Follow Jesus Christ

Sometimes a person goes to a doctor not only for a prescription, but to be heard. He sits across from the physician and realizes: what matters now is not so much the medicine as the attention. A good doctor does not start with a protocol. He asks, listens, clarifies. He knows that you cannot treat an illness without knowing the person. Without that, even an accurate diagnosis becomes a formality, or a diagnosis may prove wrong in the long run. How much suffering is caused by diagnoses from inattentive doctors!

Jesus’ teaching does not begin with a system or a structure. It begins with love and with knowing God—not as an abstract idea, but as a living source of life. “That they may know You” is not a theological formula but an invitation to intimacy. In his logic the ideal is not correct organization but living connection. God is not only an object to be defined, but a Person who can be known and loved.

But Jesus’ knowledge of God immediately becomes knowledge of the person. He did not merely talk about heaven; he stopped before particular people. Mere contemplation of divine perfection does not solve all a person’s problems. Jesus saw their fear, shame, the inner rifts of soul and heart. He asked questions that returned people to themselves, even when they could not lift their eyes to heaven. Love for him was not a slogan; it was attentive care. Like a doctor who understands that no two patients are the same.

Jesus’ group was small. He knew his disciples by name. They knew one another. There was no career ladder or competition for status. There was knowing. Leadership was expressed not by distance but by presence. Jesus did not manage people as resources. He lived alongside them. The strength was not in scale but in depth. Jesus embodied the ideal of love for one’s neighbor among his followers. Alongside the ideal of love, it was an ideal of organization and self-governance.

The early church tried to preserve this experience. People met in homes, shared bread, prayed, supported one another. Love suddenly became not a moral demand but a principle of existence. Making love the center of religious life was the greatest discovery of our ancestors. No other religion in the world had that. Freedom was part of this life: no one was held by force, no one was kept in line by fear. At the center was not pressure but attraction.

Today it is becoming clear that change is overdue. The church often knows how to speak and to make an impression, but it does not always know. A leader often knows the program and the bylaws, but not the person. Meanwhile the first duty of a pastor is to know those he serves—like a doctor who cannot treat without hearing the patient’s history. Presence is more important than doctrine. The person is more important than position. Service is more important than power.

The idea of small groups here is not simply an organizational strategy. It follows from Jesus’ view of humanity. Getting to know one another is possible only where people do not get lost in the crowd, where you can speak, doubt, and grow, where freedom is not perceived as a threat.

But here a difficulty arises. Small groups work so long as there is maturity, so long as there is discipline, so long as conflicts do not tear the fabric of trust. In reality, strong personalities appear, hidden hierarchies form, and struggles for influence begin. Without structure, charisma can turn into chaos. A hospital without order ceases to be a place of healing. Yet a hospital where the doctor does not know the patient becomes a bureaucratic machine.

So this is not about destroying the forms that have developed over centuries, but about returning to the center. Love and knowledge of God as the foundation. Love and knowledge of the person as the path. Freedom as the condition of authenticity. Perhaps this cannot be realized quickly. Perhaps it will take time for communities to learn to be not merely organizations but spaces of knowing one another. It may even take centuries.

Jesus’ teaching remains simple and demanding. Know God. Know people. Love. Everything else is merely a means. And as in a good doctor’s office, the main thing is not the sign on the door but whether a person feels that here they are truly seen and understood. Such human closeness will create in communities incredibly favorable conditions for spiritual growth, for inspiration, for the calming of hearts and minds. It will surely come—perhaps not today.