Source: Share Your Story

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by Bill Hull and Bobby Harrington: This is part of our blog series from the free eBook Evangelism or Discipleship: Can They Effectively Work Together?.

An occupational hazard for you, the informed reader, is to scan or skip this section because you know what it says. While that may be somewhat true, we would be so encouraged by your careful attention. In this chapter, we’re asking three critical questions of this seminal passage.

We begin with the two verses before it:

“Then the eleven disciples left for Galilee, going to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw Him, they worshiped Him—but some of them doubted!” (Matt. 28: 16-17, NLT).

1. Why did they show up?

The 11 disciples were afraid. They had failed Him. Yet they were His disciples, not anyone else’s. The resurrection had convinced them to stick with Jesus. They knew what was ahead. Jesus had already told them they would be hated and would die like He did. But they would also be raised like Him. So when He appeared to them once more, they worshiped Him. Still, doubt nagged at them. Was this real, were they imagining this, were they being tricked?

If a skeptic paid attention to this one simple fact about the disciples, it would erase any doubt about the reason for the creation of the church and the existence of the New Testament. The idea that these very ordinary men would have invented such a story and arranged for themselves to be killed is ludicrous. Belief and sacrifice didn’t come naturally for these 11 men; they don’t come easily to any of us.

…

Written by Bill Hull and Bobby Harrington

Bill Hull is a Co-Founder of The Bonhoeffer Project. Bill’s passion is to help the Church return to its disciple making roots. He considers himself a discipleship evangelist. This God-given desire has manifested itself in 20 years of pastoring and the authorship of many books. Two of his more important books Jesus Christ Disciple Maker and The Disciple Making Pastor have both celebrated 20 years in print. Add a third in the popular trilogy—The Disciple Making Church—and you have a new paradigm for disciple making.

Bobby Harrington is the Executive Director of Discipleship.org, a national platform, conference, and ministry that advocates for Jesus’ style of disciple making. He is the founding and lead pastor of Harpeth Christian Church (by the Harpeth River, just outside of Nashville, TN). He has a Doctor of Ministry degree in consulting and has spent years as a coach to church planters and senior pastors. He is the author of several books on discipleship, including DiscipleShift (with Jim Putman and Robert Coleman) and The Disciple Maker’s Handbook (with Josh Patrick).

The post Why Did the Disciples Show Up to the Great Commission? appeared first on Discipleship.org.

Source: Why Did the Disciples Show Up to the Great Commission?

The post Why Did the Disciples Show Up to the Great Commission? appeared first on Passion for Planting.

by Jim Putman: Sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ with others can be difficult—even daunting. Sharing the gospel means revealing the most personal aspect of our lives. It’s the core of who we are! And sharing that with someone can be just plain ol’ scary.

But if we’re going to be like Jesus, we need to share like Jesus shared. The most important thing about how Jesus shared is that He spent so much time with His disciples. They got to know just who Jesus was. Not only did they eat and travel and talk and study and serve and go to church together, but Jesus also shared even the most intimate, heart-wrenching part of His life with His disciples. When Jesus prayed the evening before His crucifixion, He wasn’t alone.

That’s how Jesus shared. Everything. The good. The bad. The ugly..

If we are going to share like Jesus shared, we have to be totally honest and transparent with ourselves and with others. We have to let people into our lives, and we have to enter theirs. When you are living with integrity, letting others see the real you, Jesus should to be what people see. Of course, no one is going to be a perfect representation of Jesus. But if we squint real close, and smudge some of the grime, we should be able to see Christ working in the midst of all our muck.

That’s the point of doing Real Life with people. We are empowered and driven by the Holy Spirit to reach out to others, to show them the love of Christ (John 13:35), and then to tell them about what makes us so different. Even if your different is only a little different, it’ll become a lot of difference as you continue to let God change you.

But Jesus didn’t limit his sharing to actions alone. He also spoke. That means we’re probably going to have to say something about our faith, too—if we want to share like Jesus shared. We have to invite our unsaved friends to church, to serve, to a small group, or even just out to coffee if they’re wary of Christianity. We have to tell them the truth: we’re all messed up and fall short of reaching heaven, but Jesus provided the way for us to be in a relationship with Him again through His death.

When it comes to sharing the gospel, there’s our part, their part, and God’s part. God’s part is to soften our friend’s heart and prepare him to hear about the gospel. Our part is to actually share that gospel with him! And then his part is to decide what he’s going to do with that. (Matthew 13:1-43) We may have to share the same gospel several times with the same person over the years. The point is that we do share. We do share who we are, how God is working in our lives, and how God wants to work in his life, too.

Written by Jim Putman

This was originally posted on Jim Putman’s blog here. Used with permission.

Source: The Disciple Maker’s Journey Starts With This Step

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