By Jack Wilkie
The more I study, read, and reflect, the more I feel that we’ve fundamentally misunderstood what the church should be. I’m not sure where that disconnect originally happened – perhaps during the centuries of the Catholic church’s domination – but it’s time we hit the reset button. We must recover the church’s primary mission.
Most modern churches have been set up like restaurants. You’re invited to come, sit down, and be served by professionals. Everything revolves around the building and the events held there. You’re supposed to study the Bible? We’ll put on a couple of classes a week. You’re supposed to fellowship with other Christians? We’ll host events at the building to accomplish that. We’ll put on the worship services, we’ll try to cater to different desires without bending Scripture, and we’ll segment and divide up our programs so you feel like you fit somewhere. All we need you to do is show up. While none of that is inherently wrong, what happens at the building should be supplemental to the main work we’ve been called to do.
We call Matthew 28:18-20 the Great Commission for a reason. Jesus told us to go into all the world, but we’ve flipped the plan on its head and tried to get the world to come to the church.
While many think of this command as a call to evangelize, that’s only part of the equation. When you break it down grammatically, the imperative is not baptizing or teaching, but “make disciples.” The participles surrounding it – going, baptizing, and teaching – show us how we execute that task. In other words, the answer to “What does Jesus want the church to do?” is “Make disciples.” The answer to “How do we make disciples?” comes in these participles.
Sadly, because the idea of making disciples has been so closely tied to evangelizing and baptizing, and most of us aren’t very good at those two, the bulk of discipleship falls through the cracks. While there has been a great emphasis on baptizing, the “teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you part” is often lacking. Many people have been baptized into the church only to struggle spiritually as they don’t know what their next step is beyond “Show up to worship and class, read your Bible, and pray.” In fact, I’d venture to guess that the majority of Christians have never been truly discipled. If we haven’t been discipled, then it makes sense why many of us don’t know how to make disciples. It’s time we change that.
We looked at Jesus’ definition of discipleship – going, baptizing, teaching them to follow Him – above. Paul gave his definition in 2 Timothy 2:2.“And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (NKJV). It’s one Christian passing on the faith to another, who passes it on to another. That’s it. It’s that simple. And that’s what the church is designed to do. It looks like Paul taking on Timothy and sending him on to strengthen the Ephesus church. It’s older women showing younger wives how to serve their families (Titus 2). It’s the church leaning on each other and working to “stir up to love and good works” (Hebrews 10:24). As C.S. Lewis put it in Mere Christianity, “The Church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time.” Discipleship is learning how to be a “little Christ” and helping others become “little Christs” as we go.
This one-on-one, hand-made discipleship work has to be restored to the forefront of the church. To be honest with you, I’m still learning how to implement this myself. I’m not the guy with all of the answers. But I know that this is what God wants us to do, and I know He’ll guide us if we commit ourselves to the task with open Bibles and hearts given to prayer. As I’m working to find out what this looks like in practical terms, here are a few ideas with which we can start.
Identify people who can help you and/or whom you can help.
Most congregations these days have plenty of older members who have been Christians for decades. Let’s tap into their wisdom! Seek out the disciples around you who best exemplify what it means to live for Jesus and draw near to them. On the other hand, if you’re one of those Christians who have many years of experience being part of Christ’s church, be looking for people you can help. While age-specific activities for singles, young marrieds, and young families can be a good thing, what those people truly need the most is to develop strong relationships with spiritual mentors. Be on the lookout for those you can help, and don’t be afraid to reach out. I suspect that any who are honestly looking to grow in Christ will leap at the opportunity.
Invite them to be part of your life.
Whether you’re asking someone to mentor you or you’re taking someone under your wing, if it’s going to have any lasting power it has to go beyond seeing each other in the church building. Consider how much time Jesus spent with His disciples during His years of ministry. Remember how the early church gathered in each other’s homes for teaching, food, and fellowship regularly (Acts 2:42, 46). It’s vitally important that we in the church start getting back around each other’s dinner tables. There will always be something special about opening the home up to others, a connection and an openness that communicates love. Other opportunities for this kind of face time will avail themselves, as well, and those should be taken as often as schedules allow.
Grow in God’s Word together.
Of course, the goal of such interaction isn’t just to make good friends to hang out with. No, the goal is to open up our lives to show God’s love, teach by word and example how to follow Him, to give others someone to lean on when their faith is weak or when they have questions, and ultimately to produce disciples who can then disciple others. Share in a study together. Teach young families how to have devotionals together in the home. Pray through the Psalms together. Ask hard questions. Confess shortcomings. Be willing to point out sins or areas in need of growth, and be open to hearing such suggestions about yourself. Share your struggles in understanding God and His Word. Get close. The Bible rightly calls us brothers and sisters; let’s treat each other like we believe we are.
Constantly look toward the goal of multiplication.
There will never come a point at which we don’t need close friends and encouragers in the faith, but there should come a time when we become ready to help disciple others, and that should be one of the goals of every discipling relationship. We don’t grow strong just for our own sakes, but so we can be a greater light to those around us, so they can grow stronger and pass it on, too. And the more we do this with our church family, the easier outward evangelism will become. I suspect that one of the biggest reasons that evangelism is so difficult for so many of us is that many of us rarely discuss the Bible even with our fellow Christians – the very people who agree with us – outside of the church building. How then are we going to turn around and tell outsiders (who may sharply disagree with us) about Jesus? But if we are in the habit of sharing God’s word together, suddenly the reaching out to others part of discipleship becomes that much easier.
When we are baptized into the church, we aren’t just adding Sunday and Wednesday commitments to our calendar. We’re signing our lives over to Jesus to be used to further His kingdom. That means we commit to becoming and then making disciples. However, it’s pretty unlikely that discipleship will come naturally or easily for many of us. It’s going to take a time commitment that is going to seem radical in our busy world. It’s going to require a level of closeness with others that for many of us is unfamiliar and uncomfortable.
Regardless of how daunting the task may seem, keep two points in mind. First, making disciples was commanded of us by our Lord. We all should consider ourselves duty-bound to the Great Commission He gave to His church. Second, He promised us He’ll give us the strength we’ll need to complete the task. He finished the command to go make disciples with the guarantee, “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” He gives the Spirit to strengthen all those who have been baptized into Him. He has given us the Word that supplies us with everything we need to know to accomplish His tasks. And, of course, He has given us prayer. When we know we are doing what He wants us to do, and we know that He is listening to us, we can go forward with the knowledge that He will provide and answer every request and need that we submit.
Make plans to start making disciples this year. Pray that God would bring you to the person or people who He wants in your life, both to disciple you and for you to disciple. I truly believe that if even a fraction of us commit to the work of making disciples, the church will be transformed, and our lives along with it.
