For three years Jesus shared an intimate life with his disciples.  There was some formal instruction, but most of Jesus’ teaching, according to the Gospels, took place “on the road.”  Whatever happened—healings, confrontations with authorities, scandalous pronouncements of forgiveness, conflicts among the disciples, the power of prayer manifest in their master’s life—all became teachable moments.  Jesus’ main concern seemed to be help the disciples “see” the Kingdom of God as a present and in-breaking reality, and seeing it, to locate their lives in an adventure of living together, now, this future that God intends for the whole world.  “It is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”             

In order to make room in their lives for Jesus’ new society, the invitation was necessarily linked to renunciation of the world as they had known it and their attachments to it.  It is an instructive exercise to scan the Gospels and note all the renunciations that Jesus asks of his disciples.  These renunciations include, but are not limited to, personal possessions, oaths and idle talk, the right to have enemies, worry, making judgments of people God has forgiven, careers, and family expectations.   This list, partial as it is, seems like the heroic stuff of super-Christians.  But Jesus assumed these renunciations came at the beginning of the life of discipleship.  How often we read, “You cannot be my disciple unless you…” 

Renunciation itself is not holiness, but it creates a necessary space where the holiness of God can dwell and can reorder the disciples’ lives.  Some of these renunciations, like family and career, happened just by leaving everything and following Jesus.  Others, like renouncing personal possessions and judgments, came with the shared life of Jesus and his camp followers.  Renunciation became real as disciples were trained and practiced new virtues in the company of believers. 

 - Excerpts from article written by David Janzen