The five observations that follow have been born out of ten plus years of discussions about the church. These are some of the key thoughts that have formed the foundations for a new way of thinking about discipleship:
1. The church no longer enjoys its former position of societal influence “at the head of main street”. Rather than trying to recapture that position as the place where the community comes to gather together the church must learn what it is to identify and move outward into the cultural and societal centers that have taken center stage.
2. As the church in the west continues to pray for “revival” it gathers together in an upper room and waits on the Lord. Is it not possible that the Lord wants to visit revival on the church even more passionately than the church wants it but that He is waiting for his people to go outside? I believe that the next revival will be one that moves the church out into the world rather than moving the world into the church building.
3. The church in the west has forgotten, if it ever truly knew, what discipleship is all about. It has taken the biblical command to “go and make disciples” and added the phrase “of Jesus”. This works well enough in a community where people are naturally drawn to “attend church.” I believe the verse really means that each of us should progress in our relationship with the Lord to the point where we serve as the equivalent to a Jewish Rabbi….and have disciples. (The disciples of Curtis or Scott or Anne). This calls us to a much higher responsibility in terms of our own relationship with Christ AND calls each of us to move outward. (Jesus found some of His disciples at the beach!) Discipleship today in most cases is nothing more than the process of taking someone who has prayed the sinners prayer and enrolling them in an intensive bible study that lasts somewhere between 12 weeks and a year.
4. The result of the church having taken this approach is that we have several generations of people who should be making disciples who have never themselves been mentored in that way. This in turn means that if we are to turn the tide there will be at least one to three generations of people who will be mentoring without any personal experience to draw from. Of course…this means we need to look even more closely at Jesus process of disciple making.
5. More than anything discipleship is about relationship. Using Jesus example as a model the process begins BEFORE “conversion”. That means that each of us is already in relationship with people we should be “discipling”, whether they are post-conversion, pre-conversion, or formerly converted.
Please feel free to poke holes in any of these observations. The conversation is well worth it. But even as you do so consider these questions:
Is the idea of “pre-conversion discipleship” too radical a departure from traditions you’ve been raised in to examine the possibilities?
If there are folks in your daily circle of relationships that you can identify as potential disciples what would keep you from pursuing that type of relationship?
Great insights, and hard-earned I’m sure. I often think the greatest hindrance to our desire and follow-through with disciplemaking isn’t that we contest the concept or process. It is just rare to find someone willing to go the distance. We’d rather a 12-week Bible study with a definite end point, rather than commit to doing life with someone, regardless of the time frame. We’re weary of our busy-ness, and we often view discipleship as one more thing on the calendar, rather than a way of living.
Good call Michele. One of the principals I’ll be outlining in days to come centers around the idea of how to identify relationships that you already have brewing that may be ripe to carry into a discipling relationship ie fitting it into that regular life thing. Stay tuned!