The disciples, multitude and impostors

From the first day, the church has been at variance with the world. It was meant to be that way. The Lord Jesus designed the church in such a way that it would operate in the physical world but will never become a part of the world system.

So there is nothing strange about Christians being distinct from the world around them. What is odd is the attempts to blend in and be like others to avoid criticism.

The church’s charter of existence is clear. It includes exclusionary clauses such as, ‘you are in the world, but not of the world’, ‘come out from among them and be separate’ and ‘do not conform to the world, but be transformed by the renewing your mind’.

The charter also contains clauses that reveal the church’s responsibility towards the world. It says, ‘You are the light of the world’, ‘You are the salt of the earth’. Without equivocation, the church is God’s kingdom on earth, the conduit through which Heaven is expressed on the earth.

However, the church’s reputation has taken so much hit in this digital age that its sanctity and relevance are being questioned in some climes.

While some of the accusations people bring up against the church are valid, others are based on a poor understanding of the church’s makeup in terms of its membership or billions of people who identify with it.

Here’s an attempt to sketch the membership of the church, at least from the perspective of a typical outsider.

In that point of view, the church is seen as a collective of every person who identifies as Christian and probably goes to church, even if it is once in a while.

Other broader definitions of people who are part of the church are people born to parents who identify as Christians and citizens of countries where Christianity is considered a national religion.

These definitions miss the mark because they are not centred on the core criteria, which is that a person needs to be born again and have a one-on-one relationship with Jesus and fellowship with others who are in a living connection with Jesus, to be a part of the church, the Body of Jesus.

However, the muddle-up view of the church is not new. We can see elements of it in the scriptures. It is necessary to identify which category an erring ‘Christian’ belongs to before castigating the church for his or her actions.

Here are the groups – the disciples, the multitude, and the impostors.

The Disciples – The mandate of the church is to make disciples. In a strict sense, this is the group that ideally should be referred to the church. The Lord intends that anyone who identifies with the church should become a disciple, indeed.

God is not against having a crowd come to church. God wants the multitude to come, but His goal is to turn every one of them into a disciple and then be able to send them out to represent Him.

A disciple is a person who has been discipled by a discipler. A discipler is a person who has been trained under God and has committed to training others.

Jesus trained His disciples. He called them to be with Him so He could train them. The apostles of the lamb were first disciples. They were trained.

A disciple in this context is essentially a follower of Christ, a person who lives by the teachings of Christ and moves by the leading of the Holy Spirit. Only a fraction of the people who gather at churches on Sundays and other days live like this.

To be a disciple of Christ is not easy, but the grace of God is available. Jesus said the world would persecute His disciples the way it persecuted Him. He said the basic requirement for a disciple is to deny him or herself daily, take up his or her cross, and follow Him.