1 - Introduction

Summary

The Challenge

In the history of humankind there are few men or women who have had more influence than Jesus. He obviously made a profound impact on many of those he met. We need not enter the long-running debates as to whether he was a man just like any other man, or was unique in unique degree. The fact is that he must have been a person of no little power and personal magnetism. Of no one else has it been said so often down through the centuries, “Would it not have been wonderful to see him for ourselves, to hear his own voice, to spend time with him”. And understandably so: An encounter with Jesus evidently proved for many of his contemporaries to be a life-transforming experience. Their lives became oriented round him, as the one who gave it center and focus. And the combined impact was sufficient to launch a movement which became in due course a religion of world importance, shaping the history of nations and the culture of continents.

Discipleship of Jesus, then, is a topic of tremendous interest in itself. Not only is it about following this Jesus, what following him meant. But it is also about those who followed – men and women who in turn have left a very substantial mark on the history of the world in what they accomplished and in the church they launched. And since they put their success down to their discipleship of Jesus, perhaps their discipleship is the key to their success.