In the Dust of the Rabbi (2006–…): Season 6, Episode 1 - When the Rabbi Says, 'Come' - full transcript
BRR
BRR
(male narrator)
Jesus the Messiah came
to the world of the Middle East
to places called Judea,
Samaria, Galilee,
the Decapolis.
He was born in Bethlehem.
Moved to Nazareth,
grew up there and taught
for several years centered
in the area called Galilee.
We've come to this part
ofthe world to see
how Jesus made disciples.
We're at a city
called Scythopolis,
about 15 miles from where
he grew up in Nazareth.
But this city is not
what people often think of
when they think
of the world of Jesus.
This is a city
of arena, theater,
university called
gymnasium, temples.
Of wide streets, and sewers
and running water.
An amazing place.
And yet Jesus didnt choose
any of his disciples from here.
So where did he go
to find disciples?
Come, let me show you.
These simple ruins are
the remains of a small village
here in Galilee
called Bethsaida.
It meant "Fishington®
or “fishing village".
Probably 6-800 people at most,
maybe in 8 to 10 families.
Not far from the shore
of the sea of Galilee.
Not the kind of place I
would think ofto go to
find disciples who are going
to change the world.
Look around you.
Just a simple,
what's called an insula.
Extended family lived here.
Over here I see
what they think is the kitchen.
Just a small room,
maybe 40, 50, 60 people lived
in this community and that's
where they prepared food.
There's kind
of a residence room,
maybe a sleeping room
or a room where people worked.
Here's an open courtyard
just out under the sky.
But notice, no theaters,
no stadium, no university,
gymnasium as we
saw it yesterday.
Just very simple,
rural village in Galilee.
He came here.
To me,
shocking, stunning.
What in the world is he doing
leaving there to come here?
He's in an area here called
the triangle, by some.
It's a place
where religious Jewish folks
lived
in the first century.
People who were
passionate about God,
passionate
about their way of life.
Passionate about obedience,
passionate about the text.
And they lived
in small villages.
Up there is Korazin,
and over there is Capemaum.
And this one is called
Bethsaida-Fishington.
Just a simple village.
Now, I'd like to have
you picture something.
Imagine in this courtyard
children playing,
mom and dad sitting over
there, grandpa and--
Children playing.
Imagine now, five little boys—-
dark hair, dark eyes.
Running around in
some kind of game.
You see them?
Let me give you
some names.
Peter.
Andrew.
James.
John.
Phillip.
Al five of those disciples,
came from this village.
Think of who came out
of this little town.
Atown of a few hundred people,
maybe 6,8, 10 family units.
All of whom
knew each other.
Think of who came out
of this place.
I'll say it again.
Peter.
Andrew.
James.
John
and Phillip.
Now, can you imagine that Jesus
came here to this simple place,
simple stones,
ordinary way of life,
and picked those five young men
to be his disciples?
So why does he
come here?
Well, I don't know the answer
to that question.
There probably are many answers,
some of which I may never know,
or you either.
But, it's in Galilee,
right here,
where the whole idea
of disciple
was most prominent
in the ancient world.
This is where people came
to be disciples
ofthe great Rabbis.
God had arranged history
so that out of all the places
in the world, this is where that
whole practice was happening.
And so Jesus came here
to make disciples.
So what's a disciple?
What really was it?
And does that help us
to understand both
why Jesus' message exploded
out into the world?
And does it have anything
to say about
what it means
to be a disciple today?
So if you'll come with me,
let's go find out
what was discipleship.
Come.
Vife've come about three miles
west of Bethsaida.
Vife're a little bit north
of the Sea of Galilee.
And we're in the ruins
of a town called Korazin.
It was a little bigger than
Bethsaida was in biblical times.
But not terribly large,
maybe somewhere
inthe area 0f2000 or so.
And you can see
its construction,
the color of the stones,
the way it's laid out,
is really what you saw
at Bethsaida,
not much different.
About the same economic level,
no fishing here of course
because we're away
from the sea.
Vife've come here
because we want to know
what did it mean
to be a disciple.
What's a disciple?
Well, I'd like to suggest there
are several building blocks.
One is represented here.
They lived in community.
In this insula was an extended
family: grandpas, grandmas,
moms, dads, cousins, uncles,
aunts—an extended family.
Maybe more than 100
people who lived here,
around this central courtyard
and their whole life
was knit together.
They had
the same occupation.
They had the same
commitment to God.
They went together
to the feast in Jerusalem.
Their life with God
was a community life.
So they supported one another,
encouraged one another,
coected one another.
And one of the building blocks
of discipleship is community.
They were willing
to live with a rabbi
as a community
of disciples.
The world we live in we tend
to think of ourselves
as individuals.
In their world they were willing
to be a community
because that's
where they grew up.
They understood that
the community is more important
than the individual.
But not every person in
a community became a disciple.
So there's got
to be more.
Come, I'l show you.
Vife've come
to the synagogue.
It's really neat how it's
so close to where people lived.
Soit's just a few hundred feet
and you're in the synagogue.
This was a significant part
of the life ofthe people
who lived in this town.
Their whole world
revolved, in a way,
around what went
on in the synagogue.
Itwas a place of
community gathering,
it's a place where they
came to worship God.
It's a place where they
joined on the Sabbath day.
It's a place where
the rabbis came to teach--
either visiting rabbis
from other towns,
or their own rabbis.
Over here Moses seat.
The person who was going to read
the words of Moses and the Torah
got to sit here to remind them
that these are words God
had given them
through Moses.
And over here,
what's called the Holy Arc,
the Torah closet where
the most precious possession
of the town was found--
the Torah, and the rest
of the Hebrew Bible
called Tenach.
Nothing more sacred.
Nothing more special
to them than that scroll.
And they would come here on the
Sabbath day and on other days
and with pomp
and circumstance
they would take out that scroll,
carefully uncover it,
hold it up to show you that the
words are still on the paper.
And the people's
hearts would dance,
sometimes their feet
would dance.
People would reach up to touch
the outside of the scroll
and then touch it
to their lips to say
“May his words
taste sweet.
We love your word."
hat's the heart ofwhat
I would have you see here.
Yeah, synagogue is communal,
synagogue is about worshiping
and praising God, but this is
what makes synagogue, synagogue.
Because you see God
has spoken.
His text.
His very words that he's
entrusted to us to tell us
who he is, who we are
and how to live.
And there's no building block
more important to discipleship
than the building block
ofthe Bible.
The scriptures
to these people from Galilee.
So the rabbis
would come here.
This is the only place
where the scrolls were found.
People couldn't afford
to have their own generally.
So you came here because that's
where the word of God was
and you would sit, several
rabbis with their disciples,
and they would hear
the scripture read.
And then they could
teach and discuss.
This is where they gathered
to debate because not everyone
agreed how to interpret and
how to read these words.
And this is
where Jesus came.
The Bible says he went
to all the towns and villages
in Galilee and taught
in their synagogues.
So picture Jesus,
delight in his eyes,
as the scroll of Isaiah
or of Leviticus
or of Deuteronomy came out
and he could raise it
and share with his audience
those words.
So a building block, a big one,
in the concept of discipleship
is the importance
ofthe scriptures.
But not everybody in synagogue,
and not everybody
who knew scripture
became a disciple.
There's more.
Come with me,
and let's see.
This probably
was the school connected
to the synagogue
of Korazin.
Find a seat.
Every synagogue has one,
this is unusually large,
believe it or not,
for a school.
Sowhat did it take
to be a disciple:
What was it?
How did you
become one?
Well it really starts in the
community and in the synagogue,
but it really starts here.
In this Jewish world
ofthe first century
people went to school,
boys and girls apparently.
Elementary school
is called Beth Sefer—
place of reading
and writing.
The curriculum of this school
was the Torah,
the first five books
ofthe Bible.
Kids leamed to read,
to write, to recite,
so that by the time they
finished Beth Sefer,
maybe around age 12 or 13,
many of them knew large parts
of the Torah by memory,
could recite it,
knew what was in the book.
Knew how to understand it
and even explain it.
An amazing thing
how well educated this world was
in the text
ofthe Bible.
At that point
many were finished.
Girls would soon may, take
their place in the community
as mother and as wife
and the things that women did
in that culture.
Most boys began
to leam the family trade.
They would move on to the
trade, whatever it was,
every insula had its own
trade--there were potters,
and there were leather workers
and there were olive producers
and each one had a trade
and the son would come home
and learn the trade
with his father,
with his grandfather,
with his uncles and cousins.
But there would be a few
who would have the ability,
and the passion—probably more
important than the ability—
to move on
to the next level.
There was a secondary school
in this world
ofthe Galilee
called Beth Midrash.
The rabbi that the synagogue
would employ
would teach Beth Midrash,
apparently.
And folks who weren't
busy at the time,
the olives are harvested,
or the wheat is planted,
could come and sit
in Beth Midrash
and hear the rabbis
discuss the text--
explaining it,
debating it
with those
of other points of view.
But there were a few
who went to Beth Midrash
because they had the ability
and the passion to go farther.
Young men, typically,
somewhere ages 12,13, 14,15,
would go on to Beth Midrash
and to begin to study
the deeper meanings of the Torah
and move on into the Tenach.
Begin to read the prophets
and the writings, again,
memorizing large portions
ofthat part of the word of God.
And then for the few,
the very few
who displayed unusual ability,
it became a possibility
to become what in Hebrew
is called talmid.
Say talmid.
Plural talmidim.
Say talmidim.
Now that's the word in Hebrew
that we translate
as disciple
in English.
So when you read
the life of Jesus
you realize he had 500
at one point.
He's got a smaller group
of 70 that he sends out.
And then he's got that really
close knit group we call the 12.
It's really the 12
who are
what the Hebrew word
talmid describes.
How did you
become a talmid?
Well, first of all
it's helpful
to know the meaning
of the word.
When we take that English word
disciple there's often a sense,
I find in the Christian world,
that a disciple is someone
who wants
to know something.
Wants to know
what the teacher knows.
Orin our case
what Jesus taught.
But a talmid is much,
much deeper than that
because the Hebrew word talmid
means or refers to someone
who wants to be
what the rabbi is.
Now think about that
for a moment.
Yeah, you want to know
what the rabbi knows,
you want to know
what he teaches:
But it's much deeper
than that.
Iwant to be in my walk
with God like the rabbi.
I may have a
different personality,
I may have a different taste
in this or that,
but when it comes to my walk
with God [want to be
just like the rabbi.
And that took both a deep
commitment to learn
the scripture the way
the rabbi knew it,
and many of them knew
the Hebrew bible by memory
or largely by memory.
But it also took a passion,
a deep level of commitment
to say no matter what the cost
I am willing to give up
everything in order
to be like the rabbi.
Aconsuming passion.
They lived with him
24 hours a day.
They watch everything they do
because how else will I know
how to become
like my rabbi.
Now before we talk a little bit
about how you become a talmid,
let me ask a question
that I ask myself.
Are you a talmid?
Are you a disciple?
Now think about how a Christian
might answer that question.
Well yeah, I believe in Jesus
so I'm a disciple.
Oryeah, I belong—
no, no, stop a moment.
If you cannot say, if I cannot
say that we are consumed every
minute of every day to be like
the one we call the rabbi--
that we wake up with it,
that we go to sleep with it,
that it drives us, that it
pushes us into this text,
that we spend serious time
with him so we can
become like the rabbi.
Ifwe cannot say that we really
cannot call ourselves disciples
in the Biblical sense.
Inthat sense [wonder sometimes
ifin Christianity we really
don't have discipleship in
the classic, Biblical model.
How consumed are you
towant to be like Jesus
more than anything else
in the whole world?
Do you have the fire?
Do you have the passion?
So how badly do we
want to be like Jesus?
Now as we leave here and go
to another part of the world,
where these disciples went,
remember that the heart
and soul of who they were was
that passion to be like Jesus.
So how did you
become one?
Well,
you went to school.
Beth Sefer, Beth Midrash,
and you knew the text.
And then when it was time
to say you know what,
I have that ability from God
and I have the fire in my heart,
lwant to become
like my rabbi.
Youwould find a rabbi
that you wanted to be like.
You would listen
to his teaching,
you would see how he lived
and how he walked
in his daily walk
with God.
And then you might go to him
and say, "May I follow you?"
Now he might observe you
for a while.
He might invite you
to walk behind him for a while
50 he could get
to know you.
He might ask you
some questions.
And on that basis
ifhe saw the fire
in your soul
that he was looking for
and if he recognized
you had the knowledge
of the text and the ability
to understand the deeper things
of scripture, he might
say, "Come, follows me.”
In other words,
come be like me.
But honestly, most likely,
most people were turned down.
Because to be
like the rabbi
demanded an unbelievable
level of discipline.
Imagine memorizing
the whole Old Testament.
It demanded a fire that fev
of us can even comprehend
to doing the things
that they would do.
So most eventually
said, you know what,
God didn't give me
those gifts.
I'l sit in Beth Midrash
and listen to the great rabbis.
I'l learn Torah, but I'm going
to go into the family business.
The few who made it
got to be disciples.
They would walk
with the rabbi everyday,
24 hours a day if possible,
for several years
until at last the rabbi said,
“Youve made it!
Go make
your own disciples.”
So weve asked the question
of ourselves, are we disciples?
Do we have the fire
and passion?
Nou let's notice something
else about Jesus.
You see, typically, the rabbi
waited for the disciple
to come and say
may I follow you?
Instead Jesus went out, found
people doing ordinary things
like fishing and said,
“Excuse me: Come, follows me.
Come, follow me."
Now stop and think
about that for a moment.
What does it tell you
that Peter and Andrew
and James and John
were fishing?
They didn't get
into any other rabbi school.
True, two ofthem had been
with John the Baptist.
But even then,
they're back fishing.
They didn't have apparently,
the training, the skill,
they didn't have something
that the rabbis looked for.
So they were satisfied and said,
ok we'll be Godly fishermen.
But we aren't good enough.
And Jesus went and he said,
“I think you could be like me."
He picked ordinary people that
hadn't made the all-star team.
Hadn't been the valedictorians
ofthe synagogue.
Not onlythat
but he chose them.
Did you ever have it
in your life
that nobody
believed in you?
Or have it in your life that
all of the sudden someone did
believe in you and it tumed
your whole life around?
Jesus went out and he said
to those guys,
“Listen, I think you
could be like me.
“I believe in you.
“I know you.
“I know what you're like.
“I know what I am.
And I know you could be like
me so you come and follow me."
Enormous.
See you can walk out of this
synagogue school today
and say wont
be a disciple.
But you cannot walk out
and say I cant,
because Jesus has said,
“I believe in you."
And that's huge.
These guys knew, deep inside,
that they could be
by the grace of God,
the direction ofthe scripture,
the filing ofthe Holy,
I understand all those things.
But they understood
that they could indeed
become like Jesus
as he enabled them.
And that was enormous
in this culture
where most
didn't make it.
Jesus said to them,
"Remember,
you did not choose me
I chose you."
But think of what it means
that Jesus believed
that his followers could,
by the grace of God,
with a fire in their chest
become like him.
That's, I think, a consuming
passion that we need to seek
in our Christian
world today.
Now that didn't happen
all of the sudden.
Ifyou read your New Testament
you discover that
often these guys
weren't very much like Jesus.
It took time.
But what they did is to spend
every day, all day with Jesus.
They walked
with him to Jerusalem.
They walked with him
in these canyons.
They sat
with him the synagogue.
They even went looking for him
when he found a few minutes
to go off alone
and pray.
Because they wanted to be
with him all the time.
So let's ask our self
a third question.
We've asked "do we have the fire
that we want to be like Jesus
more than anything else
in the whole world?"
We've asked ourselves,
do we really understand
what it means
that he believes in us?
Now let's ask
ourselves a question,
how much time
do we spend with him?
Without being
immersed in the text,
which is the only way I
know of to know the rabbi.
Hows will we ever know him
well enough to be with him,
and to be like him?
It's not only about the fire
in your chest
to want to be
like him:
It's not only the conviction
that he believes in me.
It's the passion to say I will
spend the time I need
to spend
to be with him.
Say these words
after me:
Astudent is not
above his teacher.
A student is not
above his teacher.
It is enough--
It is enough
for a student
to be like his teacher.
for a student
fo be like his teacher.
How badly do we want
to be like Jesus?
And so he took them,
out of these little villages,
out of their synagogues,
out of their synagogue schools,
away from the fishing
boats and said come.
And off he went into the
countryside to other villages,
even to Phonecia
and the Decapolis,
eventually to Jerusalem
to die.
And wherever he went they went
with him and they watched him.
They heard him teach:
obey God.
They heard him interpret
the Hebrew Bible.
Who is my neighbor,
Leviticus 19:18.
hat does it mean
that my yoke is easy?
And slowly but surely
these young men from here
became like their rabbi,
bythe grace of God of course.
And the world's
never been the same.
And now it's our turn.
How badly do you want
to be like Jesus?
BRR
(male narrator)
Jesus the Messiah came
to the world of the Middle East
to places called Judea,
Samaria, Galilee,
the Decapolis.
He was born in Bethlehem.
Moved to Nazareth,
grew up there and taught
for several years centered
in the area called Galilee.
We've come to this part
ofthe world to see
how Jesus made disciples.
We're at a city
called Scythopolis,
about 15 miles from where
he grew up in Nazareth.
But this city is not
what people often think of
when they think
of the world of Jesus.
This is a city
of arena, theater,
university called
gymnasium, temples.
Of wide streets, and sewers
and running water.
An amazing place.
And yet Jesus didnt choose
any of his disciples from here.
So where did he go
to find disciples?
Come, let me show you.
These simple ruins are
the remains of a small village
here in Galilee
called Bethsaida.
It meant "Fishington®
or “fishing village".
Probably 6-800 people at most,
maybe in 8 to 10 families.
Not far from the shore
of the sea of Galilee.
Not the kind of place I
would think ofto go to
find disciples who are going
to change the world.
Look around you.
Just a simple,
what's called an insula.
Extended family lived here.
Over here I see
what they think is the kitchen.
Just a small room,
maybe 40, 50, 60 people lived
in this community and that's
where they prepared food.
There's kind
of a residence room,
maybe a sleeping room
or a room where people worked.
Here's an open courtyard
just out under the sky.
But notice, no theaters,
no stadium, no university,
gymnasium as we
saw it yesterday.
Just very simple,
rural village in Galilee.
He came here.
To me,
shocking, stunning.
What in the world is he doing
leaving there to come here?
He's in an area here called
the triangle, by some.
It's a place
where religious Jewish folks
lived
in the first century.
People who were
passionate about God,
passionate
about their way of life.
Passionate about obedience,
passionate about the text.
And they lived
in small villages.
Up there is Korazin,
and over there is Capemaum.
And this one is called
Bethsaida-Fishington.
Just a simple village.
Now, I'd like to have
you picture something.
Imagine in this courtyard
children playing,
mom and dad sitting over
there, grandpa and--
Children playing.
Imagine now, five little boys—-
dark hair, dark eyes.
Running around in
some kind of game.
You see them?
Let me give you
some names.
Peter.
Andrew.
James.
John.
Phillip.
Al five of those disciples,
came from this village.
Think of who came out
of this little town.
Atown of a few hundred people,
maybe 6,8, 10 family units.
All of whom
knew each other.
Think of who came out
of this place.
I'll say it again.
Peter.
Andrew.
James.
John
and Phillip.
Now, can you imagine that Jesus
came here to this simple place,
simple stones,
ordinary way of life,
and picked those five young men
to be his disciples?
So why does he
come here?
Well, I don't know the answer
to that question.
There probably are many answers,
some of which I may never know,
or you either.
But, it's in Galilee,
right here,
where the whole idea
of disciple
was most prominent
in the ancient world.
This is where people came
to be disciples
ofthe great Rabbis.
God had arranged history
so that out of all the places
in the world, this is where that
whole practice was happening.
And so Jesus came here
to make disciples.
So what's a disciple?
What really was it?
And does that help us
to understand both
why Jesus' message exploded
out into the world?
And does it have anything
to say about
what it means
to be a disciple today?
So if you'll come with me,
let's go find out
what was discipleship.
Come.
Vife've come about three miles
west of Bethsaida.
Vife're a little bit north
of the Sea of Galilee.
And we're in the ruins
of a town called Korazin.
It was a little bigger than
Bethsaida was in biblical times.
But not terribly large,
maybe somewhere
inthe area 0f2000 or so.
And you can see
its construction,
the color of the stones,
the way it's laid out,
is really what you saw
at Bethsaida,
not much different.
About the same economic level,
no fishing here of course
because we're away
from the sea.
Vife've come here
because we want to know
what did it mean
to be a disciple.
What's a disciple?
Well, I'd like to suggest there
are several building blocks.
One is represented here.
They lived in community.
In this insula was an extended
family: grandpas, grandmas,
moms, dads, cousins, uncles,
aunts—an extended family.
Maybe more than 100
people who lived here,
around this central courtyard
and their whole life
was knit together.
They had
the same occupation.
They had the same
commitment to God.
They went together
to the feast in Jerusalem.
Their life with God
was a community life.
So they supported one another,
encouraged one another,
coected one another.
And one of the building blocks
of discipleship is community.
They were willing
to live with a rabbi
as a community
of disciples.
The world we live in we tend
to think of ourselves
as individuals.
In their world they were willing
to be a community
because that's
where they grew up.
They understood that
the community is more important
than the individual.
But not every person in
a community became a disciple.
So there's got
to be more.
Come, I'l show you.
Vife've come
to the synagogue.
It's really neat how it's
so close to where people lived.
Soit's just a few hundred feet
and you're in the synagogue.
This was a significant part
of the life ofthe people
who lived in this town.
Their whole world
revolved, in a way,
around what went
on in the synagogue.
Itwas a place of
community gathering,
it's a place where they
came to worship God.
It's a place where they
joined on the Sabbath day.
It's a place where
the rabbis came to teach--
either visiting rabbis
from other towns,
or their own rabbis.
Over here Moses seat.
The person who was going to read
the words of Moses and the Torah
got to sit here to remind them
that these are words God
had given them
through Moses.
And over here,
what's called the Holy Arc,
the Torah closet where
the most precious possession
of the town was found--
the Torah, and the rest
of the Hebrew Bible
called Tenach.
Nothing more sacred.
Nothing more special
to them than that scroll.
And they would come here on the
Sabbath day and on other days
and with pomp
and circumstance
they would take out that scroll,
carefully uncover it,
hold it up to show you that the
words are still on the paper.
And the people's
hearts would dance,
sometimes their feet
would dance.
People would reach up to touch
the outside of the scroll
and then touch it
to their lips to say
“May his words
taste sweet.
We love your word."
hat's the heart ofwhat
I would have you see here.
Yeah, synagogue is communal,
synagogue is about worshiping
and praising God, but this is
what makes synagogue, synagogue.
Because you see God
has spoken.
His text.
His very words that he's
entrusted to us to tell us
who he is, who we are
and how to live.
And there's no building block
more important to discipleship
than the building block
ofthe Bible.
The scriptures
to these people from Galilee.
So the rabbis
would come here.
This is the only place
where the scrolls were found.
People couldn't afford
to have their own generally.
So you came here because that's
where the word of God was
and you would sit, several
rabbis with their disciples,
and they would hear
the scripture read.
And then they could
teach and discuss.
This is where they gathered
to debate because not everyone
agreed how to interpret and
how to read these words.
And this is
where Jesus came.
The Bible says he went
to all the towns and villages
in Galilee and taught
in their synagogues.
So picture Jesus,
delight in his eyes,
as the scroll of Isaiah
or of Leviticus
or of Deuteronomy came out
and he could raise it
and share with his audience
those words.
So a building block, a big one,
in the concept of discipleship
is the importance
ofthe scriptures.
But not everybody in synagogue,
and not everybody
who knew scripture
became a disciple.
There's more.
Come with me,
and let's see.
This probably
was the school connected
to the synagogue
of Korazin.
Find a seat.
Every synagogue has one,
this is unusually large,
believe it or not,
for a school.
Sowhat did it take
to be a disciple:
What was it?
How did you
become one?
Well it really starts in the
community and in the synagogue,
but it really starts here.
In this Jewish world
ofthe first century
people went to school,
boys and girls apparently.
Elementary school
is called Beth Sefer—
place of reading
and writing.
The curriculum of this school
was the Torah,
the first five books
ofthe Bible.
Kids leamed to read,
to write, to recite,
so that by the time they
finished Beth Sefer,
maybe around age 12 or 13,
many of them knew large parts
of the Torah by memory,
could recite it,
knew what was in the book.
Knew how to understand it
and even explain it.
An amazing thing
how well educated this world was
in the text
ofthe Bible.
At that point
many were finished.
Girls would soon may, take
their place in the community
as mother and as wife
and the things that women did
in that culture.
Most boys began
to leam the family trade.
They would move on to the
trade, whatever it was,
every insula had its own
trade--there were potters,
and there were leather workers
and there were olive producers
and each one had a trade
and the son would come home
and learn the trade
with his father,
with his grandfather,
with his uncles and cousins.
But there would be a few
who would have the ability,
and the passion—probably more
important than the ability—
to move on
to the next level.
There was a secondary school
in this world
ofthe Galilee
called Beth Midrash.
The rabbi that the synagogue
would employ
would teach Beth Midrash,
apparently.
And folks who weren't
busy at the time,
the olives are harvested,
or the wheat is planted,
could come and sit
in Beth Midrash
and hear the rabbis
discuss the text--
explaining it,
debating it
with those
of other points of view.
But there were a few
who went to Beth Midrash
because they had the ability
and the passion to go farther.
Young men, typically,
somewhere ages 12,13, 14,15,
would go on to Beth Midrash
and to begin to study
the deeper meanings of the Torah
and move on into the Tenach.
Begin to read the prophets
and the writings, again,
memorizing large portions
ofthat part of the word of God.
And then for the few,
the very few
who displayed unusual ability,
it became a possibility
to become what in Hebrew
is called talmid.
Say talmid.
Plural talmidim.
Say talmidim.
Now that's the word in Hebrew
that we translate
as disciple
in English.
So when you read
the life of Jesus
you realize he had 500
at one point.
He's got a smaller group
of 70 that he sends out.
And then he's got that really
close knit group we call the 12.
It's really the 12
who are
what the Hebrew word
talmid describes.
How did you
become a talmid?
Well, first of all
it's helpful
to know the meaning
of the word.
When we take that English word
disciple there's often a sense,
I find in the Christian world,
that a disciple is someone
who wants
to know something.
Wants to know
what the teacher knows.
Orin our case
what Jesus taught.
But a talmid is much,
much deeper than that
because the Hebrew word talmid
means or refers to someone
who wants to be
what the rabbi is.
Now think about that
for a moment.
Yeah, you want to know
what the rabbi knows,
you want to know
what he teaches:
But it's much deeper
than that.
Iwant to be in my walk
with God like the rabbi.
I may have a
different personality,
I may have a different taste
in this or that,
but when it comes to my walk
with God [want to be
just like the rabbi.
And that took both a deep
commitment to learn
the scripture the way
the rabbi knew it,
and many of them knew
the Hebrew bible by memory
or largely by memory.
But it also took a passion,
a deep level of commitment
to say no matter what the cost
I am willing to give up
everything in order
to be like the rabbi.
Aconsuming passion.
They lived with him
24 hours a day.
They watch everything they do
because how else will I know
how to become
like my rabbi.
Now before we talk a little bit
about how you become a talmid,
let me ask a question
that I ask myself.
Are you a talmid?
Are you a disciple?
Now think about how a Christian
might answer that question.
Well yeah, I believe in Jesus
so I'm a disciple.
Oryeah, I belong—
no, no, stop a moment.
If you cannot say, if I cannot
say that we are consumed every
minute of every day to be like
the one we call the rabbi--
that we wake up with it,
that we go to sleep with it,
that it drives us, that it
pushes us into this text,
that we spend serious time
with him so we can
become like the rabbi.
Ifwe cannot say that we really
cannot call ourselves disciples
in the Biblical sense.
Inthat sense [wonder sometimes
ifin Christianity we really
don't have discipleship in
the classic, Biblical model.
How consumed are you
towant to be like Jesus
more than anything else
in the whole world?
Do you have the fire?
Do you have the passion?
So how badly do we
want to be like Jesus?
Now as we leave here and go
to another part of the world,
where these disciples went,
remember that the heart
and soul of who they were was
that passion to be like Jesus.
So how did you
become one?
Well,
you went to school.
Beth Sefer, Beth Midrash,
and you knew the text.
And then when it was time
to say you know what,
I have that ability from God
and I have the fire in my heart,
lwant to become
like my rabbi.
Youwould find a rabbi
that you wanted to be like.
You would listen
to his teaching,
you would see how he lived
and how he walked
in his daily walk
with God.
And then you might go to him
and say, "May I follow you?"
Now he might observe you
for a while.
He might invite you
to walk behind him for a while
50 he could get
to know you.
He might ask you
some questions.
And on that basis
ifhe saw the fire
in your soul
that he was looking for
and if he recognized
you had the knowledge
of the text and the ability
to understand the deeper things
of scripture, he might
say, "Come, follows me.”
In other words,
come be like me.
But honestly, most likely,
most people were turned down.
Because to be
like the rabbi
demanded an unbelievable
level of discipline.
Imagine memorizing
the whole Old Testament.
It demanded a fire that fev
of us can even comprehend
to doing the things
that they would do.
So most eventually
said, you know what,
God didn't give me
those gifts.
I'l sit in Beth Midrash
and listen to the great rabbis.
I'l learn Torah, but I'm going
to go into the family business.
The few who made it
got to be disciples.
They would walk
with the rabbi everyday,
24 hours a day if possible,
for several years
until at last the rabbi said,
“Youve made it!
Go make
your own disciples.”
So weve asked the question
of ourselves, are we disciples?
Do we have the fire
and passion?
Nou let's notice something
else about Jesus.
You see, typically, the rabbi
waited for the disciple
to come and say
may I follow you?
Instead Jesus went out, found
people doing ordinary things
like fishing and said,
“Excuse me: Come, follows me.
Come, follow me."
Now stop and think
about that for a moment.
What does it tell you
that Peter and Andrew
and James and John
were fishing?
They didn't get
into any other rabbi school.
True, two ofthem had been
with John the Baptist.
But even then,
they're back fishing.
They didn't have apparently,
the training, the skill,
they didn't have something
that the rabbis looked for.
So they were satisfied and said,
ok we'll be Godly fishermen.
But we aren't good enough.
And Jesus went and he said,
“I think you could be like me."
He picked ordinary people that
hadn't made the all-star team.
Hadn't been the valedictorians
ofthe synagogue.
Not onlythat
but he chose them.
Did you ever have it
in your life
that nobody
believed in you?
Or have it in your life that
all of the sudden someone did
believe in you and it tumed
your whole life around?
Jesus went out and he said
to those guys,
“Listen, I think you
could be like me.
“I believe in you.
“I know you.
“I know what you're like.
“I know what I am.
And I know you could be like
me so you come and follow me."
Enormous.
See you can walk out of this
synagogue school today
and say wont
be a disciple.
But you cannot walk out
and say I cant,
because Jesus has said,
“I believe in you."
And that's huge.
These guys knew, deep inside,
that they could be
by the grace of God,
the direction ofthe scripture,
the filing ofthe Holy,
I understand all those things.
But they understood
that they could indeed
become like Jesus
as he enabled them.
And that was enormous
in this culture
where most
didn't make it.
Jesus said to them,
"Remember,
you did not choose me
I chose you."
But think of what it means
that Jesus believed
that his followers could,
by the grace of God,
with a fire in their chest
become like him.
That's, I think, a consuming
passion that we need to seek
in our Christian
world today.
Now that didn't happen
all of the sudden.
Ifyou read your New Testament
you discover that
often these guys
weren't very much like Jesus.
It took time.
But what they did is to spend
every day, all day with Jesus.
They walked
with him to Jerusalem.
They walked with him
in these canyons.
They sat
with him the synagogue.
They even went looking for him
when he found a few minutes
to go off alone
and pray.
Because they wanted to be
with him all the time.
So let's ask our self
a third question.
We've asked "do we have the fire
that we want to be like Jesus
more than anything else
in the whole world?"
We've asked ourselves,
do we really understand
what it means
that he believes in us?
Now let's ask
ourselves a question,
how much time
do we spend with him?
Without being
immersed in the text,
which is the only way I
know of to know the rabbi.
Hows will we ever know him
well enough to be with him,
and to be like him?
It's not only about the fire
in your chest
to want to be
like him:
It's not only the conviction
that he believes in me.
It's the passion to say I will
spend the time I need
to spend
to be with him.
Say these words
after me:
Astudent is not
above his teacher.
A student is not
above his teacher.
It is enough--
It is enough
for a student
to be like his teacher.
for a student
fo be like his teacher.
How badly do we want
to be like Jesus?
And so he took them,
out of these little villages,
out of their synagogues,
out of their synagogue schools,
away from the fishing
boats and said come.
And off he went into the
countryside to other villages,
even to Phonecia
and the Decapolis,
eventually to Jerusalem
to die.
And wherever he went they went
with him and they watched him.
They heard him teach:
obey God.
They heard him interpret
the Hebrew Bible.
Who is my neighbor,
Leviticus 19:18.
hat does it mean
that my yoke is easy?
And slowly but surely
these young men from here
became like their rabbi,
bythe grace of God of course.
And the world's
never been the same.
And now it's our turn.
How badly do you want
to be like Jesus?