WACO, Texas—Becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ means being willing to say “yes” unconditionally to God, knowing he likely will lead his followers into uncomfortable places, Kay Warren told a group at Baptist-affiliated Baylor University.
For Warren, it meant becoming a global advocate for people with HIV/AIDS, for orphans and for other marginalized and vulnerable groups.
Her husband, Rick, is pastor of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., and author of The Purpose Driven Life.
Accepting Christ’s invitation to deny self, take up a cross and follow him means being “dangerously surrendered, seriously disturbed and gloriously ruined,” she told The Next Big Idea conference, an event sponsored by Baylor’s School of Social Work, Truett Theological Seminary and the Leadership Network.
Warren told participants both at a conference plenary session and workshop how she became “seriously disturbed” a few years ago by reading an article about AIDS in Africa.
“The article said there were 12 million children in Africa orphaned by AIDS. And I couldn’t name a single one of them. There were 33 million people with AIDS. And I couldn’t name a single person who was HIV-positive,” she said.
“It rocked my world. It was a pivotal moment when I said ‘yes’ to God, and he broke my heart. It turned my life upside-down.”
That kind of “signpost moment” happens when a Christian becomes “so broken by brokenness, so disturbed, that you feel like you can’t live with it another second,” Warren explained.
Discipleship also means allowing Christ to “gloriously ruin” one of his followers for the normal life he or she knew before, she added. Warren explained for her, it meant transformation from “a suburban mom with a minivan” to an outspoken advocate for HIV-positive people worldwide.
“The pursuit of the American dream in and of itself will ruin you. Pursuit of health, wealth and happiness will ruin you. And so will following Christ. If you’re going to be ruined, why not be ruined for something that matters—something that lasts?” she asked.
Being “gloriously ruined” means following the example of Christ to “take on pain that isn’t our own,” she said. In Warren’s case, one of the first and most memorable examples involved an encounter with an HIV-positive woman who was living—and dying—under a tree because she had been expelled from her village.
“Nothing in my faith had prepared me to talk to a dying, homeless woman living under a tree,” she said. “Nobody should have to die alone.”
Being a disciple of Christ means doing what Jesus did—“making the invisible God visible” and caring for “the least, the last and the lost,” Warren said.