Committed Discipleship | Acts 2:46–47

The Purpose of the Church is simple. We are called to give glory to God.

That’s the what. But the how is important. Healthy churches understand that discipleship is THE MISSION of the church.

It's in discipleship that:

Teaching finds it's TARGET

Preaching finds its PURSUIT

Fellowship finds it's FULFILlMENT

Evangelism finds it's END

Prayer is the fuel, preaching is the power, but making disciples is the heart of the church that the marks are intended to lead to.

Today, if we are going to make disciples we need to focus on what it means to make disciples. We’ll use the acronym HIT

Habitual - Discipleship for the Long Haul

They met together day after day. Discipleship is a day to day, week to week moment by moment endeavor. We like programs. We like processes. We like things with definitive start and end dates. It makes us comfortable, and it gives us hope that at some point, we’ll be don.

Discipleship is not like that.

As Mark Dever notes, promoting biblical discipleship and growth is important because none of us are finished products. Until we die, all Christians will struggle against sin, and we need all the help we can get in this fight.

Therefore, discipleship is a perpetual process that we all go through. That process will change and morph at different times of our life. Just like school children, our discipleship will become less about learning basics, and more about doing the gospel, but that doesn’t mean we cease learning.

1 Corinthians 13:11 ESV

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.

Colossians 1:9–10 ESV

And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;

True discipleship is a habit. It’s something that we become, not simply something we do. It defines us.

Former World Championship Pitcher Todd Stottlemeyer noted that, “We define our Habits, and then our Habits define us… Success is nothing more than a few simple disciplines, practiced every day; while failure is simply a few errors in judgment, repeated every day. It is the accumulative weight of our disciplines and our judgments that leads us to either fortune or failure.”

This is true in baseball, business, and discipleship.

INTENT - Discipleship is focused on living the Gospel

Not only is it consistent, true discipleship has a focus. For some churches focus on things that don’t build disciples. They may focus on habits exclusively hoping that they will lead to spirituality. As we noted, habits or spiritual disciplines are good. But that is not all discipleship is.

True discipleship is intent on learning, living out, and leading the gospel. As Jay Bauman notes, true discipleship is “about embracing gospel truths in the context of a biblical community that results in life change. It's about visibly seeing sanctification in the life of a new believer. It's about progressively becoming more aware of our sinfulness and of God's holiness. It's about the cross's looming larger and larger in our lives as we embrace gospel truths.”

Churches that make disciples have a focus, and it’s a focus not on teaching good habits, but on leading people to a good savior. This doesn’t mean that spiritual disciplines and habits aren’t important, it’s that habits without gospel is simply self-help and is doomed.

2 Peter 3:18 ESV

But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

We are to grow in our knowledge of and commitment to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

TOGETHER - Discipleship Demands Community

They broke bread together. True discipleship occurs together. Not only is it continual, but it needs other Christians. We can be Christian without the church, but we cannot grow to the full level of Christian maturity without it.

We are meant to do life together, but there are some who don’t like church. In fact they hate it. Now there are legitimate reasons why people feel this way. Church is messy. Life together is messy. It’s not easy.

Many Churches, many but not all, are guilty of financial corruption, racism, manipulation of members, favoritism, racism, sexism, abuse of all kinds, and even simple sins like just being mean. This is true unfortunately our community is filled with the victims of all of this. And if that is you, I don’t want to minimize your pain. We’re sorry that that has happened to you.

But that is not the heart of Christ, and not the heart of this church.

But the Jesus you say you’re into is also the Jesus who calls us to do life together.

Why? Because we grow best together.

I love the mountains. I love going up there and hiking to Clingman’s Dome, and going to creeks and seeing the trout. One of my favorite activities is to pick up smooth “skipping stones”. If you’ve never skipped a rock, you may not know what a skipping stone is, it’s a flat, smooth stone that skips across the water. But have you ever wondered how a stone gets so flat and smooth?

In the mountains you can purchase polished rocks. These rocks are smooth and shiny, and the way they make these rocks is the same way a stone in a river gets smooth.

The rocks are placed into tumblers that have a barrel that is loaded with rocks, water, and abrasive grit. The abrasive grit is a granular material similar to the grains glued onto sandpaper. The grit is often labeled "coarse," "medium," and "fine," similar to the different grades of sandpaper.

The barrel containing rocks, grit, and water is placed on a motorized machine that rotates the barrel to tumble the rocks that are inside. As the rocks tumble, they grind against one another with particles of the abrasive grit caught between them. This action wears sharp edges off of the rocks and smoothes their surfaces. Tumblers that operate this way are known as "rotary tumblers."

The rocks are typically tumbled for one or two weeks in coarse grit, one week in medium grit, and one week in fine grit, with a thorough cleaning of the rocks and the barrel between each grit size. Then the rocks are tumbled for one final week with water and a rock polish. After following this procedure, the rocks are usually transformed into brightly polished stones.

This is what it’s like to live with people. People are rough and abrasive. Some may be a little smoother than others, but we all have our rough parts, and as Christ rolls us through the trials, cares, and difficulties of living life together he smooths out the rough spots.

True discipleship is also done by imitating others.

1 Corinthians 4:16 ESV

I urge you, then, be imitators of me.

Notice, we cannot imitate what we do not see. Paul is encouraing us to grow together because disciples are made in community. They aren't made by one person, but rather by the church community together, teaching, reflecting Christ, directing. True disciple-making is a community project.

Truitt we need to make disciples. No we MUST make disciples. It is the mission of the church. So the question isn’t should we make disciples but how are we going to make disciples?