The Nature Of Dicsipleship Essay Example

The Nature Of Dicsipleship Essay While studying Marks Gospel I learned a lot about the nature of Dicsipleship. For example, Marks Gospel reveals a lot about the nature of Dicsipleship, about faith, sacrifice, service/selflesness, choosing Jesus, etc. I believe that the most important quality of dicsipleship is faith or maybe even sacrifice.I believe Faith is definitely a compulsory quality for a Dicsiple.Mark 4:35-40 Jesus was in the back of the boat sleeping, with his head on a pillow. The Dicsiples woke him up and said, Teacher, dont you care that we are about to die.'Here we can see a lack of faith , as the Dicsiples are just setting out with Jesus, they are not yet able to understand the ways of Jesus. It also shows we are not always able to be faithful all the time, and inspite of this, Jesus will always help us to have stronger faith.Another example of faith would be the story of the mustard seed.Mark 4:31-32 A man takes a mustard seed, the smallest in the world, and plants it in the ground. After a while it g rows up and becomes the biggest of all plants. It puts out such large branches that the birds come and make their nests in its shade.The mustard seed is the smallest seed on the earth. and with enough nutrients, it becomes one of the most amazing plants ever. This shows a very important thing. No matter how small your faith is, if you put in enough effort to your life, you can build up your faith and make it stronger, with the help of Jesus.The Dicsiples sacrificed a lot upon the call of Jesus.Mark 1:20 Without delay he called them, they left their father in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.Here we can see two of the dicsiples out at work with their father and all of a suddden they leave him, give up their lively hoods and family to answer the call of jesus, who at that time was hardly known by the dicsiples. Again this shows faith in God and Jesus to again leave mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, animals, houses and land. Sacfrifice and choosing Jesus is very importa nt when it comes to dicsipleship because we neeed to show that we are willing to give up everything to choose Jesus and follow him as a dicsiple.There is a huge connection between sacrifice and reward. Jesus promises that if sacrifices are made rewards will be received.Mark 10:28-30 No one who has left homes or brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, children or feilds for me and the Gospel, will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age and in the age to come, eternal life.Basically what this means is, whatever you give up, you will receive something a hundred times greater than that. Jesus here showed that the life of a dicsiple could be a committed and fulfilled life, making a difference in the world today as well as receiving the ultimate prize of heavenWhen the Dicsiples sacrificed what they did, they showed that they were willing to serve jesus.Mark 10:31 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.Here we can see how important service is, to be a di csiple. From this we learn that to be a dicsiple we need to put others before ourselves, rather than being served by others. For example, in todays world, service would be volenteering to help your grandparents at the weekend and not taking any money from them. With service there must be humility if you are a true dicsiple. Humility is about giving without taking any credit for it. A very good example of humility would be the story of the widows offering.Mark 12:41-43 They gave out their wealth; but she out of her poverty, put in everything. All she had to live on.Here we see the widow gave everything she has with taking credit for it or boasting about it. This is also a type of selflessness, giving what you have, instead of using it for yourself and in the widows case, using it to keep fed / alive.There is one more quality of Dicsipleship we have to look at, and it is onethat can also be found in the story of the widows offering. The quality is Generosity. The widow is generous in giving all she can afford to give. Here is a women who has a lot of Dicsipleship qualities. Sacrifices, humility, generosity, service and maybe many more.Marks Gospel reveals throughout it, the many qualities and characteristics needed to be a rue Dicsiple.