The Meanings of Discipleship: Being Disciples Then and Now

By SCM Press

Discipleship is a foundational concept of Christian life which has become a popular and ubiquitous description of belonging and growth in early 21st ecclesiastical language. Discipleship courses and popular writings abound and the term is used liberally in official church documents and strategies for growth and development, particular in a western context. But does recent use of the word risk reducing the wide range of meanings of discipleship to something less rich and inclusive than is warranted?

With contributions from an array of leading thinkers, scholars and theologians, including Rachel Mann, Kirsteen Kim and Anthony Reddie, this book argues that there is need for more clarity, precision and depth in defining what meaningfully and constructively is construed as discipleship.

Beginning with an overview of how the concept of discipleship has been understood in history, the volume goes on to consider some of the key figures who have shaped our understanding of the concept, and finally to reflect on what discipleship might look like in contemporary society.

• Language: English
• Publisher: SCM Press
• Release date: Oct 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9780334060284

Book preview

The Meanings of Discipleship

The Meanings of Discipleship

Being Disciples Then and Now

Edited by

Andrew Hayes and Stephen Cherry

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© Editors and Contributors 2021

Published in 2021 by SCM Press

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Unless otherwise indicated, the Scripture quotations contained herein are from The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, Anglicized Edition, copyright © 1989, 1995 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America, and are used by permission. All rights reserved.

Those designated RSVCE are from The Revised Standard Version of the Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1965, 1966 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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ISBN 978-0-334-06026-0

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Contents

Contributors

1. Introduction

Stephen Cherry and Andrew Hayes

PART 1 A VERY SHORT HISTORY OF DISCIPLESHIP

Early Foundations of Christian Discipleship

2. The Gospels and Acts: Discipleship and the Kingdom

Loveday Alexander

3. Early Church Discipleship: Adherence, Argument and Community

Andrew Hayes

4. Pilgrim People: Medieval Discipleship

Sarah Brush

Architects of Discipleship

5. Following in Community: Saint Benedict’s Flexible Vision for Faithful Discipleship

Sister Johanna Marie Melnyk, OSB

6. Called to a Life of Piety and Holiness: John Calvin on Discipleship

Randall C. Zachman

7. Grace Bearing Fruit: John Wesley’s Conception of Discipleship

Sondra Wheeler

8. Courageous, Prophetic and Liberating: The Discipleship of Pandita Ramabai and the Mukti Mission

Betty Govinden

9. Visible and Hidden Discipleship: The Witness of Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Jennifer Moberly

PART 2 IMPERATIVES FOR DISCIPLESHIP TODAY

Following Christ’s Commandments

10. Missionary Discipleship: Being Called and Being Sent

Kirsteen Kim

11. Eucharistic Discipleship: Participating in the Body

Matthew Bullimore

12. Relational Discipleship: Putting Kindness First

Stephen Cherry

Priorities for Contemporary Disciples

13. The Secularization of Desire: Is Discipleship a Remedy?

Herman Paul

14. Interfaith and Discipleship: Faithfulness, Discernment and the Common Good

Richard J. Sudworth

15. The Quest for Catholicity: An Anti-Racist Model of Discipleship

Anthony G. Reddie

16. Discipleship as Gardening: Reflections on Ecological Conversion

Sam E. Ewell III

17. The Power of the Personal: The Promise and Challenge of Transgender Identities for Christian Discipleship

Rachel Mann

Conclusion

18. The Authenticity of Discipleship

Stephen Cherry and Andrew Hayes

Contributors

Loveday Alexander, Emeritus Professor of Biblical Studies, University of Sheffield. Recent publications include the edited collection Faithful Improvisation? Theological Reflections on Church Leadership (Church House Publishing, 2016).

Matthew Bullimore, Chaplain of Corpus Christi, Cambridge. He has edited Graced Life: The Writings of John Hughes (SCM Press, 2016), and is co-editor of the forthcoming The Vowed Life (Canterbury Press, 2021).

Sarah Brush, Lecturer in Pastoral Theology and Director of the Context-Based Pathway at Ripon College Cuddesdon. Her doctoral work focused on the lives of Early Medieval Merovingian Saints and she is the co-author of Moving Images, Changing Lives: Exploring Christian Life and Confirmation with Young People Through Film (Church House Publishing, 2011) and co-editor of Landscape Liturgies (Canterbury Press, 2021).

Stephen Cherry, Dean of King’s College Cambridge, where he is a Fellow and the Director of Studies in Theology. His recent books include Psalm Prayers (Canterbury Press, 2020) and Thy Will be Done (Bloomsbury, 2020).

Samuel E. Ewell III, co-director of the Birmingham, UK, community-based co-op EAT MAKE PLAY and author of Faith Seeking Conviviality: Reflections on Ivan Illich, Christian Mission and the Promise of Life Together (Cascade, 2020).

Betty Govinden, formerly lecturer at the University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa and a founder member of the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians. She has published widely in the areas of postcolonial and feminist studies including Sister Outsiders: The Representation of Identity and Difference in Selected Writings by South African Indian Women (Brill, 2008) and A Time of Memory: Reflections on Recent South African Writings (Solo Collective, 2008).

Kirsteen Kim, Paul E. Pierson Chair in World Christianity and Associate Dean for the Centre for Missiological Research at Fuller Theological Seminary, USA. She is an editor of the book series Theology and Mission in World Christianity (Brill). Her most recent monograph is Christianity as a World Religion (Bloomsbury, 2016).

Andrew Hayes, Director of the Centre for Discipleship and Theology and Tutor in Historical Theology at The Queen’s Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Learning, Birmingham. He is the author of Justin Against Marcion: Defining the Christian Philosophy (Fortress, 2017).

Rachel Mann, Area Dean of Bury and Rossendale and Visiting Fellow at Manchester Met University. A poet, writer and broadcaster, her recent publications include A Kingdom of Love (Carcanet Poetry, 2019) and Love’s Mysteries (Canterbury Press, 2020).

Sister Johanna Marie Melnyk, OSB belongs to the Olivetan Benedictine Sisters of Holy Angels Convent in Jonesboro, Arkansas, where she has served as teacher, librarian, archivist and Prioress. Her doctoral work on Henry Colburn led to the co-authored Rogue Publisher, ‘The Prince of Puffers’: The Life and Works of the Publisher Henry Colburn (Edward Everett Root Publishers, 2018).

Jennifer Moberly, Tutor and Lecturer in Ethics and Spirituality at Cranmer Hall, Durham. She is the author of The Virtue of Bonhoeffer’s Ethics (Wipf & Stock, 2013).

Herman Paul, Professor of the History of the Humanities at Leiden University and formerly Professor in Secularization Studies at the University of Groningen. He is the author of Key Issues in Historical Theology (Routledge, 2015) and De slag om het hart: over secularisatie van verlangen (Boekencentrum, 2017)

Anthony G. Reddie, Director of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture. He is editor of Black Theology: An International Journal. Recent publications include Theologising Brexit: A Liberationist and Postcolonial Critique (Routledge, 2019) and the updated Is God Colour Blind? Insights from Black Theology for Christian Faith and Ministry (SPCK, 2020).

Richard J. Sudworth, Secretary for Inter-Religious Affairs to the Archbishop of Canterbury and National Inter-Religious Affairs Adviser for the Church of England. He is the author of Distinctly Welcoming: Christian Presence in a Multifaith Society (Scripture Union, 2007), Encountering Islam: Christian–Muslim Relations in the Public Square (SCM Press, 2017) and co-editor of Holy Attention: Preaching in Today’s Church (Canterbury Press, 2019).

Sondra Wheeler, Martha Ashby Carr Professor of Christian Ethics at Wesley Theological Seminary, USA. Her most recent book is Sustaining Ministry: Foundations and Practices for Serving Faithfully (Baker Academic, 2017).

Randall C. Zachman, Professor of Reformation Studies, Emeritus at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author of several books and numerous articles on John Calvin, including Reconsidering John Calvin (Cambridge University Press, 2012) and Image and Word in the Theology of John Calvin (Notre Dame Press, 2007).

1. Introduction

STEPHEN CHERRY AND ANDREW HAYES

The twentieth century saw the words ‘disciple’ and ‘discipleship’ rise to new levels of prominence and significance within the church. A plethora of programmes, materials and books aim at developing or nurturing discipleship, and their impact on individuals and on the culture of the church is considerable. This book represents an attempt to stand back from this significant development and reflect biblically, historically and theologically. The aim is to come to a deeper and richer feel not only for what discipleship means now, but also for what it has meant, and to begin to think about what it might mean and how it might be shaped in the future. This involves understanding more about discipleship in the past and developing a deeper appreciation for the contributions of some especially interesting and significant characters. It also means reflecting again on Jesus’ specific instructions to his disciples, and putting discipleship into dialogue with some of the more pressing issues of our times.

The Meanings of Discipleship is intended to be accessible and useful to a wide readership. The chapters of are richly informed by scholarship, and also by experience. Our authors have offered vivid and important insights into not only what we might think about discipleship today and how we might meaningfully talk about it, but most importantly how it might be practised and lived.

In Part 1 the focus is historical. Three authors first present an overview of the way in which discipleship might have been understood in the millennium and a half before the Reformation. New Testament scholar Loveday Alexander explains how the concept of discipleship works in the Gospels, showing how it is connected with the idea and hope of the Kingdom of God. Andrew Hayes highlights the importance of conciliar processes and decision-making in facilitating both unity and diversity in discipleship in this period. Sarah Brush offers a perspective on the ways Christian people lived out their faith in medieval Britain.

This is followed by a consideration of five historic individuals, whom we present as ‘architects of discipleship’. The importance of each of the people we have chosen is spelt out by an author who brings extended experience of engaging with the person and their teaching to the task of writing. Sister Johanna Marie Melnyk writes about Saint Benedict with the insights of a nun living under his Rule. The importance of the practical theology of John Calvin is elucidated by distinguished Calvin scholar Randall Zachman. Sondra Wheeler, a Methodist and professor at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington DC, explains John Wesley’s theological vision of a holy life. Betty Govinden explains the significance of Pandita Ramabai from a position of admiration and insight shaped by both scholarship and personal recollection. Finally, Jennifer Moberly writes about Dietrich Bonhoeffer on the basis of extensive study and detailed reading of his works over many years.

In Part 2 the focus moves to the present day, beginning with three chapters that reflect in very different ways on what it means to follow three of Christ’s commandments today. Kirsteen Kim offers her perspective on the relationship between discipleship and mission. Matthew Bullimore writes about the meaning of the Eucharist in discipleship from his perspective as an Anglican priest living through lockdown. And Stephen Cherry invites deeper reflection on what words are most helpful to us today when trying to think through how our discipleship is reflected in all our relationships.

In the final section of the book, we turn to face the question of the contemporary priorities for discipleship. Herman Paul’s chapter describes how secularization has shaped both the desire and the shape of discipleship today. The other chapters in this section consider how aspects of contemporary awareness or concern connect with the praxis of discipleship now. Richard Sudworth writes about living in a multi-faith society as National Inter-Religious Affairs Adviser for the Church of England. Anthony Reddie brings a Black and liberationist perspective to the question of discipleship and anti-racism. Samuel Ewell is a community activist in the area of ecologically informed and sustainable community engagement, and brings this experience to bear in his chapter on ‘discipleship as gardening’. Finally in this section, Rachel Mann connects the journey of discipleship with her journey as a trans woman.

One of the many decisions made between the time when the proposal for this book was first articulated and its final publication was a minor change to the title. The idea was to have a book that in some way echoed the English title of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s landmark text, The Cost of Discipleship. As the focus was to have been on the significance and implications of the words ‘disciple’ and ‘discipleship’, the title The Meaning of Discipleship was suggested and carried forward. It became apparent, a year or so into the project, however, that it would be misleading and unhelpful to continue to suggest that discipleship has one meaning. Rather it became evident that the title should reflect the diversity and plurality of discipleship to which our volume would ultimately bear witness. And so it is that we offer in the final chapter of this volume an extended discussion not of the meaning but the meanings of discipleship.

Part 1: A Very Short History of Discipleship

Early Foundations of Christian Discipleship

2. The Gospels and Acts: Discipleship and the Kingdom

LOVEDAY ALEXANDER

The story of discipleship is deeply embedded in the life of the church.¹ James and Andrew, Peter and John are our spiritual ancestors, the first to step on a road that we are still following today. Their stories commemorate the original disciples who for later generations became the foundations of the church (Eph. 2.20; Rev. 21.14). But their story is not just part of church history, buried in the past. It is in some mysterious way our story, a story that gives shape to our lives as Christians today. When we hear their story, we are encouraged to hear Jesus’ call in our lives: the call to ‘Follow me!’ This call, which begins and ends the gospel story, is addressed to every Christian, as the nineteenth-century hymn implies.

Jesus calls us! O’er the tumult

Of our life’s wild restless sea:

Day by day his sweet voice soundeth,

Saying, Christian, follow Me!

As of old Saint Andrew heard it

By the Galilean lake,

Turned from home, and toil, and kindred,

Leaving all for His dear sake.²

Discipleship is one of the primary metaphors that Christianity uses to conceptualize the demands and challenges of the spiritual life. It is not the only one: St Paul, for example, uses different terminology. The narrative of discipleship is embedded in the Gospels, where the Greek word mathetes is regularly used as a generic description of Jesus’ followers, both of the original Twelve and of the wider circle of supporters. This wider use continues beyond the horizon of Jesus’ death and resurrection. In Matthew 28.19–20, Jesus instructs the eleven apostles to ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, … teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you’: in other words, the original disciples are to become teachers and instruct disciples of their own; but these second-generation disciples will still be disciples of Jesus. The same usage continues in the book of Acts, where the growing crowd of Jesus-followers are described as ‘disciples’ through the first half of the book.

Paying attention to the way discipleship is used, and not used, in the New Testament is essential to understanding how the concept has worked and continues to work in the formation of Christian identity. Discipleship is a metaphor that originates in a particular cultural context. In the New Testament, mathetes is not primarily a religious term: it comes from the world of education, training and formation. A disciple is a student, a learner, an apprentice: the particular kind of ‘following’ expected of a disciple is the following of a teacher. It is primarily a relational term. To understand it, we need to pay attention to what the teacher–student relationship meant in the world of the Gospels, the world of Jesus and Socrates. Being a disciple meant personal choice and commitment: it often meant leaving home to live and travel with one’s teacher. And it was never primarily about book-learning: being a disciple meant above all paying close attention to your teacher, to their character, actions and lifestyle as much as to their words. Ideally, it meant being formed into the likeness of the teacher, passing on the tradition, modelling your practice and lifestyle on theirs. It meant internalizing the teachings and lifestyle (the bios) of the teacher, becoming part of a chain of transmission so that their teachings and lifestyle could be passed on to the next generation. The metaphor of discipleship in the New Testament is constrained by cultural patterns that are widespread across the ancient world.

Discipleship as Narrative

Discipleship in the New Testament is always fundamentally rooted in narrative. The short stories in which the disciples are centre-stage (like the call narratives) are embedded in a longer and more complex narrative of Jesus and the Kingdom. The Gospels give us four versions of this narrative, but they all follow the same basic shape, starting with the mission of John the Baptist and finishing with Jesus’ death and resurrection. The disciples are not centre-stage in all of this, but their presence is implicit in most of it. Variously we find them being directly addressed by Jesus, listening to what he says to other people, or simply watching Jesus at work. That process of observation is an essential part of their discipleship, part of what they have learned and need to pass on. So the Gospel narrative itself is shaped by the process of discipleship and the process of transmission to succeeding generations. To a significant degree, the Gospel narratives as we have them owe their form to the anecdotal tradition that underlies them, and the tradition in turn is conditioned by the social memory of the disciple-circles that preserved it. The viewpoint that determines the character of the underlying tradition is a discipleship viewpoint.³ It is that overall impression of the Gospel narrative (wherever it comes from) that determines the perception of discipleship in the church. The disciples are characters in a familiar story, a story that is told and retold within the Christian community, shaped by preachers and hymn-writers, reflecting the changing dynamics of Christian life in a fast-changing world. These Gospel stories are not peripheral narratives: they are the church’s foundational documents, read and expounded to the faithful week by week. This is:

the narrative that the church tells of its own origins, the story that gives the church its distinctive structures … It is not an institutional blueprint but a narrative, an invitation to inhabit a narrative world that can be heard in different ways in different times and places.⁴

It is within that long process of hearing and interpretation that some of the stresses and strains within the concept of discipleship begin to emerge. Some of the strains are evident in the popular hymn cited above. Are all disciples called to leave behind ‘home, and toil, and kindred’ to follow Jesus? Does that mean followers of Jesus should not get married or have a job? That world-denying impetus has played an important role in the development of Christian spirituality, from the Middle Ages through to the modern world, leaving a wistful feeling that authentic discipleship somehow means ‘leaving all’ to join a monastic order or become a missionary. Yet there is an equally strong impetus to see discipleship as something that informs the existence of all Christians, in every walk of life: that discipleship is about the whole of life, not just what we do in church.⁵ ‘Nurturing discipleship’ (often equated with ‘lay development’) can be understood as a way of creating a renewed sense of personal commitment in the whole body of the church, pursuing ‘the core calling of every church community, and every follower of Jesus, to form whole-life maturing disciples’.⁶

Underlying all these stress points is a deep-seated confusion about the ecclesiology of discipleship. Is the church co-extensive with ‘the body of disciples’? Is ‘nurturing disciples’ the sole task of the church? Where does the Kingdom of God come into the picture? In an influential article, sociologist Linda Woodhead argues that the concept of discipleship is ‘theologically weak’ as against other theological narratives that might act as a normative frame for ecclesiology: it ‘slides the cursor on the ecclesiastical slide rule a long way from societal towards congregational. The difference is that societal churches go out into society; congregational ones try to bring society into church.’⁷ Professor Woodhead puts her finger on a crucial aspect of the discipleship debate. What role does ‘discipleship’ play in a robust and healthy ecclesiology? Is it at worst ‘peripheral’, at best a useful corrective to a deficient ecclesiology? Or is there more that can be said? I believe that there is more: but we need to go back to the texts of the Gospels to seek a more rounded understanding of how the concept of discipleship works.

Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark

The word mathetes, meaning ‘disciple’, appears dozens of times in the Gospels and Acts, but nowhere else in the New Testament.⁸ A biblical account of discipleship must therefore begin with the Gospels. Rather than looking for definitions or propositional statements, our understanding of discipleship must start with understanding the theological shape of the narrative, identity and way of life that emerge from it.⁹ Understanding the narrative role(s) of the disciples in the Gospels, and the different ways those roles are read within the church, is fundamental to our understanding of discipleship. For the purposes of this chapter, I shall focus on Mark, the earliest and least ‘ecclesial’ of the Gospels, where the theme of discipleship is particularly prominent.¹⁰

The theme of discipleship in Mark’s Gospel is inextricably interwoven with the larger theme of the Kingdom of God. These two themes run like the interlocking strands of a DNA molecule right through the Gospel. Each theme has both an individual and a communal dimension, and I believe that much of our confusion about discipleship arises from a confusion between the two. This is not, as it is often portrayed, a tension between a ‘biblical’ discipleship ecclesiology and a ‘secular’ or post-biblical ‘Christendom’ ideology. Discipleship and the Kingdom are equally biblical, and both are equally necessary for understanding the mission of Jesus and the mission of the church in the world. In order to achieve a healthy theology of discipleship, we need to work out the dynamic relationship between the two, and try to do justice to both.

Called into the Kingdom (Mark 1.14–15)

The central theme of Jesus’ ministry in Mark is the proclamation of the Kingdom in words of authority and deeds of power. This is the core of the ‘good news’ that Jesus proclaims (Mark 1.15). Good news is offered to the poor and marginalized, and individuals who respond to Jesus in faith receive cleansing, forgiveness, salvation, new life and reintegration into the community. Jesus issues a radical challenge to the whole people, including its religious leaders, to recognize the imminent demands of the Kingdom of God. It is a message of renewal not for the chosen few but for the whole people of God, including those whom other holiness movements regarded as ‘sinners’ (Mark 2.15–17). Jesus’ mission to Israel seeks to restore God’s people to a repentant acknowledgement of God’s Kingship. It is an impassioned call to Israel to rediscover her vocation as ‘a priestly kingdom and a holy nation’ (Exodus 19.6), living out in the world the loyalty, trust and obedience that characterize God’s Kingdom.¹¹

Called to Repentance (Mark 1.1–13)

Thus ‘the beginning of the gospel’ (Mark 1.1) is not the call of the disciples but the mission of John the Baptist. John’s call to repentance and baptism signals the opening of a new era in salvation-history, the inauguration of the eschatological gathering-in of the people of God. John ‘prepares the way’ for the Kingdom with a simple rite of repentance and restoration, which offers a new start to the whole people of God. But John does not call his audience to ‘follow’ him or to ‘leave’ their occupations. Luke makes this clear in an expanded scene where soldiers and tax-collectors are encouraged to go back to their daily work with a renewed acknowledgement of Kingdom values (Luke 3.10–14). John’s baptism marks the inauguration of Jesus’ messianic ministry, as the heavens open and Jesus is anointed with the Spirit of God. And it has a future dimension: John predicts that Jesus will baptize ‘with the Holy Spirit’ (Mark 1.8), in fulfilment of the prophetic promises of the Spirit breathing new life into the people of God.

Called to Follow Jesus (Mark 1.16–20; Mark 2—3)

The call of the disciples has to be understood within this overarching Kingdom framework. It marks the foundation of a messianic community, whose task is to act as an agent of the Kingdom and to realize in itself, by its very existence, the values of the Kingdom. Along with the call goes a commission: ‘I will make you people-fishers’.¹² Being a disciple is not an end in itself. The disciples are being schooled, formed into a community around Jesus, for a wider purpose: to act as agents in the work of God’s Kingdom. They are a community within a community, a gathered and intentional sub-group that exists for the sake of the wider community to which they also belong. The great work, the vision they are caught up in, is the work of Christ in the world, establishing through word and action the Kingdom of heaven on earth.

Disciples are called as individuals: each one has a different back-story (cf. John 1.47–48). But being a disciple is not an isolated experience. Chapters 2 and 3 of Mark’s Gospel describe an intentional process of community formation. Table-fellowship is an essential element in Jesus’ strategy of welding a group of disparate individuals into a community around his own person. This is a priestly community, at home in God’s house and able to feast on the bread of heaven (Mark 2.23–28). In sharing table-fellowship with Jesus, his disciples experience a foretaste of the joy of the eschatological Kingdom (Mark 2.18–22). To be a disciple is to become part of a new family, more important to its members than parents or siblings (Mark 3.31–35).

Within the messianic community of disciples, Jesus appoints an inner circle of twelve apostles. The Twelve have a dual role: ‘to be with him, and to be sent out’ (Mark 3.14), the systole and diastole of the spiritual life. ‘Being with’ Jesus means learning by imitation, becoming apprentices in the realization of God’s Kingdom in this time and place.¹³ Being an apostle means being ‘sent out’ to act in his name: but first, they have to learn what the Kingdom means by watching and listening to the word and work of the Kingdom in Jesus’ ministry. In Mark’s narrative it is not always possible to maintain clear demarcation lines between the Twelve, the wider circle of disciples and the crowds, the ‘people’ (laos) who flock to hear Jesus’ preaching: Dunn encourages us to think in terms of ‘intersecting circles of discipleship’.¹⁴

For the Twelve, then, following Jesus has concrete implications: it means being prepared to leave home and become an itinerant preacher.¹⁵ This itinerant lifestyle makes sense within the historic role of the Twelve as a core group within the larger circle of disciples, a group with a particular calling, belonging to a particular moment in time. But not all those who ‘follow’ Jesus are literally called to leave their jobs and homes. The special calling of the Twelve plays a paradigmatic role within the hermeneutics of discipleship.¹⁶ Matthew’s Gospel reads the Twelve as prototype church leaders, a move that opens the way to interpreting the command to ‘leave everything’, and other more radical aspects of discipleship, as particular demands on a spiritual elite (clergy or religious in Catholic terms; ministers or missionaries in Protestant terms). But for Luke, the Twelve are paradigmatic of a wider circle of discipleship, representative students in the school of Christ whose questions and mistakes gradually uncover the full meaning of discipleship on behalf of us all. In this context, the command to ‘leave all’ creates a fundamentally world-denying reading of discipleship, what Matthew Henry calls ‘sitting loose to the world’: ‘not only relations, but fellow-labourers and pleasant comrades, must be left for Christ’.¹⁷

The Word of the Kingdom (Mark 4)

Mark makes it quite clear that the preaching of the Kingdom is fundamental to the mission of both Jesus and the disciples (Mark 1.27; 6.12, 30). It is the core of Jesus’ message wherever he goes: in the synagogue, in homes and on the sea-shore, travelling on from town to town and village to village, ‘for that is what I came out to do’ (Mark 1.38). The seed parables (Mark 4) make a fundamental point about the Kingdom: it is small, but alive and growing, secret and irresistible. So the fundamental challenge of discipleship is to pay attention to the word that is being spoken in the person and actions of Jesus himself: something new is happening here, something as disruptive as new wine in old wineskins (Mark 2.22). The mystery of the seeds is also a mystery of response: not all seeds will take root and grow. In the response to Jesus’ preaching, we begin to see the emergence of a distinction between ‘you’ (the disciples) and ‘those outside’ (Mark 4.11): the message is for all, but only disciples will fully understand it, and act on what they hear.

The Work of the Kingdom (Mark 5—7)

The work of the Kingdom is described in vivid detail in Mark’s Gospel, and takes up a large part of the narrative. The miracle stories are there not so much to prove Jesus’ identity as to demonstrate in the most concrete terms, in the villages of Galilee and the streets of Jerusalem, what the coming of God’s Kingdom actually means in everyday lives. Jesus’ ministry of healing and exorcism signifies the ‘binding’ of Satan and the ‘plundering’ of his kingdom