#135 3 Characteristics of a Follower of Jesus Christ
To be a follower of Jesus means to be a disciple of Jesus. You cannot follow Jesus unless you are willing to follow Him all the way to the cross. Such as Matthew 16:24 NASB, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.” So following Jesus is not just about being led by Him but rather to also act like Him. Since being a follower of Christ requires action on our part it leads to the question what actions? Matthew 16:24 gives us a clue in that Jesus clearly says to take up our cross and follow Him. Yet we are left to discern what our cross actually is.
In the book Spiritual Formation Is… Dave Early wrote that he found himself “struggling to hear God’s voice clearly.” In turn Earley created a spiritual growth plan. That I believe is one of the key characteristics of a Christ follower, a willingness to step out of your comfort zone to continue chasing after Jesus. Earley demonstrates this principle by proactively trying to hear from God.
Another important aspect of a Christ follower is to care for the things that Christ cared for. In the book DiscipleShift Putnam and Harrington write that “A disciple is a person who cares for the lost.” According to them a disciple is someone who cares for those in their life and try to bring them to know the God they know. On the one side it is caring to care like Christ and on the other to more people to Christ as Christ did. And as previously mentioned in many ways a follower of Jesus must also be a disciple. Putnam and Harrington list out many characteristics of disciples such as that they must be mature, they do life with others, who loves the poor, who understands righteousness, who worships God with their resources, they are a witness for Christ. They note though that these many ideas can lead to drastically different outcomes. But a good way to clarify if these ideas fit into the characteristics of a Christ follow is in Matthew 4:19 which says “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” This indicates to me that the act of following has a result which we can use to measure whether or not we are following Christ. Are we fishers of men? It is as though the result of our actions tells us whether we were following Christ or something else.
Evan B. Howard, Spiritual Formation Is...: How to Grow in Jesus (Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2018), 3.
Jim Putman, Bobby Harrington, and Robert Coleman, DiscipleShift: Five Steps That Help Your Church to Make Disciples Who Make Disciples (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2013), 43.
