And it got me thinking. All of Glenavon supporters whether you sit in the Crescent Stand or main stand at Mourneview, or on the visiting terraces throughout the Irish league, you do so because you are passionate followers of Glenavon Football Club. Hence the title for this article – “Crescent End Disciples.” Because someone who lives, breathes, learns and reads about that thing of which they are passionate are called Followers. When we think of the word disciple, we instinctively think of the word follower, student, someone who wants to learn everything about that person or organisation of which they seek to follow. Therefore, in those terms “Crescent End Disciples” can be applied to the “boys”! Yes?

I don’t know about you but I want to be the kind of guy who as far as it depends on me does the right thing. And I mean the right thing about the little things of life. Like putting my neighbours bin out when he is on holiday. Stopping to help someone if they are left stranded. And because of that, I have come to learn something very important about myself.

I would like, if I may just to leave one thought with you, and it comes from a passage in Matthew’s gospel that has always baffled me, until recently. Now, I ask you to stay with me on this one because I want to try and paint a picture for you and in doing so change a very important wrong stereotype which many non church going people have when they think of disciples.

What baffled me was this. The disciples have gone on ahead of Jesus across the Sea of Galilee and it is the middle of the night. And Jesus comes walking towards them on the water. And they are so terrified that they think it is a ghost. And, then verse 28: “Lord if its you then tell me to come to you on the water” Now; what is peter thinking? And why does he believe that he can walk on water?

It makes perfect sense when you understand the context. And the context is Jesus is a Jewish Rabbi with Jewish disciples, living and ministered in 1st century Jewish culture. Also; Jesus lived in a region called “The Galilee”. And it was an area that really believed and understood their identity in God and that God had spoken to Moses and given him the first five books of the O.T. which is called Torah, which means Teaching or Instruction.

Torah was the centre of their lives and the foundation of their education system. And every Jewish boy from the age of 6 went through the Jewish education system and would be taught by a local Torah teacher who would be a rabbi and part of that education was to learn the Torah. This initial part of the Jewish education system was called “Bate safare” and would last until the child was 10 or 11 by which time every child would have memorised the first five books of the O.T. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. MEMORISED. Try that the next time you cant sleep!!!

NOW By the end of “Bate safare” most kids were no longer going to school. They were apprentices learning the family trade. If you were really good, I mean the best of the best you would keep going and continue your education to the next level called “bate Talmud” and in “Bate Talmud” the best of the best, the kids with the most natural ability would then spend the next four or so years up until the age of 14 learning and memorising the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures. Genesis to Malachi memorised. Now by the age of 14 most kids are apprenticing at home but now the best of the best of the best, would then continue to the next level called “Bate Midrash” where they would then go to a rabbi and be interviewed to see if this kid could become one of that rabbi’s disciples. Now, when we use the word disciple we generally mean student, someone who knows what the teacher knows. But, in Jewish culture it meant something completely different. A disciple of a rabbi doesn’t just want to know what the rabbi knows, the disciple wants to be like his rabbi, and learn to do what the rabbi does. And if that rabbi believed that you had the knowledge and the charisma to learn to spread his “yoke” that rabbi’s subtle interpretations of the fine print of the Hebrew Scriptures he would say to you, “Come Follow Me.” And the understanding was that from that moment that disciple would devote the rest of his life learning to be like his rabbi and learning to do what his rabbi does. This is what it means to be a disciple!!!

Now, here is the essence of Jesus’ message. Most rabbi’s began their teaching around the age of 30. And so here we have Jesus at the age of 30 beginning his public teaching ministry and as he walks down the Sea of Galilee and meets his first disciples, Peter and Andrew, James & John and they’re fishermen and Jesus says to them, “Come Follow Me”, what he was saying was, you may not have been the best or even close to the best, told from a very young age that you were not good enough, but I believe in you. I believe that you can be like me and learn the things I want to teach you so that you can truly be my disciples. The message of the Cross is about being invited into a relationship with God through saying sorry and choosing to follow a man truly worth following. So the reason Peter believes he can walk on water and did, was because he was being taught to know what his rabbi knows in order to do what his rabbi does.

One more final thought and for this I return to the Crescent End Disciples. When you hear someone mention Jesus and his disciples what image do you have in your mind? Most people think of an old man with grey hair wearing a bath robe being followed by another group of old men. That is simply not the case. Jesus was thirty years old. His disciples were young men, most of whom were in their early twenties, so when I think of Jesus and his disciples every time I see a group of young men standing together like on the football terraces on the Crescent End, I am reminded that Jesus and his disciples were also young men, but young men who changed the course of human history and began a revolution that this world has not recovered from and nor shall it.

SO, “Crescent End Disciples”, keep on following and remember what it means to be a true follower of the only man who ever walked this planet truly worth following. John Newton, the author of Amazing Grace, said that there were only two things in this world that he was sure of. 1. I am a Great Sinner but 2. Christ is a great Saviour.

Come on the Lurgan Blues!!!

William Orr (Club Chaplain)