By Daniel McCoy: Dr. Orpheus J. Heyward is involved every day in the trenches helping people to be disciples of Jesus. He uses the Word of God as his foundational manual for disciple making. And yet … there are many people with questions about Scripture.

The following is a Question and Answer post by Daniel McCoy and Orpheus.

Daniel McCoy: Alister McGrath wrote Christianity’s Dangerous Idea in which he explains that if you give everybody their own Bible in their own language, you will have tons of different interpretations. With everybody having their own Bible (and their own social media account, blog, podcasts, etc.), there’s a risk that people will invent and teach some very unbiblical interpretations. Can you give an example of when you heard somebody’s interpretation of a Bible passage and it made you say, “What in the world?!”

Dr. Orpheus J. Heyward: I can think of numerous cases and some of those cases may even be from my own early preaching experience, where after looking back retrospectively, I started to realize, Man, I really took some Scriptures out of context.

In the name of theology and doctrine, sometimes our zeal gets ahead of our hermeneutical understanding. When we want to be orthodox or when we want to ensure that we’re theologically correct, sometimes we’re more loyal to a particular religious tradition than to a proper interpretation of Scripture.

One example would be 1 Corinthians 14:40. This is a really common passage, where it says,

“Let all things be done decently and in order.”

That passage has been used for a great variety of things from saying you shouldn’t clap in church, to how women are dressed in church, to what should be the order of worship, to the idea that you can’t sing and do the Lord’s supper at the same time.

Protecting the Practice vs. Interpreting the Scripture

So, there have been numerous ways that that passage has been used to suggest various positions, and every position I’ve heard on that passage has been about trying to protect the practice—as opposed to truly treating what the apostle Paul was treating in the context of 1 Corinthians 12 and 14.

In 1 Corinthians 14:40, when Paul says that all things be done decently and in order, contextually he was dealing with the management of spiritual gifts. And he was dealing with the fact that you had prophets and tongue speakers who were not doing things in a way that would be edifying, in a way the church could understand.

Yet we have taken that passage and used it for everything we want to use it for. We use it as a double-edged sword. We cut people coming and going without truly understanding what Paul was dealing with in that context.

DM: What’s another example of people teaching a Bible passage which they clearly hadn’t taken the time to interpret correctly?

OH: Another would be in Acts 17, which says that God is not worshiped with human hands. That verse has been used to suggest that clapping is a sin. Yet, if you look at the context, you see that they were making idols. Paul addresses the practice of idol making by helping them to understand who God truly is—that he is not a God that needs you to make him or create him. In that context, he’s far from dealing with clapping.

DM: I think clapping is a sin … but only when it’s off-beat. Other than that, I think it should be okay. So, a lot of people see spirituality as a matter of opinion. They might say, “Well, this is how I read the Bible. And I find it to be an inspirational, inspiring way of reading it.” If I’ve got my own inspirational feelings from reading the Bible my own way, then does it really matter what the original authors meant to say? Isn’t it enough just to figure out what it means to me?

OH: You know, that’s a common approach of reading literature called the “reader-response method.” The reader response method took the position that in the absence of the author—since we do not have access to the author and we can’t ask the author what is meant—then we need to ascertain what it means to us. Therefore, the method was called “reader response.”

The problem with that is that God places the meaning in Scripture. We need to be very careful that we don’t negate the methodology of God by which He wants us to be guided by his wisdom. And to that end, he gives us Scripture and Scripture is not to be privately interpreted from the perspective that I can come up with what it means to me.

I need to ask, “What is God trying to communicate to me? What is God trying to say to me? What is the instructive mechanism involved here?”

For instance, 2 Timothy 3:16 says that all Scripture is given by the inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness that the man of God might be equipped for every good work. Well, if it’s left up to me to come up with what it means, where’s the rebuke? Where’s the correction? Where’s the instruction in righteousness? It then becomes subjective, which means I can then bend Scripture to my will as opposed to making my will bend to Scripture.

So it becomes a dangerous process when I lead with the notion that I can give Scripture meaning. That perspective negates the wisdom of God—that God is the revealer of Scripture by which He wants to communicate meaning to us. So, I think the reader response philosophy is very dangerous and gives birth to a plethora of different religious positions that are predicated on what people want and what people feel as opposed to what did God actually communicate.

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Recommended resources related to this topic:

Join Orpheus Heyward in the Discipleship.org Collective on Thursday, April 22nd at 10:00 am CT where he will talk about how to read and understand the Bible and what to do with our questions. Hosted by Daniel McCoy and Renee Sproles from Renew.org

Original Blog Source: https://renew.org/whats-so-dangerous-about-bible-misinterpretation-qa-with-orpheus-j-heyward/

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By Discipleship.org: We change our oil every 3,000 miles. We rotate our tires every 6,000 miles. We can check lights, fluids, and tire pressure regularly. We can even subscribe to Motor Trend.

Yet we can still run out of gas.

My guess is that if you’re receiving this newsletter, then you know how important disciple making is. It’s the church’s core mission. So, we ought to learn best disciple making practices, read up on disciple making culture, and attend workshops on making actual disciples, not just converts.

Even still, you can run out of fuel.

How? Disciple making must be fueled by solid theology.

If you don’t have a solid theology that undergirds and sustains your disciple making efforts, your disciple making will run out of fuel. “Out-of-fuel” can look like a theology which props up one’s own traditions but has stopped pursuing the way of Jesus.

Out-of-fuel can also look like a theology which veers off into theological progressivism and eventually leaves the way of Jesus behind altogether.

Theology matters. Solid theology fuels effective and faithful disciple making. Bad theology derails us from our core mission. Taking our cue from the late Dallas Willard, we are convinced that, “The gospel we preach, the gospel we uphold, and the faith we coach determines the disciple we get.”

That is why we are grateful to announce Theology Thursdays as a regular feature of the Discipleship.org Collective. Starting Thursday, April 15th at 10 a.m. CT, Theology Thursdays will be a weekly, one-hour deep dive into crucial topics of theology. Hosted by myself and Renee Sproles of Renew.org, here are some of the topics we will be exploring:

Who Is the Holy Spirit? (with special guest Dr. David Young, Author of A Grand Illusion and King Jesus and the Beauty of Obedience-Based Discipleship)What Is the Gospel? (with special guest Dr. Matthew Bates, Author of Salvation by Allegiance Alone and Gospel Allegiance)What Is Sin? (with special guest Dr. Anessa Westbrook of Harding University)How Can We Understand and Value Our Bibles? (with special guest Dr. Orpheus J. Heyward of the Renaissance Church of Christ)What Christian Convictions Are Essential? (with special guest Dr. Chad Ragsdale of Ozark Christian College)

We hope you are able to join us for Theology Thursdays as we seek to fuel disciple making with God-honoring theology.

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Source: Disciple Making must be Fueled by Solid Theology

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Following Jesus

By Craig Etheredge: Jesus gave the same invitation to everyone. It was simple, direct, and called for a decision. It could be accepted or denied, but not ignored. The invitation was simply, “Follow me.” More than twenty-four times in the Gospels, Jesus invited people to follow Him. He invited the wealthy and powerful, the casual observer, the spiritual seekers, and even the religiously devoted. Jesus called everyone to follow Him.

One day while walking along the Sea of Galilee, Jesus passed by fishermen caring for their nets. They had known Jesus for a while, but now it was time for them to make a decision.

“And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men’”(Matthew 4.19 ESV).

For those men, following Jesus meant leaving behind their old life to go with Jesus. It meant being trained by Jesus, learning to obey Jesus, and coming under the authority and leadership of Jesus. Ultimately, it meant living a life that looked just like Jesus — reflecting His character, priorities, and practices. Jesus offers the same invitation today. He still calls men and women to follow Him.

While following Jesus doesn’t mean physically following Him around, it does mean turning from living your own life and choosing to live a new kind of life with Jesus in charge. Essentially, there are two ways to live. You can live with yourself in charge, going your way, and pursuing your own happiness. Or you can live with Jesus in charge, going His way, and pursuing what makes Him happy. You will discover that the first way to live always leads to a dead-end and separation from God, while the second way always leads to purpose, peace, and assurance.

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By Craig Etheredge. Used with permission.

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Source: The Great Adventure

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By Discipleship.org:

Dear Discipleship-first Friends,

We need good theology to fuel disciple making in North America. Please make time to read the long-form blog by Discipleship.org’s Curt Erskine as he seeks to ground us in a deeper theology to fuel disciple making.

Conversion, Theology, and Discipleship by Curt Erskine

Just over a decade ago, Dallas Willard lamented about what American evangelicalism is lacking: a theology of discipleship. He wrote:

Post-WWII evangelicalism does not naturally conduct its converts and adherents into a life of discipleship, nor into pervasive Christlikeness of character—with the routine, easy obedience that it entails. What this most recent version of evangelicalism lacks is a theology of discipleship. Specifically, it lacks a clear teaching on how what happens at conversion continues on without break into an ever-fuller life in the Kingdom of God.[1]

“Disciple,” “disciple making,” and “discipleship” have now become buzzwords in modern American evangelicalism. For this we are grateful—in a sense.

This rediscovery of disciple making is not new, examples of discipleship can be found throughout the 2000-year history of the church. We are now in a stage of attempting to correct an emphasis on evangelism as a separate focus from spiritual growth in Christ.

We have been hurt by this disjoining of two things that both fell under the umbrella of disciple making in Jesus’ life (he was making disciples of the disciples in John 1 before they made the decision to repent and believe in Matthew 4:17–19).

One can easily argue that true discipleship and disciple making never really vanished. Even in the Middle Ages, there were those that argued for the inner spiritual life and the death of the fallen self. Instead, it is the language of discipleship and disciple making that is in the process of being rediscovered in modern American evangelicalism.

Return to the Early Church

Here is where the theology undergirding discipleship becomes important. The desire is often expressed in American evangelicalism to return to the simplicity of the first-century church. However, what is misunderstood is how radically different the first-century church is from modern American evangelicalism. It is not only a return to first century simplicity that is needed, but a return to the theology and culture that defined the first-century church.

Stated simply, the early church understood that believing in Jesus meant not only to believe that he died for their sins, but to believe in imitating and obeying him as his disciple. As Matthew Bates has recently demonstrated, the Greek word pistis which we translate “belief “or “faith” entails more than mental assent to an idea; it denotes allegiance, faithfulness, and loyalty, as to a king).[1] Moreover, the early church understood why it was so important to imitate and obey Jesus as his disciple.

For example, when we say, “We are changed by Jesus,” exactly how much of a change are we talking about? Within modern American evangelicalism, only those who are living a “sinful life” before their conversion would undergo a radical change. Those who were already “good people” would not necessarily need to change, they just need to accept Jesus’ payment for their sins and go on with their relatively good lives. This is where modern American evangelical theology is frankly, wrong. Everyone is to be radically changed by Jesus. This was understood in the theology of the early church.

The Early Church Fathers

One of the most significant theological differences between the ancient church and the modern church is the concept of theosis, or being re-conformed into the image of God that man was originally created to be. The language of the church fathers concerning theosis would most likely seem strange to modern Evangelicals. Confounding the problem is the Mormon concept of exaltation which is a form of literal divinization whereby they ultimately become actual gods, not just the image of God. Mormon exaltation is a twisting of theosis, and unfortunately causes Evangelicals to be uncomfortable with the idea of re-conformity into the image of God.

However, the early believers and church fathers were not the only ones who taught the concept of re-conformity into the image of God. Among the reformers, Calvin and then later Wesley, both taught the concept. In the modern era, Bonhoeffer, C.S. Lewis, and A.W. Tozer (among others) all explicitly taught re-conformity into the image of God.

Rather than re-conformity into the image of God, what modern Protestants, and therefore Evangelicals, have been more likely to teach as the end goal of discipleship and sanctification is conformity to the image of Jesus. But when carried to its logical conclusion, this is the same concept. If Jesus is the perfect image of God, and if believers are conformed into His image; then believers are being re-conformed into the image of God as well. Re-conformity into the image of God is simply a concept that has not been taught widely in modern Evangelicalism, and therefore sounds strange to us.

Therefore, this is where the theological problem begins. Unfortunately, in our arrogance, modern American Evangelicals think we have the greatest theology in the world, and that we could teach everybody else what is wrong with their theology. When in fact, we have a large gaping hole in our theology. And this large gaping hole has everything to do with disciple making; or rather, our lack of disciple making. Moreover, filling in this theological hole explains why disciple making is to be the core mission of the church.

What Is the End Goal of the Gospel?

The hole in modern American evangelicalism is this: The end goal of the gospel of Jesus (and thus discipleship) is that believers bring glory to God by being re-conformed into the image of God that they were originally created to be. Furthermore, believers are thus re-conformed into the image of God by being conformed into the image of Jesus through imitating and obeying Him as His disciple. This is why disciple making is the core mission of the church; it is specifically how we render unto God the glory that He is due.

Therefore, if we are not teaching re-conformity into the image of God, then we are not teaching the primary theological basis of discipleship. This is perhaps the reason that we struggle to convince pastors, churches, and church members to fully commit to Jesus-style disciple making; because we haven’t taught them the complete theological foundation of why disciple making is to be the core mission of the church. We are telling them they should be making disciples of Jesus who are conformed into His image without teaching them that doing so is the only way to render unto God the glory that He is due. Thus, they erroneous believe that they can render glory unto God without having to make disciples of Jesus who imitate and obey Him. As a result, they struggle to understand why disciple making is to be the core mission of the church.

The Evidence

In contrast to modern American evangelicals, the church fathers, early believers, reformers, and great theologians of church history had a good reason for believing in and teaching re-conformity into the image of God through Jesus style disciple making; because it is explicitly stated in Scripture…

. . . for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23, NIV).

Jesus is the perfect image of God and the radiance of His glory:

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation (Colossians 1:15, NIV).

. . . Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God. . . (Philippians 2:5-6, NIV).

. . . the world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they will not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God (2 Corinthians 4:4, NIV).

The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word (Hebrews 1:3, NIV).

The goal of being a disciple of Jesus is to imitate and become like the Master:

“A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40, CSB).

Therefore, by imitating Jesus as His disciple, men are conformed into His image, and thus the image of God that they were originally created to be; and thereby render unto God the glory that He is due. The vast majority of the New Testament epistles have either an allusion or a direct reference to being conformed to the image of God/Jesus.

This is a central theme in the New Testament. The end goal of the gospel of Jesus is that men bring glory to God by being reconformed into the image of God. However, this requires that the old, fallen self be abandoned and crucified. Moreover, this is only accomplished through the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit.

For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. (Romans 8:29, NIV).

. . . you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness (Ephesians 4:22-24, NIV).

. . . you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator (Colossians 3:9-10, NIV).

And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18, NIV).

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires (1 Peter 1:3-4, NIV).

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20, NIV).

Therefore, be imitators of God, as dearly loved children (Ephesians 5:1, CSB).

Imitate me, as I also imitate Christ (1 Corinthians 11:1, CSB).

Just as we have borne the image of the earthy, we will also bear the image of the heavenly (1 Corinthians 15:49, NIV).

I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead (Philippians 3:10-11, NIV).

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and in Christ you have been brought to fullness (Colossians 2:9-10, NIV).

You became imitators of us and of the Lord (1 Thessalonians 1:6, NIV).

He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior (Titus 3:4-6, NIV).

And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith (Hebrews 12:1-2, NIV).

Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything (James 1:4, NIV).

But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure (1 John 3:2-3, NIV).

In this world we are like Jesus (1 John 4:17, NIV).

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48, NIV).

Influential Theologians

With those verses in mind, consider the following quotes by great leaders, preachers, and theologians throughout the history of the church:

Irenaeus: “For in times long past, it was said that man was created after the image of God. . . Wherefore also he did easily lose the similitude. When, however, the Word of God became flesh. . . He re-established the similitude after a sure manner, by assimilating man to the invisible Father through means of the visible Word.”[2]

Clement: “He Himself formed man of the dust and regenerated him by water; and made him grow by his Spirit; and trained him by His word to adoption and salvation, directing him by sacred precepts; in order that, transforming earth-born man into a holy and heavenly being by His advent, He might fulfil to the utmost that divine utterance, ‘Let Us make man in Our own image and likeness.’ And, in truth, Christ became the perfect realization of what God spoke; and the rest of humanity is conceived as being created merely in His image.”[3]

Athanasius of Alexandria: “For as, when the likeness painted on a panel has been effaced by stains from without, he whose likeness it is must needs come once more to enable the portrait to be renewed on the same wood, for the sake of his picture, even the mere wood on which it is painted is not thrown away, but the outline renewed upon it; in the same way also the most holy Son of the Father, being the image of the Father, came to our region to renew man once made in his likeness, and find him, as one lost, by the remission of sins.”[4]

Gregory of Nyssa: “The sky was not made in God’s image, not the moon, not the sun, not the beauty of the stars, no other things which appear in creation. Only you were made to be the image of nature that surpasses every intellect, likeness of incorruptible beauty, mark of true divinity, vessel of blessed life, image of true light, that when you look upon it you become what He is, because through the reflected ray coming from our purity you imitate He Who shines within you. . . , He dwells in you and moves within you without constraint, saying that ‘I shall live and walk for them’ (Lev. 26.2).”[5]

Augustine of Hippo: “We carry mortality about with us, we endure in?rmity, we look forward to divinity. For God wishes not only to vivify, but also to deify us. When would human in?rmity ever have dared to hope for this, unless divine truth had promised it?”[6]

Basil of Caesarea: “. . . for what is set before us is, so far as is possible with human nature, to be made like God.”[7]

John Calvin: “Since the image of God had been destroyed in us by the fall, we may judge from its restoration what it originally had been. Paul says that we are transformed into the image of God by the gospel. And, according to him, spiritual regeneration is nothing else than the restoration of the same image.”[8]

. . . “Hence, too, we learn, on the one hand, what is the end of our regeneration, that is, that we may be made like God, and that his glory may shine forth in us; . . . Paul, at the same time, teaches, that there is nothing more excellent at which the Colossians can aspire, inasmuch as this is our highest perfection and blessedness to bear the image of God.”

John Wesley: “Man knows not that he is a fallen spirit, whose only business in the present world, is to recover from his fall, to regain that image of God wherein he was created.”[9]

Dietrich Bonhoeffer: “The image of God should be restored in us once again. This task encompasses our whole existence. The aim and objective is not to renew human thoughts about God so that they are correct, or that we would subject our individual deeds to the word of God again, but that we, with our whole existence and as living creatures, are the image of God. Body, soul, and spirit, that is, the form of being human in its totality, is to bear the image of God on earth. God is well pleased with nothing less than God’s own perfect image.”[10]

A.W. Tozer: “This is the purpose of redemption: taking on the material of fallen man and by the mystery of regeneration and sanctification, restoring it again so that he is like God and like Christ. This is why we preach redemption. That is what redemption is; it is not saving us from hell, although it does save us from hell; but more importantly, it is making it so that we can be like God again.”[11]

Therefore, when we say, “We are being changed by Jesus,” we mean that the old fallen self (that we were never meant to be) is being destroyed (crucified with Christ), and the new self is being resurrected with Jesus into the image of Jesus/God that we were created to be. We could say that our lives are “our words and our ways”, what we say and do.

Being a disciple of Jesus is imitating and obeying Him by replacing our words and our ways with His words and His ways. And given that the words and ways of Jesus are the words and ways of God Himself, this is only possible through the power of God Himself in the form of the Holy Spirit which empowers and enlightens us.

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[1] For more on this idea see Matthew Bates, The Gospel Precisely (Renew.org, 2021) and Matthew Bates, Gospel Allegiance (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2019).

[1] Dallas Willard, “Discipleship.” Article for the Oxford Handbook of Evangelical Theology, edited by Gerald McDermott, 2010. http://old.dwillard.org/articles/artview.asp?artID=134

[2] St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies (Book V, Chapter 16).

[3] Clement of Alexandria, The Paedagogus (Book I).

[4] Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation of the Word.

[5] St. Gregory of Nyssa, On the Soul and the Resurrection.

[6] Augustine of Hippo, The City of God (Book I).

[7] Basil of Caesarea, De Spiritu Sancto.

[8] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion.

[9] John Wesley, The Works, (New York: J. & J. Harper, 1830).

[10] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, trans. Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003).

[11] A. W. Tozer, The Purpose of Man, ed. James L. Snyder, (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2013).

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Source: Conversion, Theology, and Discipleship

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By Dylan Young: Last March, this Kentucky fan could not believe his eyes when he saw the headlines that the SEC and NCAA basketball tournaments were canceled because of some sickness called the Coronavirus. My dreams of watching the Wildcats go on another Final Four run were gone just like that. I honestly could not wrap my mind around the fact that a virus was causing us to cancel events. I mean, viruses have been around forever! Fast forward to January 2021 and my bewilderment is laughable in hindsight. There was much more going on than a canceled basketball tournament.

Raise your hand if you had any personal plans canceled by the Coronavirus in 2020. Now that we all have our hands raised we can agree that we need to start planning differently moving forward. Agility is the key with anything we think through now. Rigid plans have a distinct possibility of failing more than ever. We have to be willing and able to change on the fly.

So what does that mean for us in ministry? How do we make future ministry plans when the future feels so uncertain? Do we just take things week-by-week forever? Of course not. We need to determine which parts of our lives and ministries are non-negotiables and resolve to move forward with those plans regardless of circumstances. Fortunately, the God we serve saw COVID-19 coming and gave us a mission and vision that transcends anything else happening on Earth: The Great Commission.

You know it well already, but Matthew 28:19-20 says, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (CSB)

Evangelism and discipleship do not stop because of a global pandemic, we just have to be even more creative and intentional about doing them. Specifically, in 2021 I hope you will resolve to lead a few men or women in a discipleship group that meets diligently no matter what. Resolve in 2021 that you will lead your group to use whatever means necessary to be consistent in your meeting rhythm. Let them know from the beginning that if there is a time where public meeting places are shut down again you will meet virtually. We have myriad resources to do this now so we really do not have an excuse anymore. And isn’t your spiritual health and maturity worth it?

Resolve in 2021 to bind yourself to the unchanging Word of God. Study Scripture. Journal your thoughts. Memorize it. Not much is certain right now, cling to the One who has been certain, is certain and will be certain.

Resolve in 2021 not to let social distancing excuse you from evangelism. Lead your discipleship groups to start thinking about and praying for the people they need to share Christ with right from the start and don’t let each other off the hook! I’m sure you have other goals and resolutions you’ve made in various areas of life as we begin a new calendar. In fact, I hope you do and I hope you achieve all of them! As you think through all you hope to accomplish this year, make sure you’ve got plans and resolutions for 2021 that could only be stopped by Jesus Himself showing up! Resolve in 2021 to make the Great
Commission your greatest resolution.

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By Dylan Young. Used with permission.

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Source: A Pandemic-Proof Plan for 2021

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By Bobby Harrington: When it comes to disciple making, how is the North American Church doing?

Every year, around the top of the year, Discipleship.org publishes an article covering the top disciple making trends we see currently happening, based upon the learnings of our team and the thirty plus organizations that work with us. A year ago, just before COVID-19 took center stage, Discipleship.org and Exponential.org published the results of a massive study on the state of disciple making in the American Church (click here to learn more).

That study showed that disciple making was trapped in a sort of tower of Babel, where “disciple,” “discipleship,” and “disciple making” meant everything and anything and nothing to pastors—and less than 5% of churches nationally were focused on reproducing disciples in a meaningful way. Puzzlement, bewilderment, and perplexity reigned in churches.

That was before COVID-19.

Since then, we have seen massive calls for discipleship and disciple making. Everyone now seems to realize that Sunday mornings, whether attended in person or online, are simply not enough. It is clear that God’s people are starving for guidance, for relationships … and for substance.

Non-discipleship is now the elephant in The Church.

So, we are tweaking our top ten trends this year. Our list this year focuses on the top ten trends we urge disciples, disciple makers, and church leaders to adopt. Based upon everything we have learned and the needs we see, we are taking a prescriptive posture this time rather than the descriptive one we typically issue.

You might call this list our top ten list of exhortations going into this year:

1. Make It Clear

We need clarity about disciple making today. Two areas in particular scream for elucidation.

Clarify definitions. Provide precise definitions for the key words you use like “disciple,” “discipleship,” “disciple making,” “church,” and “disciple making movement.” Until you are clear on the definitions of what you seek to create and how you will go about creating them, you will lack effectiveness. See here our list of recommended definitions (click here).

Make disciple making the core mission of our churches. If you make disciple making just one of the activities your local church does, you will not be very effective at that mission. Make disciple making the core mission of your church, as the New Testament shows us.[i] Until church leaders start evaluating everything they do through the lens of how it helps or detracts from disciple making as their core mission, they are destined for ineffectiveness.

2. Uphold the Shema

The Shema is the great commission before the Great Commission. God’s first plan for disciple making was in the home. God gave Deuteronomy 6:4–9 over one thousand years before Jesus gave the Great Commission of Matthew 28:18–20.

It is a profound section of Scripture, yet it is still one of the most practically significant of all.

Deuteronomy 6 is a key Scripture in what is famously called the Shema.

Shema means “heed,” “listen,” and “do.”

It was the operational mandate from the time the Israelites took possession of the land of Israel under Moses to this day. And the Jews in Jesus day recited it daily. Notice that it starts with parents truly loving God.

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength” (Deut. 6:4–5).

God’s commandment to pass on the faith to the next generation was so critical to Israel’s flourishing future that he called parents to intentionally and sacrificially spend relational time discipling and helping children learn to know, love, and follow him:

“These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates” (Deut. 6:6–9).

God’s commands were not just to be on the hearts of parents; they were to impress them on their children. God and his commands were to be the topic of conversations around the house, when they got up, when they sat at home, when they traveled along the road, and when they would lie down together at night.

We know this one fact: the most effective and lasting discipling is that which is done by parents in the home. Statistically, nothing comes close. Sociologists call it the 4-14 window: majority of people who become Christians do so between four and fourteen years of age.[ii]

Let us state it this way: a church can get an A+ for discipling adults, but if it does not get parents to disciple their children, that church will get a failing grade.

Remember to keep a focus on the home.

3. Make It Relational

The Word of God does not teach an educationally focused model. It teaches a relationally focused model.

Note again, how the original commission to parents in Deuteronomy 6:4-9 emphasized relationship. Disciple making was all about sitting at home, walking along the road, when families were lying down and when they were getting up.

Jesus doubled down on a relational focus when he entered into Jewish life a millennia later discipled the twelve.

First, Jesus started discipling his disciples by asking them to “Come,” and spend the day with him (John 1:39). For three and one half years he literally lived with them, discipling them in the everyday stuff of life, as they walked along the road and made regular trips where they would “lie down” and “get up” in their journeys. Jesus adopted a relational foundation that utilized an assortment of tools, including an emphasis on education, but also one that included coaching, imitation, mentoring, questions, trial and error, etc…

Second, the heart of Jesus’ disciple making method was not just relationship, it was love. Jesus’ love can be defined as cross-shaped actions.[iii] Here is what we mean: Jesus was constantly picking up his cross and putting the best interests of his disciples first. Then, at the end of his life, Jesus went to the cross and died, not just for his disciples, but for the entire world (Luke 19:10).

This focus is clear in Jesus’ NEW command (John 13:34-35). “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another,” he said. “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Cross shaped actions are the motive behind the disciple making mission and the foundation on which everything was built.

You cannot disciple people in the Way of Jesus without this same foundation of love.

4. Focus Beyond Sunday

Preaching on Sundays is good – but it is nowhere near enough. It is like throwing food to the children once a week and expecting that alone to nourish and feed them. It doesn’t work.

It never did.

As late as 2009, 50% of Americans claimed to be practicing Christians.[iv] Then the number started to drop … to 25% in 2018 and it is likely going down further as COVID-19 continues to disrupt the way we have been doing church. The previous big numbers were the result of centuries where parents, communities, schools, and even the government helped uphold many of the values found in the Bible. Churches could often get by with a shallow discipleship model – focused on Sundays – because there was so much support for disciples in the homes and other parts of life in America.

That world no longer exists.

To all the pastors, preachers and leaders out there, let us say it clearly – stop focusing on Sundays thinking it alone will make disciples.

Again, Sundays are not enough.

You must create a 7 day-a-week system of intentional, relational disciple making. You can include public meetings on Sunday, but it must also be “house to house,” (Acts 5:42) and include daily encouragement as long as it is called “today” (Hebrews 3:12-14).

5. Disciple the Mind

One of the most important books written recently is JT English’s Deep Discipleship. He makes the convincing case that we need more discipling in scripture and doctrine, not less. For too many years, those focused upon Jesus-style disciple making resisted what we call educational discipleship. We resisted an over-emphasis which held that disciple making was just about studying the Bible. As we said in point #2, that was NOT Jesus’ method.

But Jesus’ method included a strong emphasis on studying the Word of God.

We must reclaim that emphasis while also emphasizing relational disciple making. Most churches, including many disciple making churches, do not give enough emphasis to learning the Bible and doctrine. That is why we focus on the language of “disciple making” – which includes close personal relationship, studying scripture, coaching, imitation, mentoring, questions, trial and error, etc…

Read the following words by my friend David Young (about the future) and ask yourself about how important discipling people in the Word of God will need to be for disciples of Jesus to thrive?

Many Christians will have to learn to conduct themselves under the radar, avoiding social media statements and the like. Christians are already hiding many of their beliefs at work; it will only get worse. In many ways, I believe our affluence will work against us as the U.S. becomes more aggressively anti-Christian. We will want to play ball with secularism because we have so much to lose financially. And we will avoid building strong counter-cultural institutions because we won’t have to–we have enough wealth to weather the storm for a long time without changing our routines very much. Expect cultural Marxism, a continued erosion of any sense of personal virtue and vice, and a shocking hypocrisy from those on the left.

Young is not pessimistic about the future because he knows the power of disciple making. He describes a future hope that he envisions.

But, there will be faithful Christians who shine, who make up strong Christian homes, and who survive through their unwillingness to say that which is obviously false. They will become more attractive to others committed to Jesus, while Christians on the left fall away in increasing numbers.

6. Master Phygital

Some people say we must go back to in-person groups for disciple making. Others tell us that the future belongs to online disciple making.

They are both right.

Phygital combines the two and it is here to stay. Phygital is the concept of using technology to bridge the physical world and combine it with the digital world. Here is the basic idea: disciple-making groups that combine regular in-person gatherings with regular digital gatherings (through Zoom, Google Hangouts, etc.).

Here is one model to make what we are describing clear.

A group of 3 to 5 people form. This is a specific group size, ideal for the phygital environment. A same-gender group is best. I (Bobby) and Alex Absalom wrote Discipleship That Fits to explain the different sizes of groups and why this size is a good one.

Meet weekly online. The regularity of the meeting is important (for relationships and spiritual formation) and, if you are careful to keep it to one hour, it is not too difficult. My recent men’s group met every Tuesday night. The men helped get their kids in bed and then easily joined the group without the loss of work and travel time during the day.

Meet monthly in person. As a part of our holistic model, we also meet in person. In the monthly meeting, it was just the 4-5 of us. We tried to follow a rhythm where we would serve the needy, have a meal together or observe the sabbath together. Jason Dukes wrote a helpful book called, Inviting Along, which explains the seven rhythms of a “with Jesus lifestyle” and this model can be built around those rhythms.

With advances in technology, we will soon have new ways to disciple people. For example, Facebook plans to open virtual reality rooms next year. Soon using virtual reality and augmented reality for discipling relationships will be as common as meeting on Zoom meetings was in 2020.

Virtual and online meetings are also a big part of the reason we are upgrading The Discipleship.org Collective. We can now have ongoing trainings, conversations, and coaching online in ways that were not envisioned even a year ago.

7. Fast and Pray (a lot)

Here are two annoying questions. What gave power to Jesus’ disciple making efforts? God. How did Jesus access God’s power? He started his ministry with forty days of fasting and prayer (Matthew 4:1-2), he regularly withdrew to pray throughout his ministry (Mark 1:35), he prayed all night before picking the twelve (Luke 6:12-16) and he asked his three closest disciples to withdraw from the world to pray with him, and then he prayed so hard that sweat, like drops of blood, fell from his forehead just before the cross (Luke 22:39-46).

He was the Son of God and he utilized fasting and praying to be effective.

Why do we think we can be effective without relying on God’s power the way Jesus did?

Let me state this point positively. We have observed that fasting and prayer is a key component behind international disciple making movements. When people ask why we are not seeing these disciple making movements in North America, we point to our belief that a lack of fasting and prayer may be one of the key reasons.

We are not saying that Fasting and Prayer is like magic – human actions that make God give us what we ask for. God may have reasons that God alone knows why he will or he will not grant our requests. But, at the same time, he teaches us to pray and that we do not have things because we do not ask God (James 4:2). Fasting and prayer are key tools in our earnest efforts as we look to God to unleash his power. God’s Word teaches us to “Come near to God and he will come near to you” (James 4:8).

Church historians tell us that prayer is a precursor to revival and the great movements of God’s Spirit.[v]

This focus is true for those who emphasize free will and those who emphasize God’s sovereignty. It shows that both points of emphasis are needed. The Calvinist scholar Roger Nicole put it this way:[vi]It is in keeping with Reformed thought that revival should be grounded in prayer, because in prayer we acknowledge God’s sovereignty. God alone is the One who can dispense revival. So, revival is not something that is within the reach of human beings; it is something God alone can provide.

8. Develop a Simple, Effective, and Reproducible System

Those three words describe the personal disciple-making model every person and every church needs.

Several years ago, we brought on a staff minister from Jim Putman’s church in Idaho at the church where I serve as lead pastor. It was the early days of our focus in shifting to a disciple making culture. Our staff worked hard together to adapt to the differences between the Nashville area (where we are located) in comparison to North Idaho area (where our new staff minister came from). He loved basketball. So, one day he compared the disciple making system that we were developing to the way the Harvard University basketball team played basketball.

“It is pretty complicated,” he said. “But it might work.”

I soon realized the problem. Effective disciple making must focus on everyday disciples, not experts. We didn’t need a Harvard system.

If it is too complicated for the average, everyday person to adopt it, then it will not be easily reproducible and it will not multiply. And the local church or ministry needs just one system, not two or three (even though you may have variations).

So, when you are working on a team and you are seeking to create a disciple-making system, remember these three words.

Simple – it must be simple to understand, participate in and lead others in the personal disciple-making system you adopt. It can be a mission group model or small group model (designed for disciple making) or it can be a smaller transparent space model or even a one-on-one system. Just make sure it is simple, make it easy.

Effective – some of the best personal disciple making models I have tried sound great in theory, but they were ineffective in practice. Some models work with certain groups but not with other groups. Some models work well in one part of the country, but not in another. Many worked for others, but not for us. I jokingly tell my co-workers that over 90% of the ideas that I have tried do not work.

We have learned to underrate the wooden adoption of disciple making models. Let me share a good example.

Lots of people around North America have been trying to utilize Discovery Bible Study, but we are not currently seeing the effectiveness with this method in North America that others are seeing around the world. Is it because we do not have a culture where obedience is natural? Is it because we do not want to be accountable to share our faith with lost people? Is it because we are not providing the foundation of fasting and prayer? These are good questions that our team is investigating. The key point is that we want to make sure that we adopt effective models before we get the whole church to follow us. We each need our own effective model.

Reproducible – we want to raise up disciples who make disciples. That means that we also want our personal disciple-making model to be easy for people who have been discipled by us to repeat the same process with others. Sometimes people describe what we are talking about here as portable – people can take our model of disciple making and use it with men or women, students or adults, blue collar or white collar.

In short, when we utilize a personal disciple-making model, we want one for everyday people. We want a personal model for our ministry and/or church that creates disciples who make disciples, who make disciples, who make even more disciples …

9. Create Disciple-Making Culture, Not Strategies

Strategies are great. But the culture of a church or ministry is much more important.

There is an organizational and business truism that is often repeated to make this point: culture eats strategy for breakfast. Applying this to a church or a ministry, if you do not change the culture, nothing will really change. Many leaders fail in their strategies because they fail to account for this reality.

Louis Gerstner, the former CEO of IBM, took the adage two steps further: “Organizational culture eats strategy for breakfast, lunch and dinner …”

What is a culture? The Harvard Business Review describes it this way: “The values, beliefs and behaviors practiced in an organization formed over time because they are rewarded or punished (i.e. by formal or informal rules, rituals, and behaviors).”

The McKinsey Institute put it more simply: “culture is how we do things around here …”

Strategies are easy because we take something external and try to put it over top of the people and their culture. “If we can just get everyone to follow this path,” we say. “If our people will adopt our strategy, we will get where we want to go.” The problem is that disciple making is not a path and it is not a strategy.

Disciple making is both an identity and a lifestyle.

People first see themselves as disciples. They believe it is the greatest reality on planet earth. This identity represents warmth, hope and joy for a person. They internalize being a disciple as something they want to share with others.

The desire to share what it means to be a disciple grows through challenges, trials, and it overcomes the draw toward lukewarmness over time. But the conviction about the truth of Jesus and the eternal lostness of those who are not disciples prevails.

Being a disciple and making disciples becomes a lifestyle – for individuals, ministries, and churches.

A disciple making culture must be created, nurtured and developed. It will thrive when it becomes deep rooted. As we pointed out in an earlier Discipleship.org blog, in such a culture there is an internal and external congruence throughout the organization based upon common beliefs/values (deep rooted), disciples/habits (practiced daily), and narrative/words (repeated regularly).[vii]

A disciple making culture is a beautiful, almost unstoppable thing.

10. Don’t Seek Easy Solutions

Don’t settle for shortcuts.

Who doesn’t want quick answers to difficult, challenging realities? But that is a big problem if you really want to shift to a disciple-making culture.

As the old saying goes, if it were easy, everyone would do it.

Here are three common ways that church or ministry leaders search for easy.

They send other staff members or other leaders to figure out how to solve their discipleship problem.

They find and easily adopt a popular disciple-making method without doing the deeper work.

They add disciple making on top of everything else they are already doing.

Given what we have said in the points above, it doesn’t take a genius to see that these three typical approaches – and countless more like them – will lead to failure. We have seen many church leaders and many churches make failed attempts at creating a true disciple-making focus.

G.K. Chesterton had a poignant observation about true discipleship: “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.” The same is true for a disciple-making focus. So, embrace the challenges and difficulties.

We are not bringing up this last point to create discouragement. On the contrary.

The effort is worth it. Disciple making is so important, so vital, and so life changing for people, that we cannot set the bar too low. It is the greatest mission on planet earth. Just think, it was the focus for 65-90% of Jesus ministry.

There is no more worthy focus for our lives, ministries, and churches.

A culture where disciple making thrives is a culture destined to bring abundant glory to God.

We want to give him our best.

[i] Jim Putman and I make the cursory case for disciple making as the core mission of the church in our book DiscipleShift: Five Shifts to Help Your Church Make Disciples Who Make Disciples and Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert make a similar but more elaborate case in their book, What is the Mission of the Church: Making Sense of Social Justice, Shalom, and the Great Commission. To help with clarity on this point, in the late spring of 2021 Scott Sager and I will publish a shorter, punchy, and cut-to-the-chase theological argument called, Disciple Making: The Core Mission of the Church (forthcoming by renew.org).

[ii] https://www.nae.net/when-americans-become-christians/

[iii] For more information on this definition see the forthcoming book by Kelvin Teamer, Kingdom Life: Experiencing God’s Reign through Love and Holiness (forthcoming Renew.org).

[iv] https://www.barna.com/research/changing-state-of-the-church/

[v] See Richard Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual: An Evangelical Theology of Renewal (IVP Academic; Expanded Edition, 2020).

[vi] https://www.galaxie.com/article/rar01-3-03

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Source: Top 10 Forward-Thinking Trends for Disciple Makers

The post Top 10 Forward-Thinking Trends for Disciple Makers appeared first on Passion for Planting.

By Justin Gravitt: Luke 6:46-49, “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say? I will show you what he like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete.”

Jesus had had enough. For too long His disciples had been listening without acting. They engaged him with a respect that lacked response. They were polite and casual. They were ordinary men with ordinary interests and ordinary engagement.

But Jesus was tired of being the “Lord” yet being treated like an ordinary lecturer. And it was time for Him to say so.

“Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”

If our Scriptures were HD, I’m sure we’d see the sharp glint in His eyes and hear the seriousness in His voice. He hadn’t come to earth to simply make human friends. He didn’t pray overnight to select men who would remain ordinary. His Father had given him a job to do and that work would never succeed on the backs of men who were too casual or cowardly to do the hard work of becoming. Jesus’ goal wasn’t to just impact men, it was to build a foundation that would stand in the face of the coming torrent. His long-term perspective informed this instruction.

He started with the goal, “I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built.”

The illustration may have been new to them, but the lesson wasn’t. Jesus was constantly teaching them about becoming. He showed them the fruit of a surrendered life. He urged them to do what He did. His teaching was more imitation than explanation; more “follow me” than “listen to me.”

But they weren’t getting it. So, being a master teacher he continued by telling them why they needed to put His teaching into practice.

“But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete.”

The words must have rung in their ears, “Its destruction was complete.”

Jesus wasn’t saying that houses couldn’t be built without foundations. They could. They were. They are! But the difference between utter destruction and success wasn’t whether the house was built, but rather what happened to it when the torrent hit. Houses built halfway are destroyed when tough times come. On the other hand, a house with a foundation can withstand a disaster. Foundation work is hard but worth it. It’s the difference between what lasts and what’s a waste.

What’s true for Jesus’ Twelve is also true for Jesus’ Church. We can build houses of worship without doing what Jesus said. We can go through the motions of loving others without really loving them, we can preach theologically astute sermons without living it out in our personal lives, and we can run great programs without putting anything into practice, but to build a church that will stand up to the torrent, we must model our disciple making after Jesus. He showed us how to build a foundation upon which the church will thrive.

The biggest fallacy of the American church is that it can thrive on a foundation other than Jesus-style disciple making. It can’t and COVID is revealing that. So with what foundation is the church designed to thrive?

I tackle this question in my recent eBook, The Foundation of a Disciple Making Culture. Click the title to download for FREE!

Jesus’ foundation was the Twelve. Through those men, He saw the nations and all generations of disciples who would believe through them (John 17:20). They were His CORE team. I unpack CORE as an acronym in my book, but I want to point out three outcomes of Jesus’ CORE team.

1. Each individual became a disciple maker.

Jesus’ goal for each of them was their transformation. To be clear, that transformation was to be in the model of Jesus (Luke 6:40). They were to become fishers of men (Matthew 4:19) and they were to be sent out (Mark 3:14). Jesus kept that reality before them when he talked to them about how to become great in the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 5) and when He challenged them to surrender to His Lordship (Luke 6:46).

2. Their union was driven by an individual commitment to the mission of being and making disciples.

There’s no doubt the torrent struck Jesus’ disciples. Jesus was brutally executed, the government persecuted and eventually killed most of them, and there was no establishment for them to lean on. In spite of all this, this team stood firm and Jesus’ work wasn’t washed away.

3. Their connection to Jesus and one another made them resilient.

Despite persecution and uncertainty, the disciples were incredibly resilient. Together they faced beatings, death, theological disagreements, and imprisonment without turning on one another or abandoning the faith. Instead, they praised God for the opportunity to face such challenges and lived into the mission they’d been given.

The church is meant to thrive on the foundation of a CORE team of disciple makers. It was the power of Jesus’ movement and it will be the power of the next one. A CORE team allows the broader church to see the life of Jesus lived out in different contexts, but with one mission; Peter to the Gentiles (Acts 15:7-11), John a pillar in the Jerusalem Church (Gal. 2:9), and so on. Today it’s Steve making disciples at his workplace, Dana doing it with other young moms, and Zach doing the same as he volunteers to teach tennis to neighbors. As a team, the volume of their commitment is amplified; as individuals the impact is varied.

The same can happen in your church. A CORE team of disciple makers live out the same mission in different contexts. They use different gifts, but proclaim to all who watch and listen that Jesus is King and His Kingdom is here to stay. Together they display a fullness that springs from following Jesus and announces to everyone that His disciples do work that’s holy, transcendent, and fulfilling.

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By Justin Gravitt. Used with permission.

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Source: Three Outcomes of a Disciple Making Foundation

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By Stan Rodda: Scrap the mental image that fishing for men looks like a lone fisherman on a boat with a flannel shirt and a PBR hat. When Jesus said, “Follow Me and I will make you fishers of men,” He was talking about fishing in the context of a net. In disciple making efforts I often say, “Cast a wide net.”

It’s true for all of us that often our eyes get down on what’s right in front of us. Sometimes we only see the one or two people we really hope to reach with the Gospel. More often than not, we find ourselves in an environment where all the fish already look like us. The dreaded Christian subculture. The place of “Mountain Jew” and “Salty and Lit” t-shirts. It’s an awkward place.

Here’s how I knew when I was stuck in that Christian bubble. When the guy discipling me would ask about conversations with lost people and I didn’t have any stories. All my stories had to do with church staff, my teams, life group leaders and my wife. Those aren’t bad conversations to have. All of them are must have conversations, however I wasn’t fishing as much as I should have been.

That’s when I started to create my own fishing ponds. Areas of life where I was intentionally around lost people. On purpose! I know right?! The kinds of places where if my car was seen near them in the mean streets of Central Illinois, I would have been the topic of town gossip and the primary agenda item on next week’s board meeting. But for those of you who don’t care if you get talked about or if the board is confused about why you want to be around lost people, this post is for you.

How do you identify fishing ponds around you?

Well, there are five! And you can fish in all of them.

Get started on your disciple making journey by subscribing to Field Notes! A periodic disciple making email.

The Swamp

In Matthew 10:5-8 Jesus send out to the 12 into surrounding areas. He sends them specifically to the lost sheep of Israel. On this particular journey, the disciples would have met strangers and come into contact with places and people they weren’t familiar with. The swamp is difficult ground for fishing.

It’s the house of peace search in a new town or neighborhood. You are walking and praying, walking and praying. Asking God to show you who that person of peace is. It’s like quitting an addiction cold turkey, it’s difficult soil for sure. But it can absolutely be fruitful.

If you are a parachute church planter or have moved to a new city to make disciples in your living room, you are probably fishing primarily in the swamp.

The River

When you are fishing for people in the river, you are primarily focused on people who are flowing by you. They don’t know who you are, but something about you catches their eye. You somehow end up in a conversation with them over a cup of coffee. This has happened to me when I wear my Passion 4 Planting t-shirt into Panera or Starbucks. People just “flowing by” stop to ask about the shirt.

We see this with the woman at the well in John 4:1-26. She was just “flowing by” minding her own business when this man starts talking to her. Pretty soon the conversation turns spiritual and this woman transforms an entire town when she introduces them to Jesus.

If you start conversations with people just “flowing by” because you’re wearing a “Mountain Jew” tee, then you’re fishing in the river.

The Pond

The pond is where you are going to find people where you already live work and play. These people may or may not know you. They might be people from your gym you are getting to know or a cashier at Target you go to every time you’re there. Admit it, you’re there way too much.

Sometimes, these people may already have an interest in spiritual things or an inquisitive spirit. In John 1:35-30, John’s disciples start following Jesus. They swam in the same pond as Jesus, sort of. Heard His name from John, maybe witnessed His baptism. Yet, they had questions and wanted to follow.

The pond is where you naturally hang out and the people are getting to know you there. They might even have your coffee or lunch order memorized at this point. Where is your pond? Identify it right now. Write down the names of every person you know from that place. Start praying for God to go before you in future conversations with those people. God gave you that pond for a reason. Go fishing!

The Stocked Pond

The stocked pond is only slightly different in that we are talking about places full of people exploring spiritual things. You might walk or drive past a Mosque or Synagogue on your way to work. Maybe you know where a local Buddhist temple is. These places are stocked ponds because the people inside them are searching for spiritual answers.

A great example of this would be Paul addressing the men of Athens at the Areopagus in Acts 17. He recognized that these people were spiritual in every way. That they were pursuing wisdom and knowledge as best they could. He sees a statue for an “Unknown God” and sees his opportunity to share the Gospel. The Areopagus was a stocked pond.

Do you have any stocked pond opportunities where you live?

The Tributaries

This might be the best place of all for each of us to do some fishing. The tributaries are freshwater streams that feed the larger rivers. These are the places where you will find your most natural relationships. They are already naturally feeding into your regular life.

Think about your natural relational networks. The people you know well in your life who don’t know Jesus. These people can be your mom, dad, cousin, aunt, uncle, son, daughter, grandchildren or the neighbor next door. The tributaries are the places where we already exist the most naturally in relationship with others.

This about Andrew and Peter in John 1. Go and tell the most obvious person you know that the Messiah is here. Start with a brother. A natural relational connection. A tributary. Who are the closest people to you in life who need to know Jesus? Write their name down. Start praying for them. Ask God to go before you in a conversation with that person.

Download 5 Fishing Ponds

When you find yourself stuck in the Christian bubble and you have little to no contact with lost people around you, it might be time to find a new fishing pond. Use this tool to start identifying different areas in life where you need to be casting a wider net.

Happy fishing!

Source: Five Best Places To Start Fishing

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By Discipleship.org:

Shut your mouth.

That sounds a little harsh, I know, but track with me… To make disciples who make disciples, there is great value in keeping quiet. This has been the most consistently challenging, beneficial, and practical disciple-making lesson the Holy Spirit has taught me. It is a lesson I need to be reminded of everyday.

For some of you, this may be an easy directive to follow. Many of you are like me: God has given you a passion and a calling to proclaim his Good News. And perhaps you’ve studied creative communication strategies, taken a deep dive into deep truths of his Word so that our exegetical messages take into account culture and context, and when you are in a Bible study group you always have something to say that is (in our not-so-humble opinion) insightful, inspiring, and certainly interesting.

In my decades of full-time ministry, and through my missions work on three different continents, I have been blessed to sit at the feet of some amazing men and women whom God has used to spark multi-generational disciple making movements (DMMs). These leaders came from multiple streams of evangelical backgrounds and their training varied in several areas. However, one point has been consistent throughout: talk all you want if you want to make disciples and have it stop at one generation.

To truly disciple a disciple maker, however, we must learn to shut our mouths, listen,andtrust the Holy Spirit.

Why do I, personally, have a hard time shutting my mouth? It really comes down to pride. I too often trust in my own ability to impact the person I am discipling more than I trust in the Holy Spirit’s ability to teach and guide them.

Do you trust the Holy Spirit living in you? Do you really trust that the Holy Spirit can work in a disciple, even if they’ve just started following Jesus?

If you are reading this, I’m sure you love and follow Jesus. And if Jesus were physically present with you now, you would have no problem trusting him. You would also trust him with any person you might be discipling. If this disciple were reading Scripture and seeking to understand it better, there is no doubt you would trust Jesus to reveal to them just what he needs to know.

Do you trust the Holy Spirit in the same way? Jesus said that it is better for us that he should go to be with the Father (John 16). Ponder that for a moment: Can you imagine anything better than having Jesus physically present in the here and now, right next to you? Nothing could be better than going about your ministry with Jesus alongside you, right?

Getting stuck on a difficult Bible passage? Easy, let’s ask Jesus!
Someone you are discipling has doubts and asks a difficult question? “Well, I don’t know,” you might say. Then, turning to Jesus, “Uh… Jesus? What do you think”?

How great would that be? And yet, Jesus himself said there is something better:

“Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment” (John 16:7–8).

Just a few verses down, Jesus names this helper the “Spirit of truth” that will guide us into “all the truth.” What is better than having Jesus next to us? Having Jesus in us through his Spirit of truth. We must also believe this is true for our disciples if we want them to become disciple makers.

We will make disciples like Jesus when we follow Jesus’ example of trusting the Holy Spirit to guide us. Specifically, we must learn to trust that the Spirit can work even in baby believers in powerful ways. I am always astounded at how much Jesus entrusted to his disciples—all of whom he knew were still quite clueless about even important truths of the promised King and His Kingdom. Jesus knew their passionate faith and willingness to obey could make up for what they were lacking in theological depth.

Think about when Jesus sends out the twelve apostles (in Matthew 10) and later the 72 disciples (in Luke 10). Think of the crucially important task he was giving them even though they were off-track in so much of their thinking about the Messiah. They were to go to towns and villages and proclaim the prophesied arrival of the Kingdom of God! Jesus told them to make known his message and, amazingly, he trusted these young disciples to DO just as he DID. He trusted in the Spirit to lead and provide:

Jesus depended on God’s provision and his disciples were to go out with nothing and trust God to provide. (Matthew 10:10; Luke 10:4)
Jesus discerned who was open to the gospel and he trusted his followers to be able to, on the one hand, find people of peace open to the gospel and, on the other, recognize when those people were not present and walk on – shaking the dust off their feet along the way. (Matthew 10:12–14; Luke 10:6–11)
Jesus even trusted the Spirit to work in these young disciples supernaturally, so much so that he laid some pretty bold expectations before them. They were to touch the untouchables, deliver the demon-possessed, heal the sick and even raise the dead! His trust was well-founded. These disciples, who were still so young in their faith-walk, came back with amazing reports of God’s faithfulness. They joyfully exclaimed, “Even the demons are subject to us in your name”! (Matthew 10:8; Luke 10:9,17)

How much do you think they learned about Christ and his Kingdom through that experience? How much more was their faith strengthened than if they had simply watched Jesus do it? Jesus expected them to put their faith into practice from the start. He sent them as sheep among wolves because He knew God would be with them. The fruit was evident, and far more people encountered the Kingdom of God than could have been accomplished by them staying together as one large group.

Jesus sometimes had a short, impactful encounter with someone and then sent them on saying, “go and sin no more.” Even some who wanted to stay with Jesus, he sent away. One example is in Mark 5 and Luke 8. The Gerasene demoniac, so fresh from being radically delivered from a legion of demonic forces, begged to go with Jesus. In our Western Christian culture, we would invite this former demoniac into an extensive time of healing and Bible study while protecting him from the big bad world outside that had so thoroughly abused him. We would certainly not give him any significant responsibilities at church until we had seen a prolonged history of healthy habits being created. Jesus, however, commissioned him to go reach his own people in Decapolis. Some of these people had just rejected Jesus and asked him to leave! Was this commissioning successful? So the man went away and began to tell in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And all the people were amazed. (Mark 5:20)

After the resurrection and before the ascension, Jesus imparts his peace to the disciples while making it clear that they are to do as he did, “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you”. (John 20:21) He also commissioned his followers to go and make disciples by baptizing and teaching obedience. Jesus made it clear that they were NOT to do this on their own. Though he told them to go, he told them to first wait. Wait for what? Wait for the Spirit! Then, Jesus foresaw, they would be empowered to make disciples as Jesus did. (Acts 1: 4, 8)

These disciples followed Jesus’ model and trusted His Spirit in sometimes surprising ways:

In Acts 8, Philip, John and Peter went through various Samaritan villages and saw great fruit. They then moved on, entrusting the Spirit to continue the training of these new disciples. One encounter was very quick. Philip had no choice but to leave the Ethiopian eunuch with the small but significant teaching that led to the eunuch’s baptism. Philip was “carried away” to another place and the eunuch was left with the Spirit living inside of him. Was it enough? The eunuch went on his way rejoicing (Acts 8:39).
In Acts 10, we see the gentile Cornelius and his entire household become Christ-followers. Everyone knew this was incredibly significant. Gentiles had accepted the good news and God had accepted them! With something so significant and “out of the box,” we would expect Peter to be certain they would “get it right.” Right? Surely, he would stick around to impart the knowledge they needed. Instead, he had no doubt that these non-Jews had received the same Spirit that they had. Peter and his coworkers simply stayed there for “some days” – not “some months” or even “some weeks.” Just a few days! Why? He trusted that Cornelius and his household had what they needed: “God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us”. (Acts 15:8)

In the latter half of the book of Acts, the commissioned Paul and those with him followed this same model of truly trusting the Holy Spirit. Paul would stay or leave a place under the direction of the Spirit, independent of the success of his church plants in any particular area. He seldom stayed in one place more than a few months and yet the churches survive, thrive and even multiply under the continued guidance of the Spirit. Yes, Paul would often leave other leaders in these places. But these “leaders”, like Timothy, were also quite young in the faith. In 2 Timothy 2:2, we see Paul encouraging Timothy to make disciple-making disciples – four generations! All of Paul’s letters to these churches and young disciples reinforce the importance of a dependance on the Holy Spirit and trust in the Spirit’s guidance (good examples of this are found in Romans 8, 1 Corinthians 2 and 12, and Galatians 5).

Here we are 2,000 years later. Are we following the model Jesus gave us as we make disciples? Are we trusting in the Holy Spirit? Are we listening more than talking? Are we training our disciples to do the same?

All of the disciple making movements that I have encountered around the world have leaders who really, really trust the Holy Spirit’s ability to teach and guide even baby-believers. Do these young disciples get off track sometimes? Of course. Do they stumble and fall? Yes, indeed. When a child learns to walk, you expect some falls along the way. When a baby stumbles, we don’t suddenly distrust in their ability to eventually walk. We would never just put them in a wheelchair and say, “I tell you what. You just let me push you where you need to go. It will be better for you that way”. Of course not. We help them up and encourage them to try again! Half of the New Testament was written to help admonish young followers of Jesus who were struggling to obey the Spirit’s lead.

One area we often trust ourselves in more than the Holy Spirit is when we lead a disciple in a Bible study. When I was first exposed to disciple-making movements and the training from their leaders, this was one of the more challenging areas for me to follow. Again, I was blessed to be exposed to many different streams of “DMM” training and tools. Without fail, though, they employed a similar method when it came to getting into God’s Word with a disciple. This tool is commonly called a “Discovery Bible Study” (DBS). These varied methods had one crucially important trait: disciples are given the freedom to discover truths from God’s word, trusting the Spirit to teach them what they need to “discover”.

This is a significant departure from typical Bible studies in Western Christian culture. A traditional Bible study is more top-down. The teacher imparts information to the student. Yes, God’s Word is utilized but it is the teacher who tells the student what they should believe about any particular passage. A good teacher will employ questions and even discussions but only as a tool to get to a preconceived parcel of knowledge that the teacher wants the student to receive. This is not wrong in and of itself, but it does propagate a dependance upon an “expert”. Without that so-called expert, the disciple is paralyzed by lack of confidence. The teacher seems to have all the answers, so the disciple becomes dependent on that teacher. Too often, religious experts insert themselves into a place where the Spirit would be much more effective.

Discovery Bible Studies, on the other hand, ask simple questions and then allow the Spirit to do his work. The students feel a sense of ownership because this new understanding came from the Spirit living within them. This also shows them that they too can share God’s word with others. These new disciples know that they do not have to carry the burden of having all the right answers in order to make disciples. They trust the Spirit to help their new disciples discover the truth just as the Spirit helped them. This empowers even brand-new disciples to know Jesus, follow Him and teach others to do the same.

My experience in using the DBS method has humbled me. I have witnessed how much better a teacher the Spirit is than I am. I ask simple questions like, “What does this Bible passage teach you about God or Jesus”? And then I hear the Spirit tell me, again, “Shut your mouth”.

Sometimes it is so hard to obey!

“But,” my heart cries out to the Spirit, “I have such an amazing insight into this verse that I just KNOW they will be blessed by”!

“Just be quiet”.

“But what about the cultural context and other related bible passages”? I stubbornly argue, “What I know about this is very relevant and I think they need to know this”.

The Spirit patiently and firmly convicts my heart again, “Stay silent, even if the silence feels awkward. Let them think. Let me work. Just wait”.

I do. I wait. I let these young disciples discover a truth from JUST God’s word with JUST the Holy Spirit to guide them. What happens?

Time and time again, their answers blow my mind. It is often something I would have never thought to say but exactly what they needed to know and understand. I am even more amazed by their answers to another common “DBS” question, “How can I obey what I’ve learned from this passage”? Their answers are typically much more radical and far bolder than I would have been comfortable expecting of them. Are they always spot on? No. Sometimes they throw in something off the mark. A follow-up question like, “Now where in this verse did you see that”? usually gets them back on track.

Because they “discovered it” themselves, it sticks. The Spirit places it deep in their heart and they believe it. They obey it. Not only that, but they inherently understand that anyone can take God’s Word and learn what they need from it. They see that the Word is alive and active and convicting and relevant and worth spending time with.

This is what happens when I choose to trust the Holy Spirit with a simple Bible Study time. Don’t misunderstand. The Spirit will lead us to teach deep truths at times, but our default should be to first allow the Spirit to do his work. That means being quiet far more than we are accustomed to.

One final note regarding Bible Study – simple truth with simple obedience is powerful. We love to complicate things and keep truth abstract. However, when we trust in the Spirit, we must be willing to keep truth simple and practical. One of my favorite quotes is from the Danish theologian Søren Kierkegaard:

The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand, we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church’s prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes, it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament.

Of course, our need to trust the Holy Spirit transcends just Bible Studies. The need to be more Spirit-dependent saturates every aspect of making disciples who make disciples:

Prayer and Fasting (all disciple-making movements start with prayer movements).
Moving from knowledge-based discipleship to Spirit-led obedience-based discipleship.
Discerning where God is at work, who he is working on, and joining him in that work.
Knowing when a disciple is ready to step out on their own. (It is sooner than you think when you trust the Holy Spirit).
The list goes on.

Want to be a good disciple-maker? Trust in the Holy Spirit. Want to make disciples who make disciples? Trust that the Holy Spirit will work in those you disciple.

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Source: Trusting the Spirit Enough to Keep Quiet

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By Justin Gravitt:

Hey,

I’m trying to write more letters and God brought you to mind.

First, I just want to say that your passion for God is obvious. You take the time to study and apply the Scriptures. Your heart for Jesus is clear. There’s no doubt that He’s your anchor. I love that about you!

I hope this doesn’t come off as weird, but watching you is helping me learn to love others better. I’m serious! You engage people so naturally. Your heart for them is unmistakable. Others tell story after story that begins by you calling, writing a note, or inviting them to coffee. Not even this global pandemic has stopped you from impacting others!

We’ve known each other for a while now. And I hope you know how much I respect you. But I wanted to ask if you would consider becoming an intentional disciple maker?

I know it can be intimidating. The other day I overheard you saying, “Me, disciple someone? No way! What would I say? I think the best way to disciple is just to love people. That’s what I do. I love God and just care for others. I don’t want to be a discipler!  The thought of someone looking at me as their example is downright scary!”

I get it. Being a disciple maker can be scary. As an introvert, I still experience a low-level of anxiety before heading into discipleship meetings. In fact, I don’t know a single person who has felt ready before they started. Even though it’s hard, I can’t get past the fact that Jesus’ last instructions to us were to make disciples. Not only that, He also promised to be with us as we do it (Matt. 28:18-20). We don’t have to be perfect or have it all figured out.

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I really think your impact as a disciple maker could be amazing! You love God and you already know how to help people follow Jesus. Imagine how many would be changed if you took the next step and helped them learn how to help others?! I think you would only need to add vision and intentionality to what you are already doing. One thing I’ve learned is that part of being Jesus’ disciple is intentionally helping others become disciple makers.

Since you are already influencing people to grow closer to God, I’d suggest just getting started with an invitation and a simple tool. I’d be more than happy to talk with you about any questions or fears you might have. I think once you try it, you’ll be hooked! Making disciples multiplies our Kingdom impact while at the same time more fully connects us to God.

If you’d like to chat more about this, just let me know! Thanks for your patience with me as I lovingly press into your life. If I didn’t care about you then I wouldn’t bother. I so appreciate your friendship and look forward to seeing you at church next week!

“Almost disciple makers” are all around us. Some lack vision, others lack intentionality, others relational skills. One thing they have in common is a need to be engaged on the subject. So this series of letters is designed to do just that…

Justin Gravitt is the Dayton (Ohio) Area Director for Navigator Church Ministries. Read more from Justin at his blog, One Disciple to Another, where this article first appeared.

First published on Justin Gravitt’s blog here.

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Source: Letter to “Almost Disciple Makers”

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