Being a disciple - learning styles and lifelong learning

Here's the sermon that I shared this morning at St Mary’s Runwell and St Catherine’s Wickford:

I wonder whether you have ever identified the learning style that suits you best. If not, today’s an opportunity to think that through. Which of these learning styles fits you best?

o Activist – You like the opportunity to generate a lot of ideas and to think on your feet. You like to start things off, have a go and try things out. You're open minded and enthusiastic about new ideas but tend to get bored with the details of implementation. You tend to act first and consider the implications afterwards. You love bouncing ideas off other people and solving problems as part of a team but you also enjoy the limelight! You learn best when you're involved in new experiences, problems and opportunities; when you're working with others and by being thrown in the deep end.

o Reflector – You like to think about details carefully before taking action and you take a thoughtful approach. You enjoy being prepared and the chance to research and evaluate something. You welcome opportunities to rethink and reflect on what you've learned and to consider a situation from different perspectives. You like to make decisions in your own time, you keep a low profile and enjoy observing others and hearing their opinions before offering your own. You learn best by reviewing what's happened and mulling over what you've learned and when you have time to complete tasks without tight deadlines.

o Theorist – You are logical and objective and take a step by step approach to problem solving. You pay attention to the details and can be a perfectionist. You are good at translating what you see around you into theories and you're good at fitting things into an overall understanding. You're detached and analytical, rather than subjective or emotional in your thinking and you like to feel intellectually stretched. You learn best in complex situations where you have to rely on skills and knowledge and when you can question and probe the ideas behind things.

o Pragmatist – You like to see how things work out in practice and you enjoy experimenting. You're a down-to-earth problem solver and you like concepts that can be readily applied to your everyday life. You can get impatient with lengthy conceptual discussions which you regard as impractical because you like to see the relevance of your work and to see a practical advantage from using what you've learned. You learn best when there is an obvious link between the topic and job and when you have the chance to feedback on ideas. You love being shown techniques with obvious advantages (e.g. saving time or money) or when you are shown something you can copy (like a proven technique).

We all have a preference for one or the other of these and learn most easily when learning experiences fit with our preferred style but, in order, to become more rounded people its also good to step out of our comfort zones and stretch ourselves by using the other learning styles as well.

You’ve thought briefly about those different styles in relation to yourself and probably other people too, so now let’s think about them in relation to Jesus and the disciples. When Jesus called his first disciples and they dropped their nets to follow him, the disciples were in Activist mode: acting first and considering the implications afterwards; being thrown in the deep end and trying things out.

But then they spent most of their time doing what disciples of rabbi’s always did, sitting at the rabbi’s feet and listening to the rabbi’s teaching. Then they were in Theorist mode: paying attention; fitting things into an overall understanding; intellectually stretched; questioning and probing the ideas behind things.

Now, in today’s Gospel reading (Mark 6. 1-13), we see them going into Pragmatist mode by being asked to copy what they have been shown. Jesus sends them out two by two to have a go at doing what he has been doing: teaching and healing. Now they have to see how things work out in practice, apply the techniques that Jesus has taught them and solve problems in practice; like the problem of how to respond when they are rejected.

Later, when they return (and we read about this in Luke rather than Mark) they go into Reflector mode by reviewing with Jesus what happened while they were travelling preachers and healers and mulling over what they had learnt. They come back in great joy having had some great experiences and Jesus then puts what they have seen and done into the context of God’s plan for the world.

So, we can see the way in which the disciples benefited from different learning experiences and different learning styles at different times in their development.

When he gave his disciples the Great Commission just before his Ascension, Jesus said that they were to go and make disciples. What he was saying then is that all of us who follow Jesus are to be disciples and disciples are those who sit at the feet of the rabbi (in our case, Jesus) and learn from him. Just as Jesus took his disciples through a cycle of learning, so he wants to do the same with us. As part of that learning, the disciples were given roles and responsibilities and became leaders in the church but they never ceased to be disciples and always had more to learn.

It is the same for us. It is a little like the process of being ordained first as a deacon and then as a priest. Simply put, a deacon is a servant. Clergy are ordained first as a deacon to remind us that we are servants of Christ and his church first and foremost. When we are ordained as priest, we don’t then stop being a deacon and it doesn’t matter whether we then go on to further ordinations, for example as a bishop, we remain a deacon, a servant, throughout.

It is the same for us, whether we are a Licenced Lay Minister or Church Warden or Homegroup leader or Hall Bookings Manager or Choir Director or whatever role we might play in our church or our workplaces, as Manager or Secretary or Director or some other role. Whatever role or responsibility we have we are first and foremost a disciple, a learner, and, as a result, our learning should be lifelong and not only during particular periods of education.

We need to be reminded of that regularly because we all face the temptation to think that we have arrived – maybe as Christians, maybe in the role we carry out – when in fact we all have more to learn all the time. Not least, because we are learning from the perfection of Jesus himself and we always fall short of that perfection and therefore always have more to learn.

When we understand ourselves to be disciples, learners, first and foremost then it changes our attitude towards the roles we play. If we know that there is always something more we can learn then we pay attention to others and what they are doing rather than focusing on ourselves, we have a basic curiosity that makes us ask why are you doing that that way, instead of saying “it’s my way or the highway,” we have an underlying humility that recognises that I may have much to learn from your way.

Where are we in relation to these kinds of attitudes? Where are we in our learning cycle with Jesus? Where do we need to be stretched and challenged in our lives and learning styles? Are we inspired by the experience of having someone who is actively learning among us to be active learners ourselves?

What are you learning from Jesus at the moment? How is your faith changing and developing your life at the moment? How is your ministry growing in your home, in this church, in our community and in your workplace? These are the questions we need to ask if we are to be those who sit at the feet of Jesus in order to learn from his teaching and practice. These are the questions we need to ask and to answer if we are to be disciples. May it be so for each one of us. Amen.

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U2 - Atomin City.