Relearn.

I’m reading a book at the minute called ‘Understanding God’s Will’ by Kyle Lake. In it he explains how God’s will in our lives cannot be contained in a formula. God’s will is not some ‘blue print’ from which we should never deviate. It is more fluid than that, it is about living. God’s will is that we learn from him, and this is what our discipleship is all about.

I was thinking about this as I happened to read the start of Ephesians 5 and I suddenly realised these few verses are Paul perfectly describing what God’s will is for each of our lives:
“Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behaviour from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn't love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that.”
…but there is of course a warning here for us, because Paul knew [our] human nature…
“Don't allow love to turn into lust, setting off a downhill slide…” Eph 5:1-3 (Msg)

What I found interesting as I thought about the day that Jesus called his first disciples to follow [and learn from] him was what their actions revealed. When Jesus called each of them immediately left jobs, staff, family, friends, homes, businesses… everything!
What does this tell us about being a disciple?
Well, it tells me that rather than it being something else that I attach onto my life, it is my life! Unless we seek first God’s kingdom we do not seek it at all!
Homes, families, businesses, and jobs are important, and more often than not our discipleship (our learning to imitate God) will take us in these directions, but they are simply the temporary location of our training. They do not share an equal status with our discipleship training (which is God’s will for us, our life of faith).