A call to apprenticeship

Heath Hardesty’s All Things Together (Multnomah, 288 pp.) combines personal story with pastoral lessons in a multifaceted approach to following Jesus.

It’s no surprise this book on discipleship is centered on the master Jesus Himself, in whom all things hold together (a nod to Colossians 1:17). But Hardesty begins by exploring all those things that vie for our attention and promote disintegration in our current age.

Hardesty argues to combat distractions we need apprenticeship. In Part 1, he makes a case for discipleship as apprenticeship, a term often used in the spiritual formation field, and he adopts Dallas Willard’s phrase “the with-God life” to describe the journey of following Jesus. In Part 2, the book looks at seven ways in which we can be with Jesus: meditating on Scripture, talking with God, participating in Christian community, being incarnationally present, being generous with joy, being good stewards of power, and faithfully witnessing the gospel to our world.

In this book, Hardesty puts his literature degree to good use: Literary references and conversational footnotes abound. And his experience as a plumber’s apprentice brings flesh and grit to concepts we often leave too ethereal.

When Hardesty allows a peek into the messy bits of his own life, his writing brings to mind insightful pastors of earlier generations: “I am a person before I am a pastor, which means I have tear-stained pages and confusing chapters of church hurt in my own story. But forsaking the church because of church hurt is like never eating food again because of food poisoning.”

Most of the concepts in All Things Together can only be accomplished when people do life together. “We are wired to dwell in a community of being known and being loved.” Anything else is “shame running its mouth.”

Hardesty offers plenty of food for thought, and contemplative readers will resonate with his invitations. Those familiar with James Bryan Smith and Dallas Willard will recognize Hardesty’s language. For others, he may whet the appetite for a new way of considering life with Jesus.

Yet the question remains, “How?” How do we relationally live out the “with-God life” in community with sisters and brothers? What does it look like to follow a “come and see” Shepherd who invites us into relationship?

For apprentices, learning from the master Jesus is a lifelong journey. All Things Together presents the “why” and the “what” for such a pathway. The practical “how” of relational living becomes the with-God journey for each person and faith community.