WHAT IS DISCIPLESHIP?

Matthew 4:18 - "And Jesus, walking by the Sea of Galilee, saw two brothers, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother...then He said to them, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men."

"Follow Me" - that may be the simplest of all statements as to the meaning of discipleship.

Following Jesus carries with it a lot of meaning.  But let's not jump too quickly into "all" the meanings.  One thing is for sure:  when you are a disciple of Jesus, you're meant to be a follower of Jesus.

Luke 6:12,13 - "Now it came to pass in those days that He went out to the mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.  And when it was day, He called His disciples to Himself; and from them He chose twelve whom He also named apostles."

By this time, in the book of Luke, Jesus has already met a lot of people and a lot of people met Him.  Jesus purposely called some to "follow Him" but it appears that many came without being called.  But they came anyway.  Did all these people "follow Him" in the same way?  Not all of them.  How do I know that?

John 6:66 - "From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more."  They started off thinking of following Jesus, but some just couldn't deal with some of the things He said.  Did these receive a call from Him or was it because they thought it would be kind of exciting to follow this Man?  And that can lead to another question:  Can someone be called to follow the Lord and disobey Him?  If so, are they still "saved?"  Were they already saved to start out with? 

Because of the nature of this study I'm not intending to be too lengthy each time I write.  And something else:  I'm not necessarily going to make comments each and every day.  There may be times when a few days will pass before a new comment is posted.  Not only do I want you to think about what has been said, I'm taking time to pray through these studies as I write.  If you learn anything it will be because I'm learning something!