(The second in a series)
 The push to gain members in the church of today is causing serious semantic slippage in how we view the Christian life. Words and phrases that should plumb the depths of the gospel have become little more than slogans for church growth, and they bear little resemblance to the message that cost the Son of God his life.
A Gracious Gift
Take, for example, the widespread confusion between salvation and discipleship. Our salvation lies in what Jesus Christ has done for us, extending forgiveness for our sin and reconciliation into the family of God, where a glorious welcome home awaits us. There is nothing we can do to earn this salvation, and we certainly do not deserve it. It is a gift that comes to us out of a boundless divine grace. The only condition is that we repent of our sin and surrender to God's love in Christ.
A Lifetime of Learning
Discipleship, by contrast, is what we then do for Jesus Christ. As we walk with him and get to know his mind, we begin to share his passion for the world he came to save. We see that our personal salvation does not give us privileged access to God, but rather the responsibility to help Jesus with the unfinished redemption of planet earth. The indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit helps us to understand that Jesus needs our help with the world's concomitant pain, suffering, and death. Yet all too often our semantic confusion eases us out of this challenge. It allows us to assume that merely accepting Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord makes us Christian disciples. Nothing could be further from the truth. Accepting Jesus Christ is only the beginning of our discipleship, which then takes a lifetime to learn.
A Pastoral Predicament
Failing to distinguish between salvation and discipleship places those of us who lead the church, both clergy and laity, in a pastoral predicament. On the one hand, there are members of our congregations whose commitment to Christ sets them on the path to a mature discipleship. Not only are they regularly in worship, attentive to prayer and the Scriptures, and active in good works, but they also grow in grace. They seek to follow Christ every step of the way. They show the fruits of his Spirit in love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23); and they are committed to the justice of God's kingdom, on earth as in heaven (Mt. 6:9-14).
On the other hand, there are those in our congregations — usually the majority — who have accepted the salvation offered in Jesus Christ, who believe in Him as Savior and Lord, who support their churches with their prayers, their presence, their gifts and their service, but who seem to settle for a form of Christianity that does not require the sacrifice that Jesus cautioned his first disciples to expect. These church members are often faithful, affirm a spiritual relationship with Christ, and take part in the multiplicity of programs that crowd the religious market; but they seem to hold back from the more demanding discipleship expressed in The General Rule (¶ 1118.2a Book of Discipline 2004).
Today we are faced with the challenge of pastoring both kinds of Christians, and semantic slippage is not the answer — as we shall see in the next Quarterly when we look at how John Wesley dealt with the same
pastoral challenge.
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This article first appeared in the Fall 2005 issue of the Covenant Discipleship Quarterly. Copyright © 2005 General Board of Discipleship. Used with permission.
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