In Mere Discipleship, Camp tells the story of Clarence Jordan, a disciple of Christ who lived out his calling in a radical way. I apologize for the lengthy cut and paste job, but Jordan’s story is a powerful one and I wanted to share it.

In 1942, having received a Ph.D. in Greek New Testament from Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, Clarence set out with his wife to establish an interracial community based upon the Sermon on the Mount. The community was based upon nonviolence and a strict equality of ownership in all goods (taking Acts 2:44 as the basis for the practice). But even more radical for his day, Jordan knew that since the division between Jew and Gentile had been broken down in the gospel, the same was certainly true of black and white. So the community was open to all, regardless of skin color.

By the latter half of the 1950s, the rage of segregationists descended upon Kiononia Farm. The opposition began with the institutional church, when a neighboring Baptist congregation excommunicated Koinonia, given that “said members…have persisted in holding services where both white and colored attend together.” The national press reported more violent forms of opposition, which began with threatening phone calls and then escalated to bombings, vandalism, cross-burnings, Klan caravans, beatings, legal harassments, and shootings at most anything, alive or not – Koinonia buildings, houses, farm animals, and residents. An almost complete economic boycott likewise threatened the existence of the community.

In the early fifties, so it is told, Clarence approached his brother, Robert Jordan, who later became a state senator and justice of Georgia’s Supreme Court. Clarence asked Robert to serve as legal representative of the Koinonia community. Robert responded:

“Clarence, I can’t do that. You know my political aspirations. Why, if I represented you, I might lose my job, my house, everything I’ve got.”

“We might lose everything too, Bob.”

“It’s different for you.”

“Why is it different? I remember, it seems to me, that you and I joined the church the same Sunday, as boys. I expect when we came forward the preacher asked me about the same question he did you. He asked me, ‘Do you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior?’ And I said, ‘Yes.’ What did you say?”

“I follow Jesus, Clarence, up to a point.”

“Could that point by any chance be – the cross?”

“That’s right. I follow him to the cross, but not on the cross. I’m not getting myself crucified.”

“Then I don’t believe you’re a disciple. You’re an admirer of Jesus, but not a disciple.”