Hello my dear friends & partners in the gospel!
I write to you today to give a little update on life, the things I’m learning & this sweet season of support raising 🙂
partner gathering + support raising
First off, lets praise God for providing $1,818 so far, with another $800 in monthly commitments on the way, for a grand total of $2,618 !! Hallelujah & thank you all so much for being faithful in supporting the Church with financial gifts + love + encouragement. I am overwhelmed with love and gratitude for each one of you. Thank you. Thank you.
My goal is to reach $5,000 by Christmas!! I ask that you would prayerfully consider partnering with me to reach this goal! We are more than halfway there!
learning to be an apprentice of Jesus
At the beginning of the semester, a dear, dear friend of mine sent a Podcast from a church in Portland, OR called Bridgetown Church on ‘practicing the way of a believer’. I was quite intrigued, as an enneagram 7, I love anything geared towards the mind & the practical. So I listened. And I am oh so glad I did – this teaching radically expanded the way I follow Jesus & has brought me to a place of deeper intimacy and love with the Lord than ever before.
In summary – I have learned that I am an apprentice of the Rabbi, Jesus Christ!! But let me explain a bit more –
50 + times in the New Testament, Jesus is called Rabbi/ Teacher, which, in that culture, meant a highly trained scholar who would travel from city to city with his ‘yoke’ – a Rabbi’s set of teachings.
The apex of the Jewish education system would be to apprentice under a Rabbi – but only the best of the best even would get the chance – after memorizing the entire old testament (wow) and excelling in years + years of schooling. If one proved himself worthy, the Rabbi would come and say “Lech Acharai – Come, follow me” and he would become a ‘Talmidim‘: apprentice, student, disciple, of the Rabbi.
As an apprentice, you would have three goals:
- Be with your Rabbi – spending every minute beside him, eating what he ate, sleeping beside him, following him as he taught and ministered
- Become like your Rabbi- over time of being with him constantly, your mannerism & way of life, perspective of the world & understanding of God + scripture began molding into the shape of your Rabbi
- Do what your Rabbi did- the end goal: to become a Rabbi yourself and to continue on his work after being fully trained and equipped by him
& this is exactly what Jesus invited us into!! Story after story, Jesus was not “hey! Believe in me & go to Heaven when you die” but “Follow me. Be my disciple.” – the same words a Rabbi would utter to his new apprentice, “Lech Acharai”.
“Come follow me and I will send you out to fish for people” – Mark 1:16
This way of looking at following Jesus makes more sense in my mind than anything else ever has. I am an Apprentice of Jesus. My goals are to Be with Jesus, to Become like Jesus, and to Do what Jesus did. He is my teacher & I will follow him. And truly, I am seeing, more than ever before, that the way of Jesus is the way of life, and life abundant!
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy, I came that they may have life and life abundantly” – John 10:10
Jesus showed us the very best way to live – the truest way to be human & image bearers of God- living righteously, acting justly, walking humbly, showing mercy, being hospitable, praying, fasting, resting, fixing eyes on the Kingdom, ministering, loving, serving, spending time in both community and in solitude, preaching the gospel, healing the sick, living in intimate relationship with and glorifying the Father, and fostering in the Kingdom of God, on earth as it is in Heaven!!
& like the old Hebrew saying, “may you be covered in the dust of your Rabbi”, I desire to follow after Jesus so closely in the way he lived that I will be covered in his dust – a dedicated apprentice, growing and maturing to the place where I have the capacity to join in Jesus’ Kingdom work, on earth as it is in Heaven!
& that all sounds beautiful + wonderful in words + idea, but practically, it takes disciple & a lot of it – but I’m learning & the Lord is strengthening me & it’s so so sweet.
” For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruits of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Therefore, lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet , so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.” -Hebrews 12: 11-13
Practically – in my life, this looks like a multitude of things:
- feasting upon the Bread of Life each morning before the bread of man
- practicing Sabbath from Friday night & all day Saturday- resting + extended time with the Lord + doing other things that make my soul come alive & refresh me for the week to come
- discipline in scripture reading- reading the whole Bible in my 21st year of life
- setting up good boundaries with electronics – no phone for the first hour upon waking up and the hour before I go to bed & very limited throughout the day so that I may so
- stewarding money well + giving generously to the Church
& these are just a few examples, but really what it means to be an apprentice of Jesus is to reshape your entire life around following Him with ears always open to the guidance of the Spirit, and most importantly, responding in obedience!
So in telling you all this, I ask you to pray for discipline & strength & to not grow weary when I fall into old habits + mess up, but that I may be reminded of the Lord’s mercy, which is new every morning & that I may soak even deeper into the Lord’s strength, rather than my own. I know this season is foundational, as I go out on the Race, and for the rest of my life as I develop habits and practices that shape me more into the likeness of Christ & deepen my intimacy with him!
as always, thank you for your love + support + encouragement – it means more than you could ever know 🙂
please please – let me know what the Lord is doing in your life & how I can love + support + be praying for you!
with love & gratitude,
Annie
PS: I still have plenty of prayer stickers – let me know if you want one!!
***lastly- everything I have learned on practicing the way of Jesus was built upon the teachings of Bridgetown, like I mentioned before!!! If you want to learn more about being an apprentice of Jesus, start here –
https://practicingtheway.org/teaching/practicing-the-way
& I would LOVE to have coffee and talk all about these teaching and learn from one another!!
