Urban Leadership Foundation

The Disciple and Self

Facets of the Inner Core of Selflessness

from the Beatitudes

                                            Viv Grigg

   First published in the REACH Communique, Vol II, No 1, 1980

Discipleship begins with a total all-consuming allegiance and commitment to Jesus the Christ.  In our previous article, we meditated on how this love that precedes all others causes us to hate our self-centered relationships, especially with those close to us, in order to love Jesus Christ undividedly.

But we will misinterpret this change in relationships, unless we can grasp the core of our passage in Luke 14:26, 27 - "and hates even his own life..." It is the hatred of selfishness in these relationships that we are called to.  We are most of all to hate our own rottenness inside, the thoughts of our heart that are evil continually (Gen 6:5).  

How can a disciple hate himself or herself? The means is the cross.  A disciple is to take up his cross.

What is that cross? It is an instrument of slow painful death - a killing instrument.  It is an instrument to kill our basic instincts, our self-love, self-protection, self-security.  This is a death to the inner being.  (concurrent with that death is the resurrection of the Spirit within us).

"...And follow me..." If we follow Bruce Lee, we obey his disciplines.  In the same way dying to self enables us to follow the "Disciplines of the Master."  What are these disciplines of Jesus? Quiet time? Church attendance? Scripture memory? No! These re helpful, indeed essential, but they are external props. The disciplines of Jesus are disciplines of the inner person. They are crystallized in the beatitudes (Matt 5:1-12).  The beatitudes are like a diamond with many faces.  Each beatitude reflects a different facet of the inner core of selflessness - the character of those who live under the Kingdom of God. Daily we follow these disciplines by choosing against the tyranny of self and allowing the Holy Spirit of God to  fill us and mould our inner man to be like Him.

THE DISCIPLINES OF THE BEATITUDES

A disciple is poor in spirit

In ths scriptures, a class of godly poor emerged from the time of the monarchy when society began to differentiate between the rich and a class of oppressed poor.  They were the oppressed who out of their poverty turned to God to defend them.

The opposite of this godly poverty of spirit was the spirit of the rich.  Riches provide feelings of power, of control.  riches hide sin.  The rich are always right.  They are independent of others and God. 

In the scriptures, the poor are those who lack; the frail, the weak, the refugee fleeing without possessions; the dependent and those who cry for help; the oppressed. The poor in spirit have an internal poverty - people who are dependent on God, recognizing their spiritual need, their lack of spirituality, their frailty.

Disciples need to choose their lifestyles.  Jesus, though He was rich, yet for our sakes became poor.  He came not as a rich dominating King, riding on a stallion, but as a poor servant of men riding on a donkey. Not all can become wandering scribes and we are commanded to provide for our families. But these thoughts lead us to the question, "Can we be poor internally, and rich externally? (Luke 6:20).

A disciple is one who mourns

God weeps! God sits where people sit, hurts where people hurt. He dwells among the rotten of the earth.  The dying disciple wears sackcloth in his heart for the sins of his people.  He too cries over the slave trade in Manila, over the putrid wounds of the beggar he befriends.  He mourns first for himself. Confessing daily the rottenness of his own soul, he pours out his soul for the hungry (Isa 58:10).  This is the distinctive mark of the true disciple.

A disciple is meek

The disciple dies to power, and chooses powerlessness.  You cannot put him down, for he has chosen the bottom.  the steel of his inner man is tempered by the compassion of a gentle and quiet spirit in his outer relationships.  Among such people God dwells (Isa 57:15). Women like this, are beautiful before God (1 Pet 3:4).  The meek person does not have to defend his amor propio or fight for his rights.  He has chosen to have none.  Such "powerless" people are the ones who are truly powerful. The power of their inner spirit transforms nations. 

A disciple is one who hungers and thirsts for righteousness

Meekness is weakness without the burning desire for truth and God.  This hunger is not a hunger for knowledge, but for knowledge in action.  It is dying to self-righteousness and trusting in the righteousness of God.  it is a drive to be holy, as the holiness of the Spirit of God controls our being. It is a passion, outworked in meekness and poverty to see his justice established in the dark places of the earth.

A disciple is merciful

Mercy balances the drive for righteousness.  It is death to cruelty and rigid hardness that blames others, demands from others.  It is alive to a tenderness that easily forgets and forbears, daily choosing to forgive (Eph 4:32).  It walks softly among the bruised souls of humankind, to uplift and to encourage (Prov 15:1; Isa 42:3).  It is not critical.

A disciple is pure in heart

The heart is an inner shrine, the temple of Gd.  The pure heart is fixed on God alone, undivided by desires to please self or court the approval of others.  A pure heart is so ablaze with a love for God that all cares of preparing for my work, of caring for my wife, or pride in my position, do not steal way that pure devotion to him (1 John 2:15,16).

A disciple is a peacemaker

This is a dying to that kind of smooth interpersonal relationships that are merely external, for peace at the cost of truth is a false peace, fragile and treacherous.  Peacemakers are those who, because they no longer fight to justify themselves and refuse to blame others - having lost their self-righteousness - are able to speak the truth in love (Eph 4:15).  They are unafraid of conflict if it solves the sin that destroys the peace within the heart.

A disciple is persecuted, and yet rejoices

One who dies to self will be hated by those who wish he or she would live more comfortably. Families hate those who choose poverty and powerlessness for it goes against the family goals for success.  A pure love for Jesus and for others is deeply offensive to those who love self and darkness, most especially if they be spouse or parents, or family, and so they may persecute us.  Yet we rejoice, and we overcome this hatred with a pure love.

What are you choosing daily? As you measure yourself against the Beatitudes, is your discipleship of the heart or in externals only? Today commit yourself to the Disciplines of Jesus.  today, choose to follow Him into the selflessness of the Sermon on the Mount.  today, choose to lose yourself (John 12:24,25), for in losing yourself, you will find the true self-identity of a Christ-one.

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