- What is the difference between a believer and a disciple?
How do you identify a disciple of Jesus Christ?
How do you become a disciple of Jesus Christ?
We are going to dive into this right now.
A believer is someone who comes to the cross;
a disciple is someone who gets on the cross,
and carries his cross.
Believer, he retreats to safety; a disciple embraces suffering.
Believer comes to church; disciples are the church.
Believers cheer from the sidelines;
disciples are in the game.
Believers read the Word; disciples live it.
Believer is all about believing; disciple is all about being.
Believer is comfort-driven; a disciple makes sacrifices.
A believer talks; a disciple makes disciples.
I believe the time has come for us to move from a believer
to a disciple.
From changing to growing.
To move from running from suffering, to embracing suffering.
From hitting the ball, to hitting the home-run.
God is calling us today to move from maintaining
to multiplication.
Jesus called people in the world to come and believe in Him.
But once they believe, He has one more challenge
for each and everyone of us, and that is to come and die.
To come and follow Him. To come and pick up the cross
and become more like Him.
The pandemic that happens in Christianity today
is believers who don't become disciples.
Believers who simply believe in Jesus Christ
but they don't want to belong
and they don't want to become like Jesus Christ.
And they don't embrace His characteristics and His life.
Now what does it take to be a disciple?
What is the distinction or what are the marks,
if I could say, a snap chat of a disciple of Jesus Christ?
I'm going to give you five simple marks of a disciple
of Jesus Christ.
The first mark is a disciple feeds on the Holy Scriptures.
So disciples of Jesus Christ abide in His Word.
They don't just have a Bible.
They don't have a Bible installed on their app.
They don't just have a verse of the day.
They don't just read the Word; they feed on the Word.
They don't just feed on the Word but they consume that Word
and they live that Word out.
There are many things you can do with your Bible.
You can read it. You can listen to it.
You can apply it. You can speak it.
You can memorize it, and you can meditate it.
But the most important thing that everyone of us is called
to do with our Bible, and that is to obey our Bible.
And that I think is the difference between the disciple
and the believer. The believer might know the Bible
but a disciple lives the Bible. He feeds on the Holy Scriptures.
It becomes his daily bread. It becomes his sword.
It becomes his hammer. It becomes his seed.
It becomes his oil. It becomes his light.
It becomes his life. That's number one distinction of a disciple.
Is that he feeds on the Holy Scriptures. He abides in the Word.
Number two is a disciple follows the Holy Spirit.
I want you to notice that twice He says, "after Me."
"If anybody desires to come after Me"
and then He says at the end, "Follow Me."
Now today Jesus doesn't live here on earth.
He is in heaven but He is with us through the Holy Spirit.
In fact, the Holy Spirit has taken the place of Christ.
Jesus Himself said, "I will send you another."
Another, one of the same kind.
Comforter, another teacher, another guide
His name is the Holy Spirit.
Believers today have the same access to the Holy Spirit
that disciples of Jesus had access to Jesus.
And therefore, the Holy Spirit who lives in us He guides us,
He helps us to understand the Scriptures,
He fills us with power, He fills us with strength
and He gives us purpose.
And so, the second mark of every disciple is that
a disciple follows the Holy Spirit.
Disciple is filled with the Holy Spirit.
Disciple is sensitive to the Holy Spirit.
Disciple is led by the Holy Spirit.
Disciple develops and cultivates a relationship
with the Holy Spirit.
Disciple enjoys the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
And so, if you are just simply coming to church
if you simply just embraced eternal life
as the gift from Jesus Christ, He wants you to grow in Him.
He wants you to be His disciple.
He wants you to know His Spirit,
and He wants you to be known by His Spirit
and to be led by His Spirit.
Mark number three of what it means to be a disciple
A disciple forsakes those things that hinder his follow.
Mark 1:17-18, Jesus tells His disciples to come and follow Him
and then it says that they immediately left their nets
and followed Him.
Now the mark for us is that we first feed on the Scriptures
we then follow the Holy Spirit,
and then we forsake what hinders our follow.
We forsake what hinders our following of Jesus Christ.
Jesus used the words "Pick up your cross."
He's not talking about to go and find area of your life
where you can you know, inflict suffering or pain.
He is saying that as you follow Me,
it could lead you to a place of discomfort.
It could lead you to a place of sacrifice.
It could lead you to a place of self-denial.
And He says that He wants you to embrace self-denial
in your attempt to follow Jesus.
We don't embrace discipline for the sake of discipline.
We seek devotion to the Lord,
and that devotion decides our discipline.
Discipline in itself has no heavenly reward
if it's not birthed by your devotion.
There are a lot of disciplined people who wake up very early
who abstain from certain types of foods,
who abstain from certain behaviors and certain things
like alcohol and smoking,
and they are not anywhere closer to heaven
than those people who are doing the opposite
because discipline doesn't bring you closer to God.
What brings you closer to God is Jesus, is the Holy Spirit.
And as you follow Him, that's why Jesus didn't say
go and pick up the cross; He says, "Follow Me."
He says, "If you want to follow Me,"
meaning the desire to follow Him precedes the desire
to deny yourself your desires, your pleasures,
and your comfort.
Please don't fall in love with discipline,
fall in love with Jesus.
And that love for Jesus will put limits on your liberties.
It will put restrictions and boundaries in your life.
That devotion will regulate, will create your discipline.
So discipline is not the goal. Discipline is the result of
the devotion that the disciple has towards Jesus.
Number four, disciple fishes for souls.
So a disciple is a fisherman.
See, as somebody who believes in Jesus, they just got saved
but a disciple goes on saving others
through the power of preaching the Good News.
Jesus says in Mark 1:17-18:
So we see that there is follow, there is forsaking,
and then there is fishing.
He says that the by-product of you following Me
is I will make you fishers of men.
I want you to notice that Jesus didn't say
He will make us wealthy.
He didn't say I will make you healthy.
He didn't say I will make you famous.
He didn't say I will make you popular.
He didn't say I will give you a blessing
even though sometimes these things can be a result of
following Christ, and sometimes they are not.
But that's not what His promise is.
His promise is that you will live for the same reason
He died for.
You will make salvation of people your primary reason
for existence.
Your purpose will be fueled by what He loved, what He died for.
He says, "I will make you fishers of men."
If you truly follow Jesus there will be a result.
There will be a fruit of following Jesus.
You will have a heart for the lost.
You will see winning other people to Jesus as
your primary reason for being on this earth.
I love the fact that Jesus compared evangelism to fishing
because the principle is that if you go fishing you have to go.
You can't sit at home and hope for the fish
to come into your house, knock on the door
and ask to come into your house.
You have to go where the fish is, and as a fisherman
you use different kinds of baits for different kinds of fish.
As Christians who are disciples of Jesus Christ,
we have to go into the world.
We can't wait for the world to come to church.
What makes a difference between a disciple and a believer
is that the believer only comes to church
a disciple goes into the world.
Jesus says, "Go into all the world and make disciples."
So that means that He expects us to go.
That's one of the reasons why I believe in using
every means possible; from social media, to touch cards,
to sharing your faith with your neighbors, with your friends
through giving people gifts, inviting them to lunch
everything you can, to standing up on the corners of the streets
with a microphone and preaching the good news or hell fire;
whatever suites your personality and your convictions,
but we have to get the message about Jesus Christ
to this world. And that's what disciples do.
Disciples fish for souls.
Believers simply stay comfortable on the seashore of
their doctrinal beliefs: they love Jesus, Jesus loves them
but disciples go and roll their sleeves and they jump into the
purposes of God and they win the lost.
Number five, disciples feed the lambs
or in other words, disciples make disciples.
In Matthew 28 it talks about go into all the world
and make disciples.
I find it interesting that Jesus didn't say go
into all the world and make decisions or make converts.
He says, "Go and make disciples."
Only a disciple can make a disciple.
If you have not been discipled, you can't make disciples.
Believers don't make disciples.
Believers must become disciples of Jesus Christ
and disciples must make disciples for Jesus Christ.
I find it interesting because in the beginning of Jesus' ministry
Jesus told Peter, John, and His disciples,
"Come and follow Me. I will make you fishers of men."
But then towards the end of His ministry,
sitting at the seashore, He welcomes them
and He says this to Peter:
Interesting! In the beginning of His ministry He said
"Fish for souls. I will make you fishers."
Towards the end of the ministry He says, "Do you love Me?"
And when Peter says yes He gives him a new assignment.
He says, "Feed My lambs."
Lambs, meaning these are believers now.
He's saying I want you to mature my believers.
I want you, in other words to reproduce disciples.
I want you to multiply.
I want you now to begin to mentor other believers.
I want you to step into your calling as a spiritual father
to young babes.
Every Christian goes through three main spiritual growths.
The first one is you are a child,
then you are a young man, and then you are a father.
It's exemplified in the Epistle of John that there are children
there are young men, and there are fathers.
A child is somebody who needs care
a youth or a young man is somebody who cares for himself,
and then a father is somebody who cares for a child.
Jesus is calling Peter and He says, I want you to be
caring now for other believers to mature them
into full stature of Jesus Christ
so that they can become disciples.
So a disciple is somebody who feeds on the Scriptures.
It's somebody who follows the Holy Spirit.
A disciple is somebody who denies himself
in other words, somebody who forsakes that which hinders
their follow.
A disciple fishes for souls meaning the win souls.
And disciples make disciples.
Thank you for watching this video.
Are you a disciple of Jesus Christ?
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