5 Discipleship Elements--My Part
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Speech
Speech
Jared Horton
Lead Pastor—Real Life Selkirk
Introduction
Introduction
In the last session, I spoke about a one-foot-in, one-foot-out ministry model
I hope what I got across was that having both feet in and trying to do God’s part is a futile and exhausting exercise that does nothing and limits how we can see God at work in the church.
So, we talked about taking our one foot out.
With that, I think we can find ourselves praying for a miracle.
God is a God of miracles, right? He is!
That is God doing His part.
I am not advocating two feet out, just one.
With our remaining one foot in, we need to be focused on what we do.
As a small church, we cannot afford to waste our activity.
There are 5 elements to a disciple making church.
I wish I could say that I created these, but these are five points that the RDN will go in depth training church pastors in.
I will give you a personal story related to this.
A refocusing on these things helped turn our church around.
I began with our eldership and poured these things into them.
Then from there, it grew and expanded. It gave me focus on how to grow and change as a leader.
I won’t go in depth in my implementation because I will dip into Matt’s topic, but I can explain more in our final session.
Topic
Topic
Before we get into our five points, I want to highlight a few things.
First of all, defining definitions is critical
We made the emphasis of being a disciple making church.
Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
If this was Jesus’ instruction to His disciples, it seems fairly clear from this that discipleship is the path that Jesus desires for His church.
We as the church cannot separate the message of Jesus (Gospel) from the method of Jesus
His message was clearly the Gospel
His method was through discipleship.
Discipleship comes with a number of definitions in our modern church culture
Some call discipleship a class
Some say it is attending church
Some say it is just another word for salvation
Some say it is extra credit Christianity
How does this play out in your churches if you do not define a simple word like this in the same way?
The person who has discipleship as a class will see people signing up for his class and say, “We are winning”
The person who sees attendance rising at church will say, “We are winning”
The person who sees someone getting baptized will say, “We are winning”
But no one else will agree with the other person.
Some will see winning and some will see losing while they are all looking at the same church.
There has to be alignment in definition if you are going to have unity and make progress toward the same goal.
I will share with you our definition of a disciple.
We stole it, so don’t give me credit for the idea
And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
A disciple is:
Following Jesus
Being changed by Jesus
Obedient to Jesus—Making disciples
Before we get into the journey of what makes a disciple making church, we have to understand that the call to discipleship is a call away from the world.
These fishermen had to leave their nets to follow Jesus
You cannot stay where you are and follow Jesus. You have to choose one or the other.
There is also no separation of terms between disciple and Christian.
Jesus never said, “Go out and convert people to Christianity”
Jesus said, “Go and make disciples”
Being a disciple of Jesus is the gateway into the Kingdom of Heaven
He said, “Follow me”
And, He is the gate, the door, the way the truth and the life
There is no doorway into the Kingdom of Heaven except through Jesus
And Jesus invites us to follow Him.
Discipleship in Jesus is the pathway we are to call the church to.
We have to leave our nets.
So how do we intentionally create a culture of discipleship within our church?
How do we refine our focus as pastors of small churches to align with Jesus’ mission?
1. Biblical Foundation
1. Biblical Foundation
I want to look at the Great Commission and see what it can tell us about how we are to make disciples.
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
So what is our curriculum as we make disciples?
There are a lot of tools and resources out there that teach us how to make disciples.
For a long time, I thought that teaching about the elements of disciple making was discipleship. It isn’t!
Imagine us teaching about the elements necessary to make chocolate chip cookies. We meet regularly, have classes discussing the types of chocolate chips, the ratios of ingredients, how long to cook and even discussion about what makes a good cookie.
But if we never make the cookies, it really doesn’t serve a purpose.
The church doesn’t lack teaching about discipleship.
The church lacks discipleship.
Look at what Jesus told us we ought to do with the disciples that we make.
Teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.
I like to play word association games.
On one side, we have the word “teach”
On the student (or disciple) side, I would typically say that the disciple or student should “learn”.
Teaching and learning is what has been ingrained into us since we were little kids learning long division in 3rd grade.
But Jesus doesn’t say to only educate the disciples, we are to teach them to obey.
Teach to obey what?
Not me.
Teach them to obey Jesus’ commands.
This is really the follow through of Jesus Matthew 4:19 command. Follow me and I will make you into fishers of men.
We teach to follow Jesus. Following implies obedience.
To teach to obedience, we first must be humble and obedient, or they won’t know what obedience looks like
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
I go to this passage because I think it is a great extension of the idea “teach to obey”
When we use a Biblical Foundation in our discipleship environments, the Bible does “teach”
There is an academic purpose to the Bible
We are to learn
But as we know, James bluntly tells us:
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
Teaching— Literally teach or instruct.
Rebuking— This is an interesting word. The only place it is used in the Bible is in this verse.
Elegmos— rebuke, reproach, conviction
Bring to your attention disapproval of something
It is literally the Holy Spirit using the Bible, that the Holy Spirit helped write, to bring to your attention sinful things so you can be holy
Correcting— Again, this is another word that is only used in this place of the Bible.
epa-north-osis— set right, correct, improve, amend,
When these two unique words are put together, they form a powerful picture of what the Bible is to do in our lives.
It brings to our attention places of our lives that are out of God’s path, then it corrects them and puts them on the right path.
Training— I love this word
Paideia— It is literally “Rearing a child”
It is the discipline and training you need to bring a child to adulthood.
It is the same word that is used in Ephesians 6:4
Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.
This is the journey of a disciple.
A Biblical Foundation means that we have a standard of truth in our lives
This standard of truth has authority.
It teaches, rebukes, corrects, and trains in righteousness.
This is what Jesus means when we follow Him as His disciple.
As we look at the Word of God, it matures us into righteousness, like Jesus.
This is useful for the disciple, knowing that we will be corrected along the path.
But this correction is not an authoritarian correction. It is a Father correcting His children in love for their good and their maturity as the grow.
In the same way, disciple-makers, we are not authoritarians with the Scriptures. We must know that we stand on the authority of the Word of God, not on the authority of our own opinions or educations.
Our job is to bring others to the Word of God and allow the Word of God to do its work.
2. Relational Environment
2. Relational Environment
For much of my life, I believed that my entire walk with God revolved around “Me & Jesus”.
Maturity was found in knowing more about Jesus and learning about the Bible.
Everything that God designed for me was to know Him and be in His presence.
This is true. We should know God and we should desire to be in His presence.
What I missed was the overwhelming instruction from God that He created me for relationship with Him.
But He also created me for relationship with you.
If I miss one of these, it actually impacts the other. We’ll talk about this.
We believe that we are designed in creation for relationship with God, first and foremost.
Secondly, we are designed for relationship with one another.
I don’t believe you can have a “Me and Jesus” relationship, and be a mature believer.
When we look at the message of Jesus, we find the Gospel.
The truth of how God became flesh and dwelt among us. Lived a sinless life and went to the cross in the place of sinners.
How He is the King of the Kingdom of Heaven and that we are called to live, serve and be identified in that Kingdom through discipleship.
So what we will do is look at how God has created us as human beings, and how He continues to guide us in His will and His plan.
At Creation
The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.
And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden;
but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
At this point of creation, what was the condition of the world?
There was no sin.
Adam was in the completed Garden of Eden
God spoke to Adam and Adam walked with God.
It was holy, perfect and God was known and experienced in perfection.
But this is not only what man was created for.
So God created Eve to be with Him.
If a relationship with God was everything, then there would have been no need for Eve.
But God said, “I created you for more.”
That “more” wasn’t in greater capacity to know God.
That “more” was in fulfilling the relational fingerprint of God with others.
Humanity was created by God for relationship.
In the Law
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
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.
“ ‘Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.
We will see Jesus go back to these two commands in His ministry.
He will combine them into one passage, that is our key passage for today.
But Jesus didn’t create something new in His ministry about God’s plan of relationship with other people.
Jesus simply identified what God had revealed to Moses centuries before.
This was God’s plan from the beginning of the law.
Not just to love God.
This is important.
But it is also the will of God to love others.
10 Commandments
In the 10 Commandments that God gave Moses and the nation of Israel it affirms this principle.
We are called to love God
We are also called to love one another.
It isn’t either/or. It is both.
And if we try to make it all about one or the other, we are not going to grow and mature how God created us to grow and mature.
Love the Lord your God
You shall have no other gods before me.
Do not make idols and do not worship them
Love the Lord your God
Do not take the Lord’s name in vain
Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy
Rather than thinking of these as rules, let’s think of these in terms of relationship with God.
God is setting boundaries for what healthy relationship looks like with Him
He shows us things that are harmful in our relationship with Him
He shows us things that honor relationship with Him
Remember the Sabbath
When we see this as a rule, we begin to define the rule.
When we see this as a relational command, we see the heart of God wanting us to put our labor on the side and spend time with Him.
Love your neighbor as yourself
Honor your father and mother
Do not murder
Do not commit adultery
Love your neighbor as yourself
Do not steal
Do not lie
Do not covet other people’s things
The last 60% of the 10 Commandments have to do with our relationships with one another
Again, the framework of God’s clear instruction to the people have to do with how we interact with one another.
How can we step away from the 10 commandments and say, “My spiritual maturity is just about me and God”?
It isn’t, God’s guidance for us as human beings, created in His image, is to be in relationship with Him, and also grow in relationship with others.
Jesus’ Ministry
In Jesus’ ministry, we see that He gave very explicit instructions about how we ought to make disciples:
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
That “everything I have commanded you” includes what we talked about last week with a Biblical foundation.
Jesus’ words have to be the foundation of all disciples of Jesus.
But, we also have to look at what some of those words actually say.
Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’
This is the first and greatest commandment.
And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Jesus’ commands reiterated God’s overall plan for humanity.
That we would first love God. This is unquestioned.
When Jesus said, “The second is like it”
Jesus wasn’t giving this as a secondary command.
This wasn’t a lesser instruction.
Jesus equally and powerfully affirms that we are called to love God AND love one another.
Then He makes the statement that “all the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.”
When Jesus says that “all of the law”, He is meaning that every instruction that God has given humanity to reveal His purpose, His nature and His truth revolve on what? Loving God AND loving others.
If you want to change the world, you need to know how you were created and fulfill that in the eyes of God.
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
We know the definition of a disciple here at Real Life
A disciple is following Jesus, being changed by Jesus, obedient to the mission of Jesus by making more disciples.
Following Jesus results in being changed by Jesus.
What does that change look like?
Loving one another.
This is the identifier of Jesus’ disciples
It is their love.
Not their depth of theology
Not their ability to answer every question
Not their great preaching skill
Not their display of miraculous abilities.
Love defined
If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.
If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.
If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
In defining love, Paul says “It isn’t about knowledge. It isn’t about spirituality. You can have those things, and they are good. But without love, it is rendered worthless.”
Here is love.
Then he gives relational language the rest of the way.
Patient with who?
Kind to who?
Maturity as a disciple is loving one another.
The Holy Spirit
When we surrender our lives to Jesus Christ, we are given the Holy Spirit to live within us.
How do you know the Holy Spirit is living within us?
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
I think you are seeing the theme.
The same thing that Jesus does within us as His followers is what the Holy Spirit does within us.
It’s almost like God is a relational God and He is consistently commanding us and equipping us to be people of relationship with the world around us.
We’re almost done with this Bible blitz...
The Early Church
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles.
All the believers were together and had everything in common.
They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need.
Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts,
praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
How did the disciples live out their commission by Jesus to go and make disciples
The shared the MESSAGE OF JESUS WITH THE METHOD OF JESUS.
This is a relational community that loved one another and loved Jesus.
They were blessed by God.
Why do you think they were blessed by God?
Because they were obedient to obey and they taught the disciples to obey.
Jesus’ Prayer
As we conclude this broad picture of God’s plan for humanity and for His church, I want to take a peek into the heart of Jesus as He went to the cross.
“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message,
that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—
I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
Jesus’ prayer to the Father was that the church would love one another and live in the love of God.
In doing so, this would be the witness to a lost and dying world that Jesus Christ is Lord.
GROUP DISCUSSION:
What happens when the Biblical Foundation is present, without the Relational Environment?
What happens when the Relational Environment is present, without the Biblical Foundation?
How does each disciple look?
How does it look when the message of Jesus (Biblical Foundation) is present, without the method of Jesus (Relational Environment)?
How does it look when the method of Jesus (Relational Environment) is present, without the message of Jesus (Biblical Foundation)?
3. Intentional Leader
3. Intentional Leader
I’ve intentionally spent most of our time on the first two, because you will see these evidently in every environment you find yourself.
Remember, our command is to “go”. We all “go”. Did you “go” to work today? Did you establish a relational environment? A Biblical Foundation?
When I communicate this to our team at Real Life Selkirk, I do this by adding a secondary element to this: Intentional Follower.
Being an intentional leader also includes and understanding from the disciple and an encouragement to be an intentional follower.
An intentional leader will recognize first that they are a disciple of Jesus
They didn’t graduate from discipleship and now have become Jesus to others.
Live It
Live It
We don’t graduate from discipleship
I have to remind myself regularly that I am a disciple. I am in need of continued sanctification in my life.
Being a disciple while making disciples requires extraordinary humility.
Imagine going to a math class and having the teacher say, “I still mess up on math all the time. There are parts of this class I really haven’t figured out. But, let’s try this out together.”
We would say, “I think I need a new teacher.”
But this is exactly what we are doing. A life of following Jesus is not math, it is life.
I must continue to live a life that fights against my old nature (Leave your nets) and reorients my life to the authority of Jesus (follow me, then allows my life to be changed by Jesus into His holiness (changed by Jesus), then invite others along the journey.
Lead It
Lead It
You cannot make disciples if you are not a disciple
Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.
Paul gave this simple command. He recognized his part in following Jesus as a disciple.
Then, he made his following of Jesus as the example for others to follow.
Leading the discipleship process in intentional
When inviting someone into discipleship, I always call it what it is.
I define it. Clarify it.
As leaders within the church, there is a delicate balance here.
It will be easy to go home and announce from the pulpit, “We are shifting to become a disciple making church.”
This would be a mistake.
This isn’t what Jesus did.
He didn’t stand up on the Sermon on the Mount and say, “We are missing discipleship. Let me make the announcement that we need to shift our direction as a nation.”
Jesus called people and lived out discipleship, then sent them out.
If you want to make a shift, go do it.
Do it because it is the right thing.
Do it out of obedience.
Then, as people begin following Jesus and being changed by Jesus, release them to make disciples.
That is how a movement of discipleship happens in a church.
It is how it happened in our church.
I’m not saying you don’t preach discipleship, or the definition of discipleship.
But when it comes to calling for change, live it, then lead it, then reproduce it.
Reproduce It
Reproduce It
To understand the reproducible process, this is what Jesus meant in Matthew 4:19
And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
Jesus started discipleship with the end in mind.
He told them where the road would lead, then He led them there.
It took 24 chapters for them to get there, but Jesus told them where they were going, then prepared them and equipped them to be sent out to be fishers of men when He said, “Go make disciples of all nations...”
To better understand the reproducible process, we will move to the fourth element of a disciple making church.
4. Reproducible Process
4. Reproducible Process
The goal of a disciple maker is to make disciples who can make disciples.
In order for discipleship to be passed from one person to another person, there needs to be an equipping process for making disciples.
Jesus’ disciples knew exactly how to make disciples when they were sent, because Jesus was intentional with them and they knew from following Jesus.
The Destination
The Destination
If you imagine discipleship like a journey, we need to know what the end of the journey looks like
As we see what Jesus said,
Follow, be changed, fishers of men.
The end of the road is making more disciples
You don’t just begin to follow Jesus, and then become a disciple-maker
There is a process of maturity that takes place as we follow Jesus.
Again, I call this the 24 chapter growth process
Matthew 4-Matthew 28
The disciples grew from knowing very little, to being released to make disciples
The Journey
The Journey
The journey is a process that a disciple-maker needs to be adaptable to see where the disciple is as they follow Jesus.
Spiritually Dead
Need the Gospel
Spiritual Infants
Like human children, they need care and food
We share the truth of with them. Biblical foundation.
Spiritual Children
We ensure the children can connect with others in relational environments.
Spiritual Young Adults
They mature as they are given opportunities to serve others
Serve vs. Lead is a maturity judgment
Spiritual Parents
Release to make disciples
The Tools
The Tools
This one is really simple.
The tools are present right in this talk.
Biblical Foundation
Relational Environment
Intentional Leader
Reproducible Process
Alignment
5. Alignment
5. Alignment
The last one will be very quick.
Alignment is where more and more of your church begins to see their role and ministry as a function of discipleship.
This is where the intentional leader communicates, casts vision, challenges and begins to build this out more and more in their church
Communicate it
Refine it
Prune it
Fight for it
Conclusion
Conclusion
So here’s where I want to land today: Jesus gave us both the message and the method. The message is the Gospel. The method is discipleship. And the beauty of that is—it doesn’t take a big budget, a huge building, or a staff of twenty to do what Jesus already called us to do.
In fact, I think small churches have an advantage. We know our people. We walk with them. We can call them into a life of following Jesus, being changed by Him, and making disciples—just like He did with those first fishermen.
Taking one foot out—letting God do His part—and keeping one foot in—doing the part He’s asked of us—keeps us from burnout and keeps us focused on what matters. Our job isn’t to make the miracle happen. Our job is to make disciples. And when we’re faithful, God is the one who brings the growth.
So don’t measure success by size. Measure it by faithfulness. Jesus started with twelve. The early church started in homes. And God is still using small, ordinary churches—churches like ours—to change the world.
Let’s be faithful. Let’s make disciples. And let’s trust God with the rest.
