Multiplication: Making Disciple-making Disciples.

Introduction

Video: Raise Up Workers

Tension

In John 15 Jesus uses this illustration of a the branches of a vine and it’s fruit to talk about what it is like to abide in Him. To abide in Jesus is to be one of his disciples. He says

John 15:4–8 (ESV)

4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. 5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

6 If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.

7 If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.

How do you show yourself to be a disciple of Jesus Christ? How do you “prove” it? It is isn’t by having record Church attendance. It isn’t by how many Bible verses you have memorized. It isn’t by the “honk if you love Jesus” bumper sticker on your car or the number of Christian tracks you leave on the urinals at Fleet Farm. (if that was yours, I found it, but I left it there for you. And I am not saying there is anything wrong with those things, they just are not how you “show” you are a Disciple of Jesus. It is by “bearing much fruit”.

Fruit is grown when it is fed by the vine through the branches. Many of us are familiar with Jesus’ teaching here but we miss one one very important part of it. We live our lives as if we are the fruit. Like we are the end game. Like the point of our “abiding” in Jesus is to just fill us up with nutrient rich liquid of the Vine but that is not what Jesus said.

He didn’t tell his disciples that they are the fruit, he said that they were the branches. And branches do receive from the vine, they need to in order to stay healthy, but it is not to stop with them. We are fed and fueled to “bear much fruit” by being and doing what Jesus has called and commanded us to be and do.

He continues to say:

John 15:9–10 (ESV)

9 As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. 10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.

The rich nutrients that flow through this vine is God’s love. And Jesus recieved that love from the Father, but He didn’t just soak it up for himself. He gives it to us that we could also abide in the love of God. How do we do this? By keeping his commandments.

And Jesus commanded many things while he was on earth, but shortly before He returned to the Father he gave us our mission with just one commandment. He said:

Matthew 28:19–20 (ESV)

19 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, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Now you might be saying, “That looks like more than just one command” and it’s true that it does look that way, but grammatically there is only one command in those verses. There is only one “imperative” or commanding verb in Jesus’ words here, the rest of words that look like verbs are all participles. They serve as adjectives, describing what obeying the one command looks like.

The one command here is to “Make Disciples”. Going, Baptizing and Teaching are all descriptions of how we are to “bear fruit” by obeying the command - to Make Disciples.

Too often we make the mistake of substituting Bible Study for discipleship. They are not the same thing. Someone can spend a lifetime studying the Bible and never become a disciple of Jesus Christ…we have university professors around the globe who could fit this description.

Making Disciples is not about having access to a bank of information in your head, it is about a relationship that helps you to reorient how you live your day to day life.

This was the kind of relationship that Jesus had with his 12 Disciples.

First Jesus called them to a life focused on His mission (Matthew 4) It wasn’t just a Bible Study class they signed up for. They left behind their homes, their nets, their tax booth, their old way life to follow Jesus.

Then He sat them down and instructed them in his ways (Matthew 5) So teaching is a part of it, but he doesn’t stop there, he has invited them to do life with him so he

Jesus walked with them through trouble to increase their faith (Matthew 8) miracles, crowds, riots, storms, heated debates and assassination attempts.... all kinds of trouble. But in those experiences

Jesus taught them by his example (Matthew 9) what they can and will be doing. Then

Jesus sent them out to do the ministry that they were taught by Jesus words and that they caught by Jesus’ works (Matthew 10) then

Jesus called them back and talked through what they experienced and finally after three years of investing in them through teaching, modeling and correcting the risen...

Jesus sent them out to continue making disciples who would make disciples and so on so that the whole world would be reached. Matthew 28:18–20

And this is where our EKKLESIA series from the book of Acts catches up with this. The Ekklesia is where these disciples gather together and join forces to better obey what Jesus commanded in Matthew 28. What Jesus commanded in Matthew 28, he initiated in Acts 1:8

Acts 1:8 ESV

8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

You see unlike the typical Rabbi / Disciple relationship of the time, Disciples of Jesus don’t go on to become their own Rabbi’s and then gain their own following. We are to be “witnesses” for Jesus. We are successful when by the power of the Holy Spirit we make disciples... of Jesus Christ who then go on to make Disciples... of Jesus Christ who make Disciples again... of Jesus Christ and on and on.

This is where the so called “Celebrity Pastors” have gotten themselves in trouble, because their public ministries are more about how many people are following them rather than how many are following Jesus...

But before we get too excited over condemning those “TV evangelist” types... we better stop and ask ourselves if we are doing any better. We may not be trying to gain our own followers, but we may have our own set of “obstacles” that keep us from making disciples of Jesus Christ…and Jesus had harsh words to say about branches that did not bear fruit.

So this morning we are going to look at the example of the Apostle Paul and how he invested in a young man named Timothy in order to see him become a disciple of Jesus Christ…who we will see in the weeks to come, went on to make disciple-making disciples himself.

So open your Bibles with me to Acts chapter 16, page 924, I’ll pray and we will learn about effective disciple making together.

Truth

Our first theme for the week is...

1. Effective disciple-making begins with identifying a believer to mentor (Acts 16:1–2).

To catch us up to where we are in the story we have a couple of maps. On the left is the journey that Paul took with his missionary partner Barnabas. You remember that they went all this way to Derbe and then went back through to encourage the Churches.

But then Paul and Barnabas had a “directional dispute” over taking John Mark with them and so they have now broken up into two different missionary teams shown on the map on the right. While Barnabas hoped on a boat and returned to Cyprus with John Mark, Paul took Silas headed northward by land.

You can see that this is something of a reversal of Paul’s first trip. His first journey landed him in these cities with the least Jewish presence and the most opposition last…this time he begins in these cities first. As it says in Acts 16 starting in verse 1

Acts 16:1–2 (ESV)

1 Paul came also to Derbe and to Lystra. (In that order) A disciple was there, named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek. 2 He was well spoken of by the brothers at Lystra and Iconium.

So I was tempted to have our first theme say that we begin disciple making by identifying a “new” believer…but as you can see that is not what Paul has done, and so I am not sure that is always where we begin.

Timothy was already well known among the Church both in Lystra and even in Iconium the next city over. It’s seems most likely that this Timothy become a believer either during Paul’s previous visit to these cities or shortly there after in response to his visit.

We learn more about Timothy’s early beginnings in the letters that Paul writes to him much later on when he was (spoiler alert) pastoring a church in Ephesus. There Paul mentions the people who mentored Timothy in the faith before he ever did. He says:

2 Timothy 1:5 (ESV)

5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well.

Paul wanted to help Timothy reach his potential in Christ…but he first took notice of Timothy’s spiritual growth from the talk of fellow believers…and who was it that instilled that faith in a young Timothy? ...it was the “sincere faith” of his mother and even his grandmother that started him out on this path.

Mom and Dad. Grandma and Grandpa. Never underestimate the significance that your example will have on your children. I firmly believe that Scripture names you as the primary disciple-makes for your Children.

And I hope you are praying for other Godly men and women to speak into your children and grandchildren’s life, but these disciple-makers should only be re-affirming things that our kids already know because their first spiritual mentors - parents and grandparents started them out with it.

For good or bad, your children at every age are watching you. What are they seeing?

So that is why I hesitate to say that we need to identify “new” believers because “new” could be a relative term. Some people have claimed Christianity for decades but they have never been discipled. Since that first day when they put their faith and trust in Jesus, they have never taken the next step toward partnering together in ministry with other believers. So in a very real sense, they are still “new” even though they first trusted in Jesus many years ago. It is just that when it comes to being a branch that is “bearing much fruit” they haven’t even gotten started.

That is where our second theme comes in.

2. Effective disciple-making includes preparing a believer for partnering in ministry (Acts 16:3).

We are not the fruit. We are branches. One of the essential tasks of disciple-making is to help believers remove any and all of the obstacles that are keeping them from realizing their God-given place of ministry in the Kingdom of God.

Think about a Kingdom for a moment. Every person from the lowliest serf to the noblest knight has a role to play. In a healthy kingdom with a righteous King, every person executes their role in honor of their King. This is an even greater reality in the Kingdom of God.

God gives every believer spiritual gifts and our responsibility is to discover and use those gifts in honor of our King to the furtherance of His Kingdom…but there are many hindrances, excuses or obstacles that can get in the way of a believer becoming the disciples that God has called him or her to be.

So an essential aspect of disciple-making is helping a believer prepare for ministry by identifying and removing those obstacles to fruitful ministry in the Kingdom.

The particular obstacle in Timothy’s case was a unique one, but the principle still applies even if the obstacle is not a common one that we deal with today…(and we can be glad of that)…verse 3 says...

Acts 16:3 (ESV)

3 Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him, and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.

If you have been paying attention over the past several weeks then you may be very confused about this since we just got done talking about the Jerusalem Council where the leaders of the Church affirmed that both God’s works and His Word taught that circumcision was not a salvation issue.

That Gentiles would not need to first become an ethnic Jew before they could lay claim to the salvation found in Jesus, the Jewish Messiah. How could Paul require this of Timothy, especially when one of the objectives of this trip was to deliver that message to the Gentile Churches? Wasn’t this horribly hypocritical?

It certainly seems that way, but it wasn’t and let me explain why.

Paul wasn’t saying that Timothy needed to be circumcised in order to be saved, that would have been hypocritical and frankly heretical. Paul was only requiring this of Timothy because he wanted Timothy to continue with him on his missionary journey where he knew the issue of Timothy’s circumcision would become an obstacle for ministry.

Why would it be an obstacle? Well there was a lot of debate among Jewish Rabbis over whether or not a man who was only half-Jewish should or even could be circumcised. In Timothy’s case, we don’t get a sense that Paul is condemning him for not being circumcised because he wasn’t fully Jewish... but he does require it of Timothy because he wasn’t fully Gentile either. Not knowing exactly where the Jews in these cities would land on this hot topic, Paul saw this as a necessary step of preparation for ministry.

So it was not a salvation issue, but it was a missionary issue. Sometimes God calls us to commitments for a specific mission that not all believers are required to do and often our response to that calling will uncover what kind of branch we are.

I remember back when I took teenagers on missions trips to work and minister in Appalachian Mountain Communities. One of the requirements for going on this summer trip was that they all had to wear T-shirts all week...with both sleeves intact. I learned that I had to be very specific about this because just saying “no tank tops” was not enough. In truth, it made me laugh to hear of some of these farm boys who literally had to go buy a bunch of Tshirts at the thrift store to buy because every one they owned had the sleeves cut out.

And I get it. I know that it gets hot when you are working up in hay lofts or driving an open air tractor and you do whatever you can to stay cool. And my point was not that it is immoral to cut the sleeves off your T-shirts. My point was to teach these young men and young ladies that part of taking the mission of God seriously is to be ready to give up anything that might become an obstacle to that mission. Even if it isn’t a salvation or moral issue.

Because the truth is, what we are willing to give up for God’s mission says a lot about how important that mission is to us.

Obviously Timothy’s willingness to go along with Paul’s requirement showed an even greater dedication to the mission than having to wear sleeves for a week, but the principle is the same.

In our Table Talk groups today we are going to challenge each other with this very question. What is keeping you from being even more effective at making disciples? and Would you be willing to give that up to see the Kingdom of God grow?

This leads us to our final theme for the week:

3. Effective disciple-making means investing our lives in walking with others into a lifetime of ministry (Acts 16:4–5).

Acts 16:4–5 (ESV)

4 As they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem. 5 So the churches were strengthened in the faith, and they increased in numbers daily.

Paul invested in Timothy by including him in all aspects of ministry life. Just like Jesus did for the 12 original disciples. Paul did life together with Timothy.

“They” went through the cities. “They” delivered the decisions of the Apostles and elders. Paul trained Timothy in ministry as “They” visited and ministered to churches together

Paul would later reflects on this in his second letter to Timothy where he says:

2 Timothy 3:10–11 (ESV)

10 You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, 11 my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet from them all the Lord rescued me.

Paul’s approach to disciple-making gave Timothy insight into Paul's spiritual life, into God's work as they ministered, and into the challenges and blessings of ministry.

This seems to stand in contrast to much of what is called “discipleship” today. It is typically a classroom learning experience, much like the way I first learned Drivers Ed.

This is going to age me I know, and probably many of you because you know what I am talking about, but my high school had a classroom full of these driving consoles complete with steering wheels and gas an brake pedals. I am sure it was “state of the art” stuff 15 years earlier because each one of those driving consoles were somehow linked together with a projector that showed a picture of the open road on the front wall of the room. Our job was to use the steering wheel and floor pedals to safely guide our car down the road wherever it turned.

The problem was that everyone in the room still saw the same movie no matter what you did with the steering wheel and and floor pedals. An electronic report was just sent to the instructor in the back of the dark room.

What this meant was that I had no idea anything was wrong until I heard the instructor yell out “#13 Is there some reason that you are driving 135 mile per hour” Oops. Not a strong day for driver Dan. And I hated that room.

But here is the thing, I know that would never have happened in a real life experience. I know that if that instructor was sitting next to me in the Drivers Ed car, we would never have gotten even close to 135 mph before his foot would be slamming down on his little boss brake on his side. Don’t ask me why I know that, but I do. And of course his being in the car with me was better for both of us and anyone in my path...

My point is that throwing a good book, excellent class or some kind of “simulation” experience at someone will never teach them as well as walking - or riding- alongside them will. That is the kind of Discipleship that Jesus and Paul modeled.

Gospel Application

One of my favorite verses for summing up this kind of Discipleship is found in 1 Thes 2:8. I learned it from the NIV where it says.

1 Thessalonians 2:8b (NIV)

8 Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well.

I love that attitude toward Disciple-Making and I believe that attitude is foundational for us if we are going to abide in Christ and be the Church, the Ekklessia that Jesus has called us to be.

Obeying Jesus’ command to effectively make disciples...

1. ....begins with identifying a believer to mentor (Acts 16:1–2).

2. .... preparing them for partnering in ministry (Acts 16:3) and

3. .... investing our lives in training them for a lifetime of ministry (Acts 16:4–5).

But none of that can happen if we are not willing to commit to these things ourselves.

Landing

You know at one point when Jesus was going through varios cities and villages he became compelled with compassion for the people that he encountered. He saw how lost they were, how they were “harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd”. I wonder, when was the last time we allowed ourselves to see people the way that Jesus did? I find I am quicker to condemn and criticize then to make room to see them as harassed and helpless needing someone to come along side them.

Matthew 9:37–38 (ESV)

37 Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; 38 therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

So we are going to take a few minutes and do that this morning. I know it will be a little different than what we are used to, but that’s ok. I encourage you to participate with me in this as you would choose. I will first open in prayer and then throw out a guiding thought for everyone to pray toward in their own way. Then I will leave some time to pray for a little while until I throw up the next prayer prompt.

Again these are just prompts - you go ahead and pray into them anyway you feel led. I will have them spelled out on the screen too in case you are still praying when the next one comes and you want to consider that one too.

Let’s pray...

1. Ask God to help you identify another believer whom you can mentor in ministry.

2. Ask God to help you become part of a ministry team dedicated to equipping believers to serve God.

3. Pray for opportunities to partner with others in hands-on ministry training.

4. Pray that God will be honored by your efforts and that the Kingdom will grow as you serve with other believers.

Close the prayer time by thanking God for His faithfulness to help His people become more like Him.