The Second Sunday before Lent, 4 February 2024, Eldroth, Clapham
What are you following at the moment? The Test Match in India? The snooker in Germany? The Six Nations? EastEnders? The Apprentice? Donald Trump? The Stock Exchange? The weather forecast?
I think that we’re all followers. Whether we’re following a hobby - which could be Pickleball, or knitting, Tai Chi or gardening - or whether we’re followers of a musician or an actor or a novelist or other artist whose work we love. One click on social media and you confirm to the world that you are ‘following’ someone. Remember the old days when you’d have joined a Fan Club?
Some of us are followers of ideas: our heroes are not only the ones whose songs we sing in the shower, but also the ones whose thoughts have become our thoughts, as we’ve listened to their speeches, soaked up their teaching, over the years. Their words have inspired us on our path through life. Whether philosophers or poets, politicians or playwrights. Who are your inspirations? Churchill? Ghandi? Christ?
We are all followers: or, to use a scriptural word to describe this aspect of ourselves, we are disciples. We desire to learn from those we admire, to be shaped and formed as we follow in their way.
The English word disciple in translation essentially means 'learner'. We look back fondly to our experiences as students or as apprentices - learning from the skills of those who shared their knowledge with us, to our benefit. As we picture Jesus’ devotees taking in his teaching by the Sea of Galilee, we understand something of what they went through, from our own experience.
We might describe a disciple as ‘a life-long learner’. Many of us would agree that you should never stop learning; you must never stop being open to new experiences, new ideas, to keep mind and spirit nimble, even our bodies, in age-appropriate ways. We admire those well into their eighties and nineties still very active, full of spirit, with lively, inquisitive minds.
Jesus called people, saying 'come to me … and learn from me'. [1] A disciple of Jesus is a life-long learner for whom Jesus is our most important teacher, under whose influence we allow ourselves to be shaped and formed. One reason for that is the promise Jesus made, saying, 'I came that you may have life, and have it abundantly', [2] with no limits on what that abundance might mean.
The evangelist John wrote that ‘To all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God’. [3] If we choose to follow Jesus, then, how are we to live the life of a disciple? Well, I think we live it like fans, as followers, as learners.
Like fans - showing our colours, by our attendance at church, by our bible on the table at home, by the prayerbook at our bedside, by the cross in our lapel, or by the devotional picture we cherish on our kitchen wall - not showing off, but deeply rooted, these things are signs that we are his fans.
We live as followers - with our eyes open to see what Jesus is doing in the world around us, and to consciously, prayerfully, try to walk where we feel he is leading us, hour by hour. Watching out for him, placing ourselves where we feel close to him - this is how we practice being his followers.
And we live as learners - with our mind open to learning new things we study his word, we read devotional books, or those which help us see how his gospel impacts on our life in the world today, we listen to radio broadcasts or podcasts or audiobooks on spiritual themes, we join study and discussion groups, Lent courses and so on. In these ways we develop as his students, his learners.
Now one thing which is certain to me is that Jesus doesn’t want us to be blind followers with fixed ideas, immovable in our faith; he wants us to be questioning, critical, open-hearted and open-minded disciples. Remember how he always welcomed those who came to him with open questions, and opposed those who wanted him to conform to their worldview. He preferred the muddled questions of the quizzical disciples to the manipulative certainties of the Pharisees.
We may have been badly taught that religion is all about following unbreakable rules, accepting unshakeable truths. If so, it’s a revelation to realise that Jesus was the ultimate rule breaker, who taught using not doctrines but parables - so designed that those who had ‘ears to hear’, as he often put it, could decide for themselves their response to these stories he told. In the Parable of the Good Samaritan, which character am I? Which character do I want to be? Parables are conversation-starters, which prompt us to ponder the nature and outworking of the kingdom of God on earth. [4]
Bristol’s rule-breaking guerrilla artist Banksy has been quoted as saying, 'The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules. It’s people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages.' [5]
And that great rule-breaker St Paul, in his letter to the Romans, instructs the disciples of Christ, 'Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - his good, pleasing and perfect will.' [6]
We might find it liberating to realise that it’s fine not to have all the answers, but instead, if we are open about our questions and doubts, we can help others along the road with theirs. Our life in Christ is not ‘an artificial conformity’ to a fixed set of rules, but an ‘unbending quest for truth’. [7]
There is, however, certainty: the security we have in knowing that our life in Christ is a life of love.
The ex-Archbishop of York John Sentamu taught that the Church is 'a mixed community of sinners called to be saints, a divine society where the risen Christ in the midst of it is grace and truth, and the Holy Spirit is at work within it. An inclusive and generous friendship, where each person is affirmed as of infinite worth, dignity and influence. A community of love, overflowing in gratitude and wholehearted surrender, because it participates in the life of God.' [8]
We are disciples together. Where will our discipleship take us? In his poem Little Gidding, T. S. Eliot suggests that this life of following Christ will get us to a place of deep understanding, of who we are and of our place in the world:
With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this Calling
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time. [9]
The writer of Proverbs asks, ‘Does not wisdom call, and does not understanding raise her voice?’ [10]
The answer is yes, of course. With ears to hear, we find wisdom for life as followers of Christ.
Notes
‘I am your fan’ is a direct quote from the title track of the album 'Fanatical' by Calvin’s Dream. I’m a fan of theirs. 'Redux': this is a revisited version of I am your fan (on Christian Formation), preached in Somerset, 2018.
[1] Matthew 11.28-29.
[2] John 10.10.
[3] John 1.12.
[4] See William R. Herzog, Parables As Subversive Speech: Jesus as Pedagogue of the Oppressed.
[5] Wikiquote: Banksy.
[6] Romans 12.12.
[7] H.P. Lovecraft, Selected Letters, Volume 3.
[8] Rt Revd John Sentamu, Inaugural Sermon: The Archbishop of York. Times, 1 December 2005 [paywall].
[9] T. S. Eliot, Little Gidding in Four Quartets.
[10] Proverbs 8.1.
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