Deliberate Family Discipleship Part 2
Deliberate Family Discipleship • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Homegrown Discipleship
Homegrown Discipleship
The society many of you once knew or grew up in no longer exist. The same is for the church. The church once was a place you could rest assured was safe and solid. But for many churches, this no longer holds true ethically nor theologically.
Regardless of the ever-shifting culture around us, within us must remain the Kingdom of our God. As such, the mandate to disciple our families in the way of the Lord remains. In this we must diligent.
In his book, Building a Discipling Culture, Mike Breen states, “If you make disciples, you always get the church. But if you make a church, you rarely get disciples.” (Mike Breen; Building a Discipling Culture; (South Carolina, 3dm, 2011), 11-21.)
I believe the same rings true for our homes and our families. For generations many have been making what we called families within their homes. But they did not get children who grew as disciples. Instead, their worldviews have been hijacked and taken captive by the secular pagan culture around us. Instead of just making families within our homes, we need to be deliberate about making disciples of our entire families. If you are only building a family, you may not get disciples who continue to follow the Christ. But if you build disciples, you will build a strong and healthy family.
The final command given by Jesus was:
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 all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Most of the time in Scripture the word used for “nations” is goy גּוֹי referring to the pagan people. However, there is a parent root of the word “nations” in Hebrew is ‘am עַם meaning paternal kin or family. Most often used to refer to “the people of God”, a holy people; those belonging to God alone. Another Hebrew word for “nations” is ‘ummah אֻמָּה meaning tribe. So, at the root of what Jesus was telling us is to go out and make disciples of all families which in turn would build the family of God. The command stems from the Torah where God’s intent is to build a family starting within your home. God seeks a relationship with you, not a religion from you.
When God delivered Israel, He brought them to the mountain to speak to them to build this relationship and immerse them in His presence. But they refused this model. So instead, God gives them the Tabernacle of His presence which became the center of their daily lives. Their entire lives were immersed in worship to the Lord and receiving His divine instruction and favor. To be molded and shaped into holiness (A living offering consecrated to the Lord in monogamous relationship; separated from that which is common; a sanctuary; a dwelling place for His presence.)
True discipleship is all about relationship. You cannot make disciples of those you have no relationship with. There is no relationship where there is no commitment. There is no commitment where personal convenience is your highest priority. This includes those within the walls of your home.
Again, Breen states, “Effective leadership is based upon an invitation to relationship and a challenge to change. A gifted discipler is someone who invites people into a covenantal relationship, but challenges them to live in their true identity in very direct yet graceful ways. Challenge may be given from the pulpit on Sunday, but challenge is always given best in the context of personal relationships.” (Ibid)
A healthy home and church must maintain a healthy balance between an invitation and motivation to enter into the discipleship process as well as challenge and accountability to that process. Discipleship is a “must win battle” for our families and the Body of Christ.
There are three primary tools to discipleship: Instruction, Internship, and Immersion. Instruction is necessary but must be followed-up with the hands-on commitment to internship. Internship provides the demonstration and application. But immersion solidifies, molds and shapes. (Ibid)
You shall bring Aaron and his sons to the entrance of the tent of meeting and wash them with water.
In preparing Aaron and his family for the call of God’s priesthood, God commands them to a ritual cleansing. The word used here is rahats רָחַץ meaning to wash the hands in innocence. The more you and your family are immersed in this world and the godless culture around us, the more innocence (niqqaywon נִקָּיוֹן ; cleanness, guiltlessness, purity) is lost.
John the Immerser said, “I immerse you in water, but He will immerse you in Fire.” In other words, I get you wet and you come up looking the same in the flesh, but the Messiah will immerse you in the “Mikveh of the Presence of God” and you will be changed!
Discipleship immersion could be defined as continuous instruction, demonstration and application with correction, training and challenge through relationship to absorb and apply all to daily living in nature and character. Immersion embraces every moment as opportunity to provide training that produces fruit in the life. So, what does this look like in the home and the church?
This involves discipling in everything from good decision making to self-control and moral discipline. It involves encouragement as well as correction. It involves confrontation, commitment and challenges to overcome, persevere, change one’s thinking, perspective and responses. It includes fundamental life skills to include good discernment, judgment, people skills, time, task and resource management and problem solving. It involves boundaries, accountability, responsibility and follow through. It seeks to build in the individual a solid moral, mental and emotional foundation with maturity and wisdom. All this is instruction in righteousness when done in the admonition and trust in the Lord.
Parenting is meant to be immersion. Marriage is meant to be immersion. Ministry is meant to be immersion. Discipleship is meant to be immersion. Relationship with Christ is meant to be immersion not just informational or superficial participation.
What does the Bible say about Homegrown Discipleship?
Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.
Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.
Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.
For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart.
Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid.
And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
What is “Homegrown Discipleship”? Homegrown means it was immersed and nurtured in a specific environment and carries specific characteristics relative to the environment of which it was produced. Is your home one that promotes homegrown discipleship? When others look at you, does your life look like it is immersed in the way of the Lord? Is Jubilee a place where you have been or can be immersed in the discipleship of the Lord Jesus Christ?
The Prophet Isaiah stood in the presence of Almighty God and exclaimed, “I am undone, I am unclean because of this world.” But He was purged and made clean, innocence and holiness restored, in the mikveh of God’s presence. Have you gotten dirty again by this world?Have some of your family fallen into the mire and become unclean? I know the true immerser who makes the dirty clean again. Do you need cleansing today? Do you want Holy Spirit to immerse you in the mikveh of His presence and be freshly cleansed a new and transformed by the fire of the Holy Spirit?