University Baptist Church

"Of course, the Bible contains little of Mary's story beyond the birth narratives and several later stories, but Burns makes a good case for these glimpses of Mary's experiences as pointers on the road of Christian living. Avoiding the fanciful, his meditations are biblically based and often include the experiences of his family and friends. He ends with the heady observation that 'we are not the ruler of our world, but rather... God is sovereign.'" —Publishers Weekly, May 28, 2007

"Dad, I have read your book all the way through and really enjoy it.  I have a deep respect for your take on faith, and find it to be more applicable to myself than most things.  I think the concept of some graduated scale of discipleship is just unreasonable.  I also feel like you do a good job of speaking to the confused and slightly lost souls in the religious world.  I feel that most faith-based writing intimidates the sinners among us away from the church by telling them that they are less worthy of our Lord than the saints.  I truly believe that people of your calling ought to focus on pulling people out of the darkness rather than strengthening the spotlight on the righteous.  Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I really liked the book, and it made me think." —Aaron Burns, author's son, age 22

Thinking about discipleship in terms of steps, stages, phases, or levels makes many Christians uncomfortable. After all, how many of us want to take a critical look at ourselves and our journey of spiritual development, only to find we’re not at the level we think we should be—or worse yet, we’ve regressed! Maybe we can’t even identify the stage we’re in.

Author and pastor John Burns has an aversion to descriptions of discipleship that involve gradations of achievement. He’s troubled by the many best-selling books on the subject that indicate that there are steps to follow which take disciples in a straight line from baptism to sainthood like ascending rungs on a ladder of discipleship.

Burns found comfort in the Bible where, when looking at the examples of Jesus’ followers, he discovered that he couldn’t find uninterrupted linear progress in their lives either. The surprise came when he discovered the disciple he was most drawn to was Mary, the mother of Jesus. Although the biblical references to Mary are not overwhelming in number, they are profoundly reflective of the stages of discipleship that each of us must pass through on our way to spiritual maturity.

Modeling Mary addresses the questions:

• How does spiritual maturity look when we take a dynamic, artistic approach versus a linear, measured approach?
• How can Mary’s life provide illumination for our own growth in discipleship?
• What does it mean for us to answer God’s call rather than stick to our own agenda?

Burns offers readers:

• Spiritual meditations built on ten passages from the Gospels which focus on the spiritual development of Mary
• A look at pondering, suffering, and refocusing in our journey of spiritual development
• An understanding of the role grace plays in our becoming disciples of Christ
• Questions for reflection and small group study