What makes authentic disciples is not visions, ecstasies, biblical mastery of chapter and verse, or spectacular success in the ministry, but a capacity for faithfulness. Buffeted by the fickle winds of failure, battered by their own unruly emotions, and bruised by rejection and ridicule, authentic disciples may have stumbled and frequently fallen, endured lapses and relapses, gotten handcuffed to the fleshpots and wandered into a far county. Yet, they kept coming back to Jesus.

It is for the inconsistent, unsteady disciples whose cheese is falling off their cracker.

In every encounter we either give life or we drain it; there is no neutral exchange.

I asked for wonder, and He gave it to me.

How I treat a brother or sister from day to day, how I react to the sin-scarred wino on the street, how I respond to interruptions from people I dislike, how I deal with normal people in their normal confusion on a normal day may be a better indication of my reverence for life than the antiabortion sticker on the bumper of my car.

When being is divorced from doing, pious thoughts become an adequate substitute for washing dirty feet.

One of my realizations in such an earthy atmosphere was that many of the burning theological issues in the church were neither burning nor theological.