Jesus founded His school when He told those of His day, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matt. 11:28–30).
5. Perseverance. The final important element in following Christ, the most basic expression of the call to discipleship, is perseverance. This is because following is clearly not an isolated act, done once for all, never to be repeated. It is a lifetime commitment which is not fulfilled here until the race is won, the final barrier crossed, the crown received, and it and all other rewards then laid gratefully at the feet of Jesus.
3. Submission. In one of Jesus’s most important sayings about discipleship—which we will study more carefully next week—the Lord pictures discipleship as putting on a yoke. This suggests a number of things, but chiefly it suggests submission to Christ for work assigned. It is the picture of an animal yoked to others as well as to a farm implement for labor.
1. Obedience. Obedience is an unpopular concept today, which we betray by our frequent use of a phrase like “blind obedience,” meaning mindless adherence to authority. We think of it as enemy soldiers blindly carrying out the inhuman orders of an evil commander. So when we come to a phrase like “follow me” we naturally think of it as an invitation and conform our evangelism to that pattern. We invite people to follow Jesus, promising that He will receive them and make them happy if they do come. Well, there may be an element of invitation in Christ’s call to sinners, but it can hardly escape any thoughtful student that the words “follow me” are in the imperative voice and are therefore essentially a command—which is why those commanded to follow Jesus did in fact immediately leave their nets, boats, counting tables, or whatever else was occupying them before this and followed Jesus.
But it is not only a false theology that has encouraged this fatal lack of discipleship. To limit it thus is to blame theologians, and God does not allow us to blame others for our own failures. The error is also due to the absence of what the older devotional writers called a “self-examined life.”
