From Brian Blount, President of Union Presbyterian Seminary, in Then the Whisper Put On Flesh: New Testament Ethics in an African American Context (2001):

Discipleship is not exemplified by suffering; suffering is the tragic outcome of following this kingdom-preaching Jesus. This is what makes Jesus discipleship heroic. Despite the probability that one will suffer if one persists in imaging the life of Jesus in his or her own life, the disciple goes ahead and images that life anyway.