving other identities out of the center of our time and energy. When we go to work, do we think of ourselves as “an employee”? Then you might be likely to complain about co-workers and the boss because they are lazy or don’t listen to your ideas. If you think of yourself as a disciple of Jesus, then you see that Jesus has led you to work and Jesus is asking you to serve co-workers and your boss not just your clients. You aren’t surprised or hurt when co-workers disappoint and bosses are unreasonable; Jesus is leading you to care about sinners and forgive them and help them grow, just as you are a sinner Jesus cares about. He forgives you and helps you to grow by helping you in these difficult situations! If you’re a student or retired or work at home, I pray the Holy Spirit helps you see how you are disciples first in all those situations.

Participating in Church is similar. If we are centered in Christ, following him, we aren’t surprised that the church is full of sinners who need forgiveness and growth. Paul writes to the Ephesians, especially to Gentile (non-Jewish) Christians who are pushing Jews out of the Church. He urges them to see the conflict between them as an opportunity to grow and for them to grow to become more mature. He writes that God has equipped them for “building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ” (4:12-14).

For the New Year, center yourself on these three goals: unity, maturity, and measure in Christ. First, we are growing into unity of faith and knowledge of the Son of God. As sinners, we are naturally prone to squabbles and exaggerating miscommunication. We should expect this. Rather than cutting off relationships with Christians with whom we disagree, this is the year to pray for opportunities for come together to grow with others in unity in Christ, not our opinions or ideas.

Second, we will naturally have times of disappointment, frustration, or anger when we want to lash out at others or even ourselves. Rather than react, this is the year to pray for the Holy Spirit to give a calm and mature response that helps avoid judging or hurting others with our sharp words or petty actions.

Third, Christ is our measuring stick for growth. We don’t need to save the world—Christ already did this—but we do need to keep growing to become more Christ-like every day. One place to see the measuring stick of Christ is 1 Corinthians 13:4-6: Christ’s love is patient, kind, not arrogant, not boastful, not rude, and so on. We will not measure up to Christ in this life, but that doesn’t mean we don’t try.

No matter what happens this year, centered in With the Holy Spirit’s help, this is a year to grow!

Growing in the New Year,

Pastor Peter