In the month of April we looked at what it means to be a disciple of Christ. This month we’re looking at the fruits of discipleship.

Jesus was a Jewish Rabbi, with Jewish disciples living in a first-century Jewish world. The majority of Jewish kids from the age of six would attend school to learn the Torah, they would learn the Torah from the age of six to ten and by the end of that time they would have the first five books of the Bible (the instruction) completely memorised. That’s Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy by heart.

The Torah was the foundation of their lives, the focus of the first-century Jewish educational system. From 10 years old, most kids would move on to the family household, to learn the family trade. The best of the best though, would continue going. They would commit to heart the rest of the Hebrew scriptures; that’s Genesis through to Malachi… Memorised. Cazy!

Now after that almost all children left would then return home to learn the family trade and be taught in household things – but the outliers, those who showed extreme promise, they aimed to become Rabbis. So the next step would be to become the disciple of a Rabbi.

Now our common understanding of ‘disciple’ is simply to be a pupil or student. But a disciple in the Hebrew sense of the word doesn’t just mean student – the word disciple is so much more holistic, it means to be like that rabbi.

Rabbis had varying interpretations of the Torah. One rabbi might interpret a verse in one way, while another might interpret it differently. Each rabbi’s interpretation was known as their “yoke.” So, when someone became a disciple of a rabbi, they took on that rabbi’s yoke.

If you applied to be a disciple of a rabbi and the rabbi interviewed you, thinking to himself, “This kid has what it takes. He knows the Torah, he loves God, he can bear my yoke,” the rabbi would say, “Come, follow me.” The new disciple would then leave everything he owned to follow his rabbi.

He would devote his entire life to becoming like his rabbi.

First-century Jewish Rabbis travelled from town to town by foot with their pack of disciples following closely behind – travelling on these dusty, hot , sandy roads you’d simply have everything your rabbi stepped in caked all over the front of you. and there was a saying that from that…

“May you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.”⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Similarly, we aim to walk so closely with Jesus that we are caked in his dust. The fruits of our discipleship to Him mean that we think like him, talk like him, and do what he does.

These are the fruits of discipleship — to be covered in the dust of our rabbi… Jesus.