Discipleship and Christian Resistance

00:00 - James Spencer (Host)
What we're looking at is what are the conventions in our lives, what are the assumptions that we're making that are holding us back from moving toward the God that we want to be present with? What sort of walls are we creating between us and God that are really keeping us outside of His presence more than we want to be?

00:19 - Speaker 2 (None)
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00:54 - James Spencer (Host)
Hey everyone, welcome to today's episode of PREPPED. I'm your host, James Spencer, and today we're going to be diving into the topic of discipleship once again. But we're not just going to be talking about discipleship on you know, sort of a way to learn the basics. I want to explore it through this idea of discipleship as an act of resistance. I wrote a book not too too long ago. It was called Christian Resistance Learning to Defy the World and Follow Jesus. And I think that today we're going to kind of dive into the broader concepts of that book and frame discipleship as a way to defy the world, its distractions and its temptations, and live more fully for Christ. So let me just start by asking a couple questions. Have you ever felt like life is pulling you in every direction except toward God? Maybe it's that relentless demand of work, family, or that constant noise of social media and the news cycles. And discipleship isn't just about surviving these challenges, it's about thriving within them by following Christ more closely. And so here's what we'll cover today. First, we're going to explore discipleship as coordination and how the world often out-coordinates the church. Then we'll define what it means to resist the world. Next, we'll talk about the transformative power of imitating Christ. We referenced that in the last episode. We're going to get a little deeper into it today. After that, we'll explore how discipleship reorients our attention to the triune, god as our ultimate reference point, and finally, we'll discuss why the church must take discipleship seriously, incorporating insights from a thought-provoking article on the subject. So let's just get started, and before we dive in, I just want to take a moment to reflect on this what does discipleship look like in your daily life? Is it a set of actions, a mindset or something more? Keep that in mind as we unpack these ideas. Discipleship is a journey, and today we're here to take a next step on that journey together.

02:49
So let's start off by saying let's talk about discipleship as coordination. So discipleship can be understood as a form of coordination. It's about aligning ourselves, our priorities, our actions with the will of God, in conjunction with the rest of the body of Christ. So if we think through the metaphor of the body right that Paul often uses in his letters, what we see is that we are members of a body and what we want to do is we want the body of Christ to look less like a, you know, sort of gawky teenager. Gawky teenager who has grown six inches but hasn't really gotten back the coordination of their limbs. We all have those pictures, probably, of a gawky teenager who just doesn't move quite as fluidly as he might. We don't want that. That's not what coordination needs to look like in the body of Christ. We don't want that. That's not what coordination needs to look like in the body of Christ.

03:49
More than we want coordination to look like in the body of Christ is we want all of these different members moving in harmony and unison. And so we can think about things like dancers. They have this sort of amazing control of their body, and all their different muscles and their limbs and everything are working together to present this sort of beautiful action for us. You can think about an athlete. You know even if it's an NFL lineman, big NFL lineman the amount of coordination required to do what they do, the way that their hands have to be placed on the other person, the way that their feet need to move, all of those different aspects, the way their abdominal muscles and everything has to tighten at different points, the quickness with which they do things. It's not, as you know, we don't think of it as conventionally beautiful like a ballet, dancer or something like that. But there is a deep, deep coordination to that that I think is really important for us to recognize. And so one of the big challenges I think that faces the church today is that the world often out-coordinates us when discipleship should be bringing us together and helping the body of Christ and all of its members move with the sort of harmony that we see in a dancer or an NFL lineman, with the sort of harmony that we see in a dancer or an NFL lineman. What we're getting is we're getting the world sort of pulling some of our members out and integrating them into the world's body, so to speak, and they become more adept at handling and coordinating with the world than they do with the body of Christ. And I think the world is exceptionally good at organizing people around its values and goals. Social media and entertainment, advertising they all bombard us with these messages designed to shape how we think and feel and act. They create the conventions that we go about following, and these systems are highly coordinated and effective at pulling our attention and allegiance away from God.

05:40
Now, I mentioned in a previous podcast I don't want podcast. This is not a conspiracy theory. There's a great dad joke on conspiracy theorists, and it goes something like I saw three conspiracy theorists going into a store the other day. That can't be a coincidence. That's not at all what I'm talking about. This is not about a conspiracy theory. When I say that these things are highly coordinated, I'm not picturing one evil coordinator sitting above it all twisting his mustache and petting his cat. That is not at all what I have in my mind.

06:13
What I do see, however, is that these various groups have very similar interests and very similar values, and that those often converge, and so there isn't a need for a grand master plan that's being orchestrated behind some you know curtain that we never get to see behind. These things are happening more naturally because the interests of the world are sort of pushing toward the same direction. When those interests align, there's no need for a conspiracy theory. The interests are just aligned and moving forward. So if we consider how platforms like social media, for instance, create a constant stream of curated content that subtly encourage comparison, consumerism and self-focus, or think about how advertising ties our identity to what we buy, promoting the idea that we can find fulfillment in material things, those forces are not random. They are intentionally designed to shape our desires and behaviors. Now, what's fascinating is the precision with which these systems work. Social media algorithms are fine-tuned to keep you scrolling, and advertising campaigns are crafted to tap into your deepest desires. They tend to know what we crave and how to offer a version of it that seems fulfilling.

07:26
Meanwhile, the church can sometimes feel really fragmented and focused on events or programs, rather than creating a cohesive and lifelong discipleship path. Now, part of that is certainly on individual Christians. To the extent that we continue to live with misordered or disordered desires, misordered loves, the church is always going to have a rough time attracting us, because it doesn't really matter how good the worship service is on Sunday mornings, it's never going to match a concert by your favorite band. It doesn't really matter how good the production is on the skit that the small group team filmed or something like that, it's never going to match the production value that you can get out of a television show. And so we've got to sort of do the work in and of ourselves to realign our desires and recognize that what we're trying to do in church, what we are doing in church, is worshiping the triune gods, where we're coming uniquely into his presence. Now I know, and we've talked about sanctuary, sacred space and all those kinds of things in previous episodes. But if you think about, what we're really doing in that moment is we are taking time, we are giving time back to God and we are saying these moments are yours and they're only. That is not the only time during the week that we do it right.

08:52
So the point is that the church can't really do this alone, that being out-coordinated is not an institutional problem, or at least not solely an institutional problem. It is an individual member problem. So I think the church often struggles to match the level of coordination that the world can do. And while the world operates with precision, the church's efforts at discipleship can tend to be reactive rather than proactive, and that gap has consequences. And as believers, we're often left unequipped to navigate a culture that then pulls us in a number of different directions.

09:28
And so as we think about this, we think about the individual responsibility to commit to discipleship when we actually come to Christ. What we are doing is we are committing our entire lives, putting everything we are and have into Christ and saying I am baptizing myself into your death. That's what Romans 6, 4 reads. This is a radical commitment. This isn't just some sort of like club we're joining. It's a radical commitment to Christ. We're putting ourselves under the water, we're burying ourselves with him, and when we bury ourselves with him, we are giving up everything we have for him. To him it all goes. And then we are committing to learning to observe all he commanded, to live like he did, to do what he did, to set aside our own desires and say I'm going to put these away and I'm going to pick up the desires that Christ had. That's what we're doing. It's a radical commitment.

10:22
Now, when churches are, you know the institutional side of this, that's the individual side, the institutional side of this when the church is trying to figure these things out, I think part of what they're fighting is our own distractions. They're fighting our misdirected desires. They're fighting the ways in which we've decided that, hey, the world should work like this. The world is here to entertain me, the world is here to add value to me. It doesn't matter what other commitments I've made. You've got to impress me. You've got to put something out there that's good for me, that I value. And I don't think churches should be doing things that are horrible. Right, it's not the point. But when we are trying to force churches to attract us in, that's not a great position to put our churches in either.

11:04
And so when I say that sometimes I think discipleship efforts in churches can feel reactive rather than proactive, I am not saying that churches are reacting to the world. I am saying that the churches are reacting to their individual members, the people who are within their congregation, who somehow need to be incentivized to do what they've already been committed to do. We are committed to be and make disciples. If we are Christian, if we have accepted Christ, if we have the Holy Spirit within us, that is our commitment. Why is it that we feel we need to be incentivized to fulfill that commitment? That's what I mean when I say the church is sometimes can feel reactive rather than proactive. Okay, so how can we better coordinate our efforts to form disciples who are resistant to the world's influence? How can we create these communities that shape our desires and habits around Christ?

11:54
And imagine if the church could organize its message with the same intentionality as a social media platform, but with the goal of pointing people to God's truth. The church is sort of the original social media platform. We are the body of Christ universal. We aren't just the body of Christ local, we're the body of Christ universal and we have this amazing book that is spread around the entire world, that reveals God to each one of us and to the extent that we learn to follow the customs and conventions and rules and instruction and really wisdom of that book, we are now all growing together. Even though we may not know each other. We're all growing together in coordination toward Christ and we're going to be guided to these activities that help us manifest Christ in the various parts of the world where we actually sit.

12:45
Discipleship is a coordinating mechanism. It brings us together. We can trust that if I'm doing discipleship and someone else out there is doing discipleship, that we're really aiming at the same thing. We have a co-worker, a co-partner, a co-laborer who is committed to doing what Christ is asking us to do, is telling us to do, and so that's how discipleship is, sort of this coordinating mechanism. And so if you think about the way the world coordinates your attention, your time and your desires, we kind of have to ask ourselves well, what steps can we take to reorient these toward God? You know, you might limit time on social media, establish daily habits of prayer, prioritize participation in a small group that encourages accountability and spiritual growth.

13:28
I mean, coordination is about more than strategy. It's about aligning your whole life with God's will, and so, as we think about that the way I've tended to suggest we think about that is this we have to set aside, identify and set aside things that are hindering us from growing spiritually. We have to lean in or participate in those things that are going to help us grow spiritually, and in doing both of those things, then we are going to move forward and advance ourselves toward discipleship, and along the way, what we're going to do is we're going to learn to resist the world. And so now let's talk, let's shift gears a little bit and let me frame out what I mean by Christian resistance. Let's talk, let's shift gears a little bit and let me frame out what I mean by Christian resistance. It's a strong word, I get that, but it means something, I think, very specific for Christians, and, in its simplest form, resistance is about opposing anything that pulls us away from God or tempts us to be something that God has not made us into. It's not just avoiding sin, it's actively choosing God over the subtle distractions and misplaced priorities that dominate our culture.

14:36
A lot of times, when I talk about this, I tell people to picture a dam, and if you think about a dam, what a dam's basic function is is to hold its shape, even when the water pressure is coming at it. You know, and the pressure of that water, whether it's still water or whether it's got the waves in it, the pressure of that water, whether it's still water or whether it's got the waves in it, the pressure of that water is tremendous. It's unbelievable pressure on the wall, and so the wall, the dam's job is just to hold its shape, and I think that's a great picture of what I'm talking about with Christians. I'm not suggesting that we isolate ourselves from our culture. I'm not even suggesting that we go on the offensive. What I'm suggesting is that, in order to affect the world, we have to hold our shape. We have to have these distinctive moments where we know who we are and it's clearly differentiated from the water that's pressing in on us, the water of the world that's pressing in on us, and so the dam and the water are never out of contact. Like I'm not suggesting that the church step away from the world, I'm suggesting that, as the church engages with the world, it has to hold onto its particular shape, it has to have a particular character, and holding onto that character is part of resistance.

15:50
Now, as we think about resistance, one of the big things that I think is a struggle for the church today and for individual Christians today is distraction. There's really only one story that I can think of that mentions the word distraction or even translates with the word distraction, and that's Mary and Martha in Luke 10. Martha is distracted by the necessary tasks of hosting, while Mary sits at Jesus's feet listening to his teaching. And I think it's interesting that Martha's distraction isn't some sort of sinful, evil thing that she's doing right. She's not doing something that we would ordinarily label as horrible. She's just trying to get dinner together, she's trying to do the act of serving, providing some form of hospitality. But that distraction, that idea that this is necessary and even more necessary than sitting at Jesus's feet, it keeps her from what Jesus calls the better portion or the good portion, and being fully present with Christ is that good portion.

16:48
And so resistance really does mean identifying those distractions, not just the evil stuff, right, not just what we would classify, as you know, the normal run-of, not just the evil stuff, right? Not just what we would classify, as you know, the normal run-of-the-mill sins, right? What we're looking at is what are the conventions in our lives, what are the assumptions that we're making that are holding us back from moving toward the God that we want to be present with? What's keeping us, what sort of walls are we creating between us and God that are really keeping us outside of his presence more than we want to be? So resistance isn't always, you know, grand or dramatic either. Sometimes it's the quiet daily choices like choosing to read scripture instead of scrolling on social media.

17:28
I don't think anybody's really going to see that Saying no to overcommitment so you can spend time in prayer. I think those are really small acts of defiance against worldly pressures that can add up and transform our hearts over time. So consider also the cultural pressures we face today, whether it's the expecting to be the keep up right, keep up professionally, or the pressure to conform to popular opinion. Resistance often involves swimming upstream, but I think, as Romans 12, 2 reminds us, we're called to be transformed by the renewing of our minds, not conformed to the patterns of this world, and so part of what we're doing and when we resist is we are holding onto that character. We're holding our shape, just like that dam with the water pressure. We're holding our shape and we're making sure that the things that we engage in aren't necessarily leading us toward the world, toward becoming more like what the world says we should be, but that we are truing ourselves to this basic referent point.

18:29
So, as we think about Christian resistance, I think my advice would be you know, it's easy to start small. It's easy to you know, implement some sort of practice every day that you can keep up with and start clearing paths for the way this would work. I mean, you don't build a dam in a day, right, and so taking those small steps, I think, can really be helpful, and I would just use those sort of in-between moments, those small steps waiting in line, commuting, to redirect your thoughts to God. I think, additionally, I would just set aside one evening this week to reflect on what's trying to truly pulling your attention away from God. You have to identify those things that are hindering you from moving forward, and I don't think that's a one-time act. I think at any given point we can overwhelm ourselves with all the different ways in which we are hindered from moving toward God, and so my advice would be just hey, don't try to tackle them all at the same time. Identify them, decide which ones you think you can resist well at the moment and do those. But I think we have to start thinking about what it would mean to make resistance a habit and not just a one-time choice.

19:41
All right, so let's move to the third segment here that we're gonna talk about is imitation as the core of discipleship. So if resistance is about saying no to the world, discipleship is about saying yes to Christ, and at its heart, discipleship is imitation. It's about aligning our desires and actions with the example of Jesus. Rene Girard he was a cultural critic and he talks about mimetic desire, and it's this idea that we become what we imitate. The apostle Paul understood this In 1 Corinthians 11, one. He writes be imitators of me as I am of Christ.

20:12
And I don't think Paul was boasting here. He's modeling how to live as a disciple by pointing people to Jesus. Notice, he's not saying imitate me. He's saying imitate me almost to the extent that I imitate Christ, and I think that's really the sense of this here. Even though that's not grammatically exactly what he's saying, I think the force of it. Paul has already talked about hey, don't follow Paul, don't follow Apollos, don't follow Cephas. Christ is the only one who has died and was. You know? You're baptized in the name of Christ. What are you following these other people for?

20:50
And in this statement in 1 Corinthians 11, I think he's saying look, be imitators of me. It's not that I can't serve as a model for you, but I can only serve as a model to the extent that I am following Christ, that I'm imitating Christ. You need to look at me, see the various ways that Christ is present in me, follow those and toss the rest out. So imitation isn't about perfection, it's about persistence. And I won't get into everything, I won't get everything right, but the act of trying to live with Christ refines us. If you think about Jesus's humility, his compassion, his unwavering commitment to God's will, those are qualities we're called to emulate.

21:21
So think about someone in your life whose Christ-like character has inspired you. Maybe it's their patience, their generosity, their unwavering trust in God. That's the power of imitation. It transforms not just the imitator but everyone around them, and I'll share an example from my own life.

21:36
There's a mentor of mine who never seemed hurried, no matter how busy life got, he also had time to listen, to pray and to point others to Christ, and his calm present wasn't just natural, it was a reflection of his deep trust in God. And so when I saw that, I started asking myself why do I always feel so hurried? Why don't I feel like I have time for people? Why is it that I'm always in a rush? And I think it was watching him do what he did that really helped me understand what it looked like to live a more patient, more cadenced life. It took a long time to sink in, but I'm glad that I was able to imitate that value, that characteristic that I saw in him, that he's also seeing in Christ.

22:19
So here's something real simple. As we sort of wrap this episode up, I think what captures our attention shapes our priorities, and so discipleship is about reorienting our attention toward the triune, god as our ultimate reference point, and instead of being swayed by the noise of the world, we need to align ourselves with God's presence, character and will. So let's look at numbers 13 and 14, where the spies report on the promised land. Most of them are focusing on the challenges, the fortified cities and the strong inhabitants, and their fear spreads like wildfire. It just goes nuts.

22:52
But Caleb and Joshua see the same land, but they see it differently and they focus on God's promise and power, urging the people not to fear. Their attention was fixed on God, not the obstacles. They're truing themselves to a reference point and so now everything they see outside of themselves, outside of that reference point or alongside that reference point, they're seeing in a different way. They're looking at the world with eyes that see and ears that hear, as opposed to looking out at the world and saying, oh my gosh, I can't do this on my own. What they're recognizing is that when we true ourselves to God, when we true ourselves to God as our reference point, these obstacles aren't that big a deal, because God's already told us he'll take us into the land. That's a good, I think, biblical picture of the way.

23:36
What I'm talking about when I say we're truing ourselves to this reference point, when we're allowing and responding to God in the moment where our primary response, our primary orientation, our primary attention is given to God, and if God has said I'm going to give this to you, then we don't have to worry about what else is out there. Now, ultimately, we're going to have to deal with it. It isn't about saying that there's no consequences for all of us. All we have to do is trust the Lord and don't worry about anything. It's not bad. But there's a big difference between looking out at the obstacles that you're going to face by yourself, apart from God, and looking out at those obstacles having responded to God in the first place. And I think that's what we're really trying to do as we reorient our attention.

24:22
So why do we need to get serious about discipleship right now? Well, let's turn to the broader role of the church in discipleship. I think we've got to think this through. It's worth discussing. The true discipleship is not a one-size-fits-all program. It's relational, it's intentional, it's transformative.

24:44
The Great Commission in Matthew 28 doesn't say go and make converts. It says go and make disciples, and this means helping people grow in their faith, not just introducing them to it. So are we equipping believers to navigate a culture that often contradicts biblical values? Are we teaching them how to resist worldly pressures and focus on Christ? If discipleship is reduced to Sunday sermons or occasional Bible studies, I think we're missing the mark. And so, as we think about what we can do, as we want to create, you know, sort of a discipleship culture within our church. If we want to just honor our commitment to be and make disciples, as we see in the Great Commission, we do need to commit to creating discipleship opportunities where seasoned believers can guide new ones. We need to prioritize accountability and spiritual growth. We need to encourage members to serve in ways that stretch their faith and their reliance on God and we need to just make discipleship a lifelong process rather than a seasonal one.

25:41
So today we've explored some of these ideas of discipleship as coordination, resistance, imitation, reorientation or attention and a collective responsibility of the church. These aren't abstract concepts. They're daily practices and communal commitments that help us follow Christ more closely. Discipleship isn't about doing more. It's probably about doing less, but it's certainly about being more intentional with what we already do. It's about transforming the ordinary moments of our life into opportunity to reflect Christ. So let me leave you with this challenge. This week choose one act of resistance, one moment of imitation, one way to recenter your attention on God and one way to engage with discipleship in your church community. Journal about it, reflect on it, do whatever it is that you need to do, but ultimately act on it. Start becoming the disciple you're called to be. Start that discipleship journey this week. Thanks for joining me today on PREPPED and I will catch you on the next episode. Let's continue to resist the world and follow Christ with our whole hearts. Take care everybody.

26:44 - Speaker 2 (None)
Thanks for tuning into PREPPED. If today's episode helped you view the world through a God-centered lens, be sure to hit subscribe so you're always prepared for what comes next. Don't forget to rate and review us on your preferred podcast platform. Your feedback helps us reach more believers eager to live out God's story. Share this episode with a friend, family member or loved one, and together let's keep challenging the world's narratives. Until next time, stay grounded, stay inspired and continue living out God's plan. See you soon on our next episode of PREPPED.