The Radical Disciple

Wholehearted Christian Living

John Stott

• Publisher: IVP
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781844748099
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

'A rare and personal glimpse of the sacrificial discipleship that marked John Stott's life so deeply.'Peter HarrisWhat is a life of radical discipleship? At root, it means we let Jesus set the agenda of our lives. We aren't selective. We don't pick and choose what is cosy and stay away from what is costly. He is Lord of all of life.In the last book by a Christian leader who was himself a radical disciple, John Stott opens up what it means at root to be a follower of Jesus. He explores eight aspects of Christian discipleship that we need to pay much closer attention to.The message is simple, classic and personal: Jesus is Lord. He calls. We follow.

Chapter 1

Non-conformity

The first characteristic of the radical disciple which I bring before you I will call ‘non-conformity’. Let me explain why.

The church has a double responsibility in relation to the world around us. On the one hand we are to live, serve and witness in the world. On the other hand we are to avoid becoming contaminated by the world. So we are neither to seek to preserve our holiness by escaping from the world nor to sacrifice our holiness by conforming to the world.

Escapism and conformism are thus both forbidden to us. This is one of the major themes of the whole Bible, namely that God is calling out a people for himself and is summoning us to be different from everybody else. ‘Be holy,’ he says repeatedly to his people, ‘because I am holy’ (e.g. Leviticus 11:45; 1 Peter 1:15–16).

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We are neither to seek to preserve our holiness by escaping from the world nor to sacrifice our holiness by conforming to the world.

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This foundational theme recurs in all four of the main sections of Scripture: the law, the prophets, the teaching of Jesus, and the teaching of the apostles. Let me give you an example from each. First, the law. God said to his people through Moses:

You must not do as they do in Egypt, where you used to live, and you must not do as they do in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. Do not follow their practices. You must obey my laws and be careful to follow my decrees. I am the Lord your God.

(Leviticus 18:3–4)

Similarly, God’s criticism of his people through the prophet Ezekiel is that ‘you have not followed my decrees or kept my laws but have conformed to the standards of the nations around you’ (Ezekiel 11:12).

It is the same in the New Testament. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus spoke of the hypocrites and the pagans, and added: ‘Do not be like them’ (Matthew 6:8). Finally the apostle Paul wrote to the Romans: ‘Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind’ (Romans 12:2).

Here then is God’s call to a radical discipleship, to a radical non-conformity to the surrounding culture. It is a call to develop a Christian counterculture, a call to engagement without compromise.

So what are the contemporary trends which threaten to swallow us up, and which we must resist? We will consider four. First, the challenge of pluralism. Pluralism affirms that every ‘ism’ has its own independent validity and an equal right to our respect. It therefore rejects Christian claims to finality and uniqueness, and condemns as sheer arrogance the attempt to convert anybody (let alone everybody) to what it sees as merely our opinions.

How then should we respond to the spirit of pluralism? With great humility, I hope, and with no hint of personal superiority. But we must continue to affirm the uniqueness and finality of Jesus Christ. For he is unique in his incarnation (the one and only God-man); unique in his atonement (only he has died for the sins of the world); and unique in his resurrection (only he has conquered death). And since in no other person but Jesus of Nazareth did God first become human (in his birth), then bear our sins (in his death), and then triumph over death (in his resurrection), he is uniquely competent to save sinners. Nobody else possesses his qualifications. So we may talk about Alexander the Great, Charles the Great and Napoleon the Great, but not Jesus the Great. He is not the Great – he is the Only. There is nobody like him. He has no rival and no successor.

A second widespread secular trend which Christian disciples have to resist is that of materialism. Materialism is not simply an acceptance of the reality of the material world. If that were the case, all Christians would be materialists, since we believe that God has created the material world and made its blessings available to us. God has also affirmed the material order through the incarnation and resurrection of his Son, in the water of baptism and the bread and wine of Holy Communion. It is no wonder that William Temple described Christianity as the most material of all religions. But it is not materialistic.

For materialism is a preoccupation with material things, which can smother our spiritual life. But Jesus told us not to store up treasure on earth and warned us against covetousness. So did the apostle Paul, urging us instead to develop a lifestyle of simplicity, generosity and contentment, drawing on his own experience of having learned to be content whatever the circumstances (Philippians 4:11).

Paul added that ‘godliness with contentment is great gain’ (1 Timothy 6:6) and then went on to explain that ‘we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it’. Perhaps he was consciously echoing Job who said: ‘Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall depart’ (Job 1:21). In other words, life on earth is a brief pilgrimage between two moments of nakedness. So we would be wise to travel light. We shall take nothing with us. (I will say more about materialism in Chapter 5.)

The third contemporary trend which threatens us and to which we must not surrender is the insidious spirit of ethical relativism.

All round us moral standards are slipping. This is certainly so in the West. People are confused as to whether there are any absolutes left. Relativism has permeated culture and is seeping into the church.

There is no sphere in which this relativism is more obvious than in that of sexual ethics and the sexual revolution which has taken place since the 1960s. It used to be universally accepted (at least wherever Judeo-Christian ethics were taken seriously) that marriage is a monogamous, heterosexual, loving and lifelong union, and the only God-given context for sexual intimacy. But now, even in some churches, co-habitation without marriage is widely practised, dispensing with that commitment which is essential to authenticate marriage, while same-sex partnerships are promoted as a legitimate alternative to heterosexual marriage.

Over against these trends Jesus Christ calls his disciples to obedience and to conform to his standards. It is sometimes claimed that Jesus did not speak about these things. But he did. He quoted both Genesis 1:27 (‘At the beginning the Creator “made them male and female”’) and Genesis 2:24 (‘A man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’) as giving the biblical definition of marriage. And after quoting these Scriptures Jesus gave them his own personal endorsement, saying ‘what God has joined together, let no-one separate’ (Matthew 19:4–6).

This viewpoint was critically evaluated by the distinguished American moral and social philosopher Abraham Edel (1908–2007), whose first major book was entitled Ethical Judgment, and subtitled ‘the use of science in ethics’.1

‘Morality is ultimately arbitrary,’ he wrote, and went on with a piece of popular doggerel:

It all depends on where you are,

It all depends on who you are,

It all depends on what you feel,

It all depends on how you feel.

It all depends on how you’re raised,

It all depends on what is praised,

What’s right today is wrong tomorrow,

Joy in France, in England sorrow.

It all depends on point of view,

Australia or Timbuctoo,

In Rome do as the Romans do.

If tastes just happen to agree

Then you have morality.

But where there are conflicting trends,

It all depends, it all depends . . .

But radical Christian disciples must disagree. To be sure, we are not to be completely rigid in our ethical decision-making, but seek sensitively to apply biblical principles in each situation. Fundamental to Christian behaviour is the lordship of Jesus Christ. ‘Jesus is Lord’ remains the basis of our life.

So the fundamental question before the church is who is Lord? Is the church the lord of Jesus Christ, so that it has liberty to edit and manipulate, accepting what it likes and rejecting what it dislikes? Or is Jesus Christ our Teacher and our Lord, so that we believe and obey his teaching?

He still says to us, ‘Why do you call me, “Lord, Lord,” and do not do what I say?’ (Luke 6:46). To confess Jesus as Lord but not obey him is to build our lives on a foundation of sand. Again, ‘Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me,’ he said in the upper room (John 14:21).

Here then are two cultures and two value systems, two standards and two lifestyles. On the one side there is the fashion of the world around us; on the other side is the revealed, good and pleasing will of God.

Radical disciples have little difficulty in making their choice.

We come now to a fourth contemporary trend, which is the challenge of narcissism.

Narcissus (in Greek mythology) was a hand...