The First Thing: Worship

That's the first thing: worship, worship that can be flat on its face in adoration and up on its feet following Jesus wherever he goes.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 67.

The Example of Naaman

You've got to start somewhere, and Naaman starts with the most important thing of all: to recognize the truth of the muddled situation you're in, to ask for forgiveness where you seem to be compromising, and to take it one step at a time from there.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 66.

No Fear

Let's make no mistake about it: until you learn to live without fear you won't find it easy to follow Jesus.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 56.

Easter People

Without Easter, Calvary was just another political execution of a failed Messiah. Without Easter, the world is trapped between the shoulder-shrug of the cynic, the fantasy of the escapist, and the tanks of the tyrant. Without Easter, there is no reason to suppose that good will triumph over evil, that love will win over hatred, that life will win over death. But with Easter we have hope; because hope depends on love; and love has become human and has died, and is now alive for evermore, and holds the keys of Death and Hades. It is because of him that we know--we don't just hope, we know--that God will wipe away all tears from all eyes. And in that knowledge we find ourselves to be Sunday people, called to live in a world of Fridays. In that knowledge we know ourselves to be Easter people, called to minister to a world full of Calvarys. In that knowledge we find that the hand that dries our tears passes the cloth on to us, and bids us follow him, to go and dry one another's tears. The Lamb calls us to follow him wherever he goes; into the dark places of the world, the dark places of our own hearts, the places where tears blot out the sunlight, the places where tyrants pave the grass with concrete; and he bids us shine his morning light into the darkness, and share his ministry of wiping away the tears. And as we worship, and adore, and follow the Lamb, we join, already, in the song of Revelation 5:11-14, the song that one day the trees and the mountains and the whales and the waterfalls--the whole world, reborn on Easter morning--will all sing with us:

Worthy is the Lamb that was slain...
to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength
and honour and glory and blessing!

To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb
be blessing and honour and glory and power for ever and ever,
Amen.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 50-51.

Thanksgiving and Thanksliving

Paul's vision of the Christian life is thus (as has often been pointed out) of a life lived between D-Day and VE-Day. The decisive battle has been won; the battles we face today are part of the mopping-up operation to implement that victory. We are called to thanksgiving, where we stand at last in the truly human relationship to the creator and the world; and we are called to thanksliving, where we behave as the free subjects of the true king, and owe the powers nothing at all. There is now only one Power we are to follow, and that Power has a human face, a face once crowned with thorns.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 17.

The OT Points to Jesus

The argument of Hebrews runs like this: the Jewish scriptures are continually pointing beyond themselves to a further reality which they do not themselves contain. More particularly, they are pointing to a great act of salvation, of dealing with sin, which they do not themselves offer. This great act has now been accomplished in Jesus; and we must therefore follow this Jesus.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 7.

Following Jesus is the only way to go.

Jesus, the Son of God, the truly human one, is leading his people to their promised land, and is available for all people and for all time as the totally sympathetic one, the priest through whom they can come to God. Following Jesus is the only way to go.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), 5.

Church without sermons...

A church without sermons will soon have a shrivelled mind, then a wayward heart, next an unquiet soul, and finally misdirected strength.

--N.T. Wright, Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship (London: SPCK, 1994), x-xi.