Discipleship

3.4. Discipleship. With the exception perhaps of Exodus or Deuteronomy, no other book of Christian Scripture is devoted as much to ethics as the First Gospel. The keynote of Matthew’s view of discipleship is radical obedience to the teachings of Jesus, summarized at times with the term righteousness (5:17–20) and at others with love (22:37–40). Disciples, or adherents (see Wilkins), are those who have radically conformed their lives to the teachings of Jesus. However, it must not be thought that Jesus expects perfection; indeed, in the pages of Matthew the disciples fail frequently. But a pattern is established in Matthew that has comforted countless followers of Jesus since then: failure is met by Jesus’ stern rebuke; Jesus’ rebuke gives way to instruction for future improvement; Jesus restores the repentant disciple (see 14:15–21).
The importance of discipleship to Matthew can be seen in the final command of Jesus: “Go, make disciples in all the nations ...” (28:19; see McKnight 1988, 111). A disciple is here defined as one who is baptized (see BAPTISM) and has been taught to obey all the teachings of Jesus (28:19–20). The essence of discipleship for Matthew is to form a new people of God that conforms to the entirety of the ethical demands of Jesus. For Matthew orthopraxis has as much importance as orthodoxy. Being a disciple is equivalent to being a Christian and to being in a position of final approval by God. The distinction between Jesus as “Savior” and Jesus as “Lord” is a modern one and wholly foreign to the message of Jesus and the Gospels.