Discipleship

“ Presently we find an offer of discipleship met by the warning that “the Son of Man” is a homeless wanderer; and then the stern refusal of a request for leave to perform a father’s funeral rites.
Close upon these incidents follows a special mission of disciples, introduced by the saying: “The harvest is great, but the labourers are few.” The disciples as they journey are to take no provisions, but to throw themselves on the bounty of their hearers; they are to heal the Other Sayings of Jesus. sick and to proclaim the nearness of the kingdom of God. ”

“ It is a call to communion. If a man follows Christ he will walk close behind Him, and near enough to Him to hear Him speak, and to be 'guided by His eye.' He will be separated from other people, and from other paths. In these four things, then—Faith, Obedience, Imitation, Communion—lies the essence of discipleship. No man is a Christian who has not in some measure all four. Have you got them?
What right has Jesus Christ to ask me to follow Him? Why should I? Who is He that He should set Himself up as being the perfect Example and the Guide for all the world? ”

“ Now, what is it to be his disciples? It is to renounce one's self, to carry his cross, to follow him. Are you mortified in your desires, patient under your afflictions? Do you walk in the ways in which Jesus Christ hath walked before you? To be his disciples is mutually to love each other. And how often have you come to eat of this bread of union? How often have you made your appearance at this banquet of charity, your heart inwardly loaded with gall and bitterness against your brother? How often have you come to offer up your present at the altar, without having reconciled yourself with him? ”

“ If you would be my disciples, you must be willing to forsake father, mother, wife, children, brothers, and sisters. If any one of you would now be my disciple, you must be willing to give up even your life just as the Son of Man is about to offer up his life for the completion of the mission of doing the Father’s will on earth and in the flesh. ”

“ They inherit from their parents a predisposition to evil or to good; they imitate them as their example, in all things, take their word as the law of life, and follow in their footsteps as the sure path to happiness. These parents are members of the church, and, as such, have dedicated their children to the Lord at the altar of baptism, and there in the presence of God and a witnessing assembly, they vowed to bring them up in the nurture of their divine Master, and to minister in spiritual things to their souls. ”

“ After passing over the ages and generations of the children of men for about six thousand years, we will come to the present congregation and say the right of heirship is the same now that it was in the beginning. It is as it was and as it ever will be, worlds without end. This I wish the Latter-day Saints to understand a little better than they have heretofore. I will give you my reason.
For instance, there are sisters in this Church that have been bereaved of their husbands, who died full of faith in the holy Gospel and full of hope for a glorious resurrection to eternal life. ”

“ The dedication of our children to the Lord is one of the first acts of the religious ministry of home. All the means of grace will be of no avail without it. What will the acts of the gospel minister avail if they are not preceded by an offering of himself to the Lord who has called him? His holy vocation demands such an offering. It is his voluntary response to and acceptance of his calling of God. Thus with Christian parents. What will baptism avail, so far as the parents are concerned, without this dedication of their children to Him in whose name they are baptised? ”

“ Note, Sometimes those that have the smallest estates have the most numerous progeny; but he that sends mouths will be sure to send meat. 2. That religion shall continue in the family: " He shall not want a man to stand before me, to serve me." Though they are neither priests nor levites, nor appear to have had any post in the temple service, yet in a constant course of regular devotion, they stand before God, to minister to him. Note, (1.) The greatest blessing that can be entailed upon a family is to have the worship of God kept up in it from generation to generation. ”

“ When we do not, by family-worship, instruction and government, consecrate our houses to God, as Bethels, to his service. If God be the founder of the family, if domestic deliverances, mercies, and trials, come from God? where is his honour and fear? How ungrateful to forget, or conceal, the goodness of such a gracious Father! If children and servants, and visiters in a family, near the worship of God, how is Christ confessed under that roof? The worst of the heathen shall be witnesses against these families, falsely called Christians, in the day of the Lord. ”

“ How many Christian parents could be found in any Church who habitually set apart a portion of the sacred day, to be employed in singing and praying with their children, and instructing them in the knowledge of Christ and his salvation? What would be the effect, if all professing Christian parents were in the habit of spending an hour with their children this way each Sabbath! [Pg 48] Would not the baptized youth of our congregation be a very different race of beings from what they now are? ”

“ The highest family life is that consecrated by Religion. The household where God is acknowledged, from which the members go regularly together to the house of God, within whose walls is heard the voice of prayer and praise, is the ideal Christian family. In such a family the father is the priest, daily offering up prayers for those whom God has given him, at the family altar. He makes it his duty, and regards it as his privilege to bring up his children in "the nurture and admonition of the Lord," and by personal example and teaching to train them up as members of the household of faith. ”

“ Our Holy Father, Pope Leo XIII., with an ever-watchful eye to the necessities of our time, has seen the importance of a devotion to the Holy Family, and has recommended it to the faithful, and with his own authority established a sodality of the Holy Family; he has invested it with many indulgences in order to encourage the faithful in taking the Holy Family as their model. Here is, then, a practical way to teach ourselves the way of salvation by the example of others. ”

“ It is held by all who practise infant baptism, that the children of believers have a peculiar relation to the church. That relation is very generally expressed by the word membership. We have treatises, by the most orthodox divines, on the church-membership of the children of believers; which children they freely call members of the Christian church; and, in catechisms and confessions of faith, the church of Christ is declared to consist of such as are in covenant relations with God, and their offspring. ”

“ Each member has been baptized with the same baptism, been sanctified by the same Holy Spirit. They have all been pardoned for their sins through the same Precious Blood, do all eat of the same spiritual food, the Body and Blood of Christ. Then, to come to natural reasons, they are bound together by the tie of blood, by the tie of parental and filial affection; they live together, pray together, rejoice together, suffer together. So there is every reason why the Christian family should be united; and if it is to fulfil its mission properly it must be united, or it will be brought to desolation. ”

“ But to you, my brother, shall, by the authority of our God, and Lord Jesus Christ, be subject not only those bishops you shall ordain, and those that shall be ordained by the bishop of York, but also all the priests in Britain; to the end that from the mouth and life of your holiness they may learn the rule of believing rightly, and living well, and fulfilling their office in faith and good manners, they may, when it shall please the Lord, attain the heavenly kingdom. God preserve you in safety, most reverend brother. ”

“ Pour down Thy blessing, O Lord, on Thy holy Church, on our holy Father, the Pope, on this Diocess, on our Right Reverend Bishop and on all Pastors of souls; on this country, on our rulers, and all superiors, temporal and spiritual; on this congregation,, on this family, on our parents, relatives, benefactors, friends and enemies. Help the poor, the sick, and those who are in their agony. Convert all sinners, and enlighten all heretics and infidels. ”

“ Instances are on record where as many as twelve children in one family have all come into the light of Present Truth and consecrated, as a result of the life and teachings of a noble father and mother. There is a family interest on the part of the Heavenly Father in every family that rightly seeks His face. Not a crown is available for others, so long as even one child of one of the consecrated is ready to run for that crown. ”

“ Jesus said: “The people of another age will better understand the gospel of the kingdom when it is presented in terms expressive of the family relationship—when man understands religion as the teaching of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man, sonship with God.” Then the Master discoursed at some length on the earthly family as an illustration of the heavenly family, restating the two fundamental laws of living: the first commandment of love for the father, the head of the family, and the second com- mandment of mutual love among the children, to love your brother as yourself. ”

“ Inasmuch as the said bishop lives with steadfast hopes of greater progress and advancement if he were again aided and reënforced with other laborers of their order, such as they, and resembling them, the sacred Congregation, attentive to this, petitions your Paternity, with the affection and earnestness that the salvation of so many souls merits, to effect and strive anew, with all the earnestness and care possible, to provide new religious and workers for those so remote and needy regions. We assure your Paternity that it will be a great service to God and to the holy apostolic see. ”

“ Now there were great multitudes that followed along with Jesus. He turned around and said to them, If any man comes to me, and does not forsake his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yes, and his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple. ”

“ You are here in order to labor at your salvation. When you are sufficiently instructed in our holy Roman Catholic and apostolic religion, you shall take the eternal vows to enter our Order of the Augustinians. You will then be allowed to see your parents again. You are not to leave this cell before taking the veil. You will be allowed out every day only to take a little walk under the archway of the cloister, in the company of one of our sisters. ”

“ WILL your Ladyship and honoured sister be pleased to accept, though late, my most hearty and grateful acknowledgments for all the kindnesses you conferred on me when at A―― place. They are noted in his book, who has promised, “That a cup of cold water given in the name of a disciple, shall in no wise lose its reward.” What a beneficent master does the christian serve! Who would but be his disciple, whose service is perfect freedom here, and who hath reserved in heaven a crown of glory for those that love him hereafter? ”

“ Every child of God, by virtue of his birthright into God’s family, a family of priests to God, had the right to perform any and every service connected with the Church of God, limited only by God’s directions and by the ability to do it decently and in order. ”

“ They are fathers. They hold the evangelical office in the Church. It is their business and right to bestow blessings upon the people, to make promises unto them in the name of the Lord, as it may be given them by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to comfort them in the hours of sorrow and trouble, to strengthen their faith by the promises that shall be made to them through the Spirit of God, and to be fathers indeed of the people, leading them into all truth.—Oct. ”

“ They will be attracted to the sanctuary of their fathers and attached to the faith and worship of those among whom they have been solemnly dedicated to God. How often in after years do we in fact see them coming themselves and esteeming it a privilege to bring their own children to receive, as they have received, the seal of the covenant!—The baptized are, further, candidates for all the immunities of Christ's house. They may come to the Lord's table as soon as they have attained to the requisite knowledge and piety. ”

“ These children of the Church will be found a Catholic or universal people, collected from all ages and nations, offering the same sacrifice, administering or receiving the same sacraments, and yielding to the same authority a reasonable obedience. Finally, there will be found included in this great family the Apostles and their disciples, and the descendants of those disciples,—faithful men keeping the deposit of the faith, or transmitting it to others through all the vicissitudes to which this world is a prey, even to that hour when the dead will arise and come to judgment. ”

“ The disciple of Christ is the man, or woman, or child who learns of him. When you are about the farm with Cephas, you are his disciple, in sewing and mending you are Aunt Rody’s, in housekeeping generally you are my disciple. ”

“ We must solemnly commit ourselves, our families, and all our family affairs, to God's guidance and care, must pray for his presence and blessing, must devote ourselves and all ours to his glory, and must resolve both that we put away iniquity far from our tabernacles and that we and our houses will serve the Lord both in the duties of family worship and in all instances of gospel obedience. ”

“ We who, being unworthy, have been appointed shepherds in the Church of Christ, and are styled Heads therein, and have been constituted Fathers of the flock, and brethren of the Heads, in an excellent manner, do ordain for you a profitable ordinance, the end and design of which is praiseworthy and excellent, since you are our brethren, the children of the baptism of our Lord Christ, especially in this age in which we have filled up the troubles which you have endured. ”