Tag: Great commission

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Kingdom Ambassadors

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Last week we looked at Jesus’ absolute and unconditional victory over the devil as He went to the cross. The gospel — victory message — of His Kingdom has come! The devil is defeated. Jesus is King!

When Jesus finished His time on earth, before ascending to Heaven to take His throne over all creation, He made the announcement that “all authority in heaven and earth” belong to Him (Matthew 28:18). The problem, however, is that there are people on the earth who have not heard of Jesus’ victory, nor do they recognize His rule in the world, and therefore their lives remain unchanged by His grace. Jesus’ victory is undeniable, yet the world is unaware. What can be done?

The Great Commission

Of course, most Christians are familiar with Jesus’ words in Matthew 28:18-20; the passage known as “the Great Commission.”

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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.”

The last thing Jesus did before His ascension was to send His followers out as ambassadors of this Kingdom He had come to establish. He had conquered sin, death and the devil, and taken the authority over the nations; now it was their job to be the heralds of this gospel. What did this job entail, though?

Is this commission simply to call people to put faith in Jesus and be saved? Is it only to bring sinners to repentance so that when they die they go to heaven?

I believe the answer is no! This calling involves so much more than just creating converts to the Christian faith. This commissioning was to fully bring the culture of Jesus’ kingdom into the world, to all those He had liberated from the devil’s control.

To get a full picture of Jesus’ intent, however, we must once again take a look at the Greek culture in which Jesus lived, to see the metaphors He used to lay out His plan.

Empires and Conquest

Beginning with Alexander the Great, the Greek empire set a pattern for conquest which would be followed for centuries, by many succeeding empires. Considered one of the greatest conquerors in all of history, Alexander built the largest empire the world had ever seen, up to that time. As his empire grew, however, he did not just seek power for himself, but uniformity among the people under his rule. He would gain power by military conquest, but he would achieve this uniformity through massive cultural transformation.

As Alexander’s empire grew, he would bring a unity throughout the territories he controlled by not only installing a new legal system, but also instilling a new cultural identity as Greeks into the people. Through cultural diffusion, in which conquered people were scattered throughout the empire, and syncretism, in which each people groups beliefs and practices were assimilated and blended, Alexander sought to destroy any previous cultural identity in the people, and to fully establish a unified Greek culture. (This system of cultural transformation was continued and perfected by the Romans through “hellenization.”)

According to wikipedia, the “Greek cultural influence and power reached the peak of its geographical expansion, being dominant in the Mediterranean world and most of West and Central Asia, even in parts of the Indian subcontinent, experiencing prosperity and progress in the arts, astrology, exploration, literature, theatre, architecture, music, mathematics, philosophy, and science1.”

Greek Culture-Bearers

This conquest and hellenization of surrounding Kingdoms was a two-part strategy for Alexander and future Greek and Roman emperors.

First, the military conquest would ensue. The Greek army would set off each spring and go to battle against the neighboring countries; conquering, pillaging, and dethroning the Kings of those nations (as we discussed last week). The emperor or later, the caesar would be declared King of the defeated territory, and His legal rule would be established.

However, as the military would move on to battle the next kingdom to be overtaken, Alexander would engage part two of the strategy. Another military commander would be dispatched as a cultural emissary to convert the conquered kingdom to the Greek way of life2. This “apostolos” or “apostle” would be sent with a delegation of culture-bearers (also called “apostolos” or “apostles”), who’s job was to transform the conquered kingdom to now look Greek.

The delegation would have military leaders, sure, but more importantly it would consist of lawyers, architects, educators, artists, poets, fashion designers, philosophers, entertainers, and more. Their commission from the emperor was simply this: “I have conquered that kingdom, now go transform it to look like my kingdom.”

As Walt Pilcher writes,

“Apostle” was a military term used by both the Greeks and the Romans to refer to an ambassador sent from the government of a conquering country to the conquered country. It was the apostle’s job to change the culture of the conquered country so that it resembled his own so that when the conquering ruler visited he would feel at home.

Walt Pilcher, “The Five-Fold Effect” (Bloomington, IN: WestBow Press, 2013), 40-41

Apostolos

Before we get too far, I need to take a moment to give some background on this word, “apostolos,” as it is a widely debated term. According to Harper’s Bible dictionary, “apostle” is

the English transliteration of a Greek word meaning ‘one who is sent out.’ An apostle is a personal messenger or envoy, commissioned to transmit the message or otherwise carry out the instructions of the commissioning agent.

Paul J. Achtemeier, Harper & Row and Society of Biblical Literature, “Harper’s Bible Dictionary” (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1985), 40.

Based on this definition, we might say simply that a Greek apostle would simply be an ambassador for the emperor, which would be true. Yet the term is still a bit tricky.

In early Greek usage, the word apostolos did not signify a person. Rather, it was a general word that simply translated as: “to send with a particular purpose3.” There were other, more common Greek words meaning “to send,” but this word implied an intentional commissioning or specific purpose inherent in the sending.

The earliest usages of ‘apostolos’ referenced an official letter or cargo being shipped. Eventually, it was applied to a royal cargo manifest, listing all the sent items aboard a ship.

In later usage, however, the term began to be used to identify the military official given oversight of the sending operation. At times, he would be in charge of seeing that letters or items fulfilled their intended purposes. Other times, the military leader himself would be the one sent out, carrying a one-man ambassadorial assignment or being placed in charge of special delegations of people, or even entire fleets of ships, being sent as emissaries to represent the king4.

This usage, meaning an ambassador or emissary delegation, is that which would be used by Alexander and future emperors as they sent out their apostolos to bring Greek (and Roman) culture to the conquered nations under their rule.

This ambassadorial usage would also be the understanding and intent used by Jesus and the New Testament writers.

Apostles in the New Testament

By the time Jesus lived on the earth, most secular Greek writers had ceased to use the word. However, in Israel, in the Jewish culture, the Greek word was still being used.

According to some scholars it was viewed as an equivalent to the Hebrew word, “saliah” — “an accredited representative of religious authority, entrusted with messages and money and empowered to act on behalf of the authority5.” (A direct link between the Hebrew and Greek words is disputed, though a loose connection in semantic usages is obvious.)

According to one Bible dictionary, when the Hebrew culture began to use the word apostolos, it meant “one commissioned” and

signified not merely a messenger but a delegate, bearing a commission, and, so far as his commission extended, wielding his commissioner’s authority. ‘The Apostle of any one,’ says the Talmud, ‘is even as the man himself by whom he is deputed.’

James Hastings et al., “Dictionary of the Bible” (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1909), 44.

Therefore, when Jesus began to use the word “apostle,” it makes sense that it was with the Greek, “commissioned for cultural transformation “idea in mind.

This intent becomes clear when we look at His sending out of the first apostles and the assignment they carried:

And he called to him his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every affliction. The names of the twelve apostles (sent ones) are these…

Matthew 10:1-2 (emphasis mine)

It goes on to say:

These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, “…proclaim as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay.

Matthew 10:5-8 (emphasis mine)

Heaven’s Culture Bearers

As we have seen before, when Jesus came to present the Kingdom of God, He revealed it in various ways. He proclaimed the kingdom publicly in His teachings. He explained the kingdom deeply, in private to the disciples with “ears to hear.” He demonstrated the kingdom with power by healing the sick, casting out demons, raising the dead, and working all kinds of miracles. Then He taught His disciples to seek God’s Kingdom reality to come into this world, “on earth as it is in heaven.”

What Jesus was doing in all of this was training the disciples to understand Heaven’s culture, and to live their lives in the reality of this kingdom. Every time Jesus spoke about heaven, it was an invitation to enter into heaven’s kingdom, now.

Then, when Jesus commissioned the 12, He was giving them both the authority and the assignment to take the culture of heaven, which they had seen in Him, to the rest of the world! This is what it meant to be Jesus’ apostle. He had won the military victory over the devil’s kingdom of darkness. Now they were commissioned to bring the culture of His kingdom to the nations He now rules.

As one writer says,

An apostle [is] one who is called and sent by Christ to have the spiritual authority, character, gifts and abilities to successfully reach and establish people in Kingdom truth and order, especially through founding and overseeing local churches.

David Cannistraci, “Apostles and the Emerging Apostolic Movement” (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1996), p. 29. Quoted in C. Peter Wagner, “Apostles Today” (Ventura, CA: Regal, 2006).

When the disciples went out preaching, healing, casting out demons, and doing other demonstrations of Jesus authority working through them, it was to reveal the culture of heaven and to invite people into this new reality as they come to serve Jesus as king! They would then gather the believers together as local churches (Greek ekklesia; a term for a legislative assembly), to further establish God’s kingdom on earth, together. (We might say that the gathering of the local church is to be an embassy of God’s kingdom in the midst of a territory yet to be converted.)

When Jesus later sent out another 72 disciples to do this apostolic work, the message behind every healing, deliverance, and miracle was, “The kingdom of God has come near to you” (Luke 10:9).

The Apostolic Mission of the Church

Jesus’ apostolic assignment did not end with the twelve apostles or an “apostolic age.” It also was not limited to those who saw Jesus face to face, as some have claimed. Far from it!

Remember, in the Greek culture, the military commander given charge by the king, as well the individuals being led by that commander were all called apostolos. In the same way, the great commission given by Jesus in Matthew 28 extends His apostolic commission beyond the twelve, to the church, throughout every subsequent generation6.

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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.”

Matthew 28:18-20

It is as if Jesus told the disciples, “I have revealed heaven to you. It is your job to bring heaven’s reality to the world I now rule, but you won’t be able to do it alone. Equip others to do the same work I am assigning to you.”

As those original 12 raised up disciples and enlisted them into the kingdom work, the apostolic mission has advanced, and continued to this day.

We live in a world that belongs solely to King Jesus. The problem is that so many people are still living as though the devil remains on the throne. Salvation, righteousness and the reality of God’s kingdom are available to all, yet they have not yet seen it.

It was Jesus’ work to defeat the devil. It is our job to reveal this new King and His kingdom to those He came to liberate.

Their Commission is Our Commission

Back to our original questions: Is Jesus’ commission simply for us to call people to put faith in Jesus to be saved? Is it only to bring sinners to repentance so that when they die they go to heaven?

No! That only scratches the surface.

The assignment on the church is not just to get people into heaven when they die. It is to get heaven’s reality to all people, now.

Mark’s version of the Great Commission reads this way:

And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name (or “by my authority”) they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

Mark 16:15-18

In the same way as Jesus sent the apostles, we are to go, preach, heal the sick, deliver the oppressed, work miracles, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the poor, raise the dead, etc., etc., etc. And as we go, we are to declare, “this is God’s kingdom and you are invited in!”

We have the privilege of being Kingdom Ambassadors.

We do not live on earth, waiting for heaven. We now live as citizens of heaven — under the rule of King Jesus and in the culture of His kingdom — bringing our reality to the world.

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Footnotes

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellenistic_period

2: According to John Eckhardt, “Before (the word apostle) found its way into our Bible, it was a secular term used by the Greeks and Romans to describe special envoys who were sent out for the purpose of expanding the dominion of the empire. May of these envoys were military generals with authority to go into new territories and fight, if necessary, to establish the Greek or Roman culture in that region. They were also responsible for teaching and training the new subjects in the laws and culture of the kingdom.” (Quoted from John Eckhardt, “Moving in the Apostolic” (Minneapolis: Chosen Books, 1999), 23.)

3: A. F. Walls, “Apostle,” ed. D. R. W. Wood et al., New Bible Dictionary (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1996), 58.

4: “After Herodotus in the 5th century BC… it generally means ‘fleet’, or perhaps occasionally ‘admiral’.” (ibid, 58)

5: ibid, 58

6: As Pilcher writes, “In establishing His own apostles along with the other four of the five-fold ministries, Jesus created a self-replicating ambassadorship whose mission was, and is, to represent the Kingdom on Earth and to establish its culture here so that Jesus will recognize it as His when He returns for us, His church. To Him, it will look a lot like Heaven.” (Pilcher, The Five-Fold Effect. 41.)

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© Anthony Scott Ingram 2021. All Rights Reserved.

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Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.”

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Level 4 Discipleship: From Learner to Leader

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(Click here for an Overview of the 4 Levels of Discipleship.)

After a person gets saved (Level 1) and matures in the Lord, they will go through the process of being taught about Christianity by others (Level 2) as well as learning to grow themselves through the Word of God and prayer (Level 3), yet that is not the end of discipleship. Their personal maturity in the Lord must continue to develop until their focus makes a shift from themselves to others. This change is part of a life-long journey into Christian service.

Catching a Vision To Serve

While a person is growing in the Lord, they must come to know their new identity in Him, and also the inheritance they carry. This process can take a lot of time and revision – years for many of us. However, this internal identity shift should naturally begin to manifest itself outwardly in service toward others. 

As a believer discovers the extravagant ways Christ loves us, their hearts will begin to change, in love, toward other people. They will naturally begin to look for ways to share that love. As they do, God will begin to give them a vision for ministry (which simply means service) and to reveal their spiritual gifts to them, for His purposes.

Although there are obvious universal aspects to God’s ministry within the church, this developing vision for ministry will be personal to each believer. As people demonstrate the desire to serve and begin to step into various love-sharing opportunities, we must begin to disciple them in clarifying their vision for serving others. 

Christ gave general commands to those He sent out in the New Testament. Those same commands still apply today. We must continue to “preach the gospel,” “heal the sick,” “cast out demons,” “encourage one another,” “care for widows and orphans,” etc. However, He has also uniquely designed each one of us to fulfill different aspects of service in His Kingdom. Each of us are equipped with different giftings and callings from the Lord.

As we disciple people to “become who they are in Christ,” we must never seek to force all Christians into the same areas of service, or expect the same abilities from everyone. Just as not all are apostles or pastors (see 1 Corinthians 12:29-31), it is also true that not all are choir leaders, children’s ministers, or ushers.

As we continue to disciple people, personally getting to know them, we must give them opportunities to develop their own unique gifts and talents, and help them find their place within the Body of Christ. This will enable them to serve His people, and the world He wants to save, with passion and effectiveness.

Catching a Vision To Lead

Once a person has found their own place in the Body and is using their gifts with excellence and with joy, the next step is to go beyond simply serving, to leading. As we have discussed before, we replicate in others what God has formed within us. We said that at the most basic level, disciples make disciples. In the same way, ministers will make ministers out of others.

As we have also previously discussed, Ephesians 4:11-12 makes clear that the role of ministry leaders is not “doing” the ministry, but “equipping” others to serve. All believers, without exception, must discover how to minister to the body of Christ and to share the gospel with the lost. However, in the continuing growth process, we must all move from being ‘learners’ to being ‘leaders’ in our service.

Part of a person’s vision to lead will develop naturally, as others begin to pick up and follow their passion for service. However, for most Christians, there comes a time when they must be pushed out of their comfort zone, and into the place of leading and guiding others.

We, as disciple makers, must make every effort to identify the giftings and fruit in a person’s life, and move them toward opportunities to teach others what they have learned from the Lord.

Let me share a personal example. I once served as a missionary to the island nation of Haiti. I was in an area of heavy witchcraft, yet the present reality of evil also built an expectation of supernatural activity from God. Every Sunday after I closed our church services I was approached by many people for prayers for their physical healing.

Up to this point in my life, I had seen people healed through the prayer of others, and I had a very high personal desire to see healing in the ministry, but I had never had the opportunity to pursue healing very much. I had no idea what I was doing. I knew that the “effectual, fervent prayers of a righteous man” has power to heal (see James 5:13-15), but I did not know how to pray that prayer for myself. My passion was still greater than my inability; however, and so I prayed (ineffectively) for every person who came to me for months.

As I continued this pursuit, God led me to the ministry of a man named Randy Clark, whom God has used to both heal the sick, and to impart the healing gift into thousands of regular Christians all around the world. I was personally touched very powerfully by the Lord while attending the Voice of the Apostles conference and receiving Randy’s prayer. I went out with a new boldness to pray and a new gift inside me. The very next week, on a short trip to Southern Sudan, I had the chance to lay hands on a blind man and to watch his grey eyes regain their color. Many other incredible healings followed over the next few days.

Being emboldened by this experience, I signed up for Randy’s training course for healing ministry, to learn from him and his team how to pray more effectively. That was in 2012. Since then, God has used me to heal hundreds, maybe thousands, around the world in my own ministry.

I have also taken up the responsibility of teaching those I lead how to pray for the sick. I want my fellow ministers to have strong faith for healing breakthroughs, too. Though I have not attained to the level of Randy Clark or others, it does not release me from the responsibility of sharing what I have learned with others.

Imparting God’s Vision for Your Organization

The last thing I want to touch on is moving people from “lay minister” to joining the official ministry leadership within your church or ministry. It is at this point you must add to your mentoring processes what I call, Values-Based Discipleship. This is how you will begin to shape them with the vision God has given for your organization.

If I were to ask you, “what are your highest personal values as a ministry,” you would likely have an answer. Most founders and senior leaders of organizations have received a clear vision for the ministry. However, as I have found throughout my own ministry experience, that vision is seldom passed on to other leaders clearly or effectively.

We must personalize our leader-making discipleship strategies to fit our church or ministry. This will begin the process of turning new disciples into long-term, mature leaders within our organizations.

To give an example, in my ministry, Sozo Ministries, we have set 5 “cultural values” that the Lord called us to live out when we founded the ministry. They are Bible-loving, Intimacy (prayer)-led, Identity-driven, Revival-longing, Empowerment-focused.

The goal is that these values would mark every leader, missionary, pastor, church, and church member in our ministry. In order to make that goal a reality, we cannot simply post the values on the wall and hope they are being received by people passing by. We have to teach, train, and demonstrate these things in order to impart them into every leader and member of our churches. These things, then, become a vital focus in our disciple-making process.

In your ministry, too, I am sure you have a vision from the Lord and a set of values you attempt to live out. The question that must be asked is, “how well are you imparting those things into your next generation of leaders?”

It is true that not every person who comes through your ministry will end up carrying the same vision. That is perfectly fine! You will eventually release those individuals to go serve another ministry or begin something new. Praise God that He used you to touch their lives as you did. 

Despite this fact, there are those whom God has called to come behind you, to carry your vision on long into the future. That is a high honor for both you and to them, but it only happens when you fully share with them all that the Lord has placed on you.

We must realize that everything the Lord has done in our lives is intended to be passed on to others. We are to take the things God has given to us, and to give them away to others. If we have been taught from the word, we must share the truth with others. If we have been set free of demonic powers, we are given authority to set others free as well. If we have been called into leadership, we must raise up other leaders around us. This is not optional!

If we seek to protect what is “ours” — our ministry, our church, our blessing, our…whatever — we will end up losing it. Instead, when we learn to pour out what God has given to us for others, we will be refilled again and again as faithful stewards of the things of God.

Photo by Jehyun Sung on Unsplash

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Level 2 Discipleship: The Basics of Faith

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(Click here for an Overview of the 4 Levels of Discipleship.)

What are the marks of a mature believer in Christ?

This is a question that every leader in the Body of Christ should ask. We must find the answer in the Bible, with the help of the Holy Spirit, and apply it to the current setting in which we live. And then we must see this as the basis for our discipleship for new believers.

As I think through the question, there are many traits that come to mind. Things like knowing their identity in Christ, as well as running to God rather than away from Him when we sin. As we seek to answer this question, looking at those we deem strong men and women of God around us, we will begin to get a general picture of what a mature believer looks like.

As we turn our attention from leading people to Christ – Level 1 Discipleship – to helping them begin their new walk in Christ productively, we must keep these marks of maturity in mind, in order to impart them to the new disciples.

While it is true that every church and leader may place different levels of importance on different characteristics of a Christian, the goal of this post is to get you thinking about your own discipleship teachings, and to help you form a plan for your own church or ministry. What are the first steps we must lead new believers in, to get them started toward maturity?

I said in a previous post that one of the best ways to help a new believer start their walk in Christ is to lead them in some topical-based teachings, which is what I want to look at today. I call this Level 2 Discipleship.

These topical teachings will hit specific points of orthodox theology and practical Christian life, in order to help new believers gain a Christian worldview and begin to live in a manner worthy of the call on their lives (see Ephesians 4:1).

I want to share 9 topical-based discipleship themes to get you started in the process of developing new believers in their Christian walk toward maturity. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but is simply to set the example of things to be discussed to get new disciples moving in the Christian life.

Salvation and Repentance

The fundamental need for all people is to understand that salvation is a gift of God, given through faith and by grace. It is not dependent on good works. It is only dependent on the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. When we come to Him seeking forgiveness, it is always given! We must ensure that new believers are trusting in Christ alone, and not in their own ability to gain favor with God.

Repentance, then, is the process of turning aside from our own striving and away from everything which offends the Lord, and coming into our new identity in Him. It is a changing of mindsets wherein we begin to understand Jesus’ way of life and godliness as opposed to our old way of living, and then allowing our actions to come into alignment with His reality.

Hearing God’s Voice and Prayer

New believers must be taught that God is not far away or that He ignores His people. Salvation is entering into renewed relationship with God, and He wants to have personal, intimate encounters with us as His children. Therefore, early on in the Christian life, believers must learn to pray to Him for guidance and to hear Him when He speaks. We must learn that God is not angry with us when we fail, but He will lead us every day of our life, as we are conformed to His image, if we simply draw close to Him in prayer, listen and obey.

Bible Study

New believers must also be taught to value the Word of God — to read it, study it, and live by it. It is not a rule book to earn God’s favor, but a love letter to us revealing the destiny and favor He has already given to us in Christ. It must become the basis of our faith-walk, as the only source of reliable truth as God’s revelation to man. (We will discuss this topic more in our next post.)

Worship

New believers must learn to worship the Lord with their lives, as well as in church services and songs. The Bible says that the Lord is enthroned on the praises of His people (Psalm 22:3), which means there is a greater spiritual reality that comes into our lives, releasing the power of God, when we humble ourselves to worship Him. The whole of the Christian life should be worship.

Church Involvement – Becoming a Part of the Body of Christ

New believers must be taught the importance of the body of Christ and their role within the community of faith. They must not only be taught that church attendance is important, but must understand why they should be connected as part of the community of faith. This includes helping them understand the need to serve and love other believers in unity, as God empowers them.

Baptism and Communion

New believers must learn to walk in obedience to the Lord’s commands. The first of which is to be baptized as a public testimony and prophetic declaration that they have died with Christ and risen to new life in Him. 

They must also learn the value of the Lord’s supper; what it means to come before the Lord with a clear conscience, and to realize our place in His story, somewhere between the first establishment of the passover meal and the future marriage supper of the Lamb.

Baptism in the Holy Spirit

Just as Paul asked the Ephesian church, “have you received the Holy Spirit,” we must also ensure that new believers are empowered by the Holy Spirit to walk in power and holiness. Without the baptism of the Holy Spirit, people will not be able to live a victorious Christian life. Of course, different parts of the body of Christ hold different beliefs about this baptism. Nevertheless, it must not be overlooked in our discipleship.

Spiritual Warfare and Deliverance

We must ensure new believers also understand that there is an enemy who hates them and wants to drag them back to every sinful way they have left behind. Some of them will need deliverance as they enter the Christian life, but more than that, all believers must be equipped to live a lifestyle of victory spiritual warfare, ensuring the enemy will never be able to win them back or hold them down. 

The Kingdom of God

As people grow in the Lord, we must teach people how to live as ambassadors in the Kingdom of God, seeking to see revival and awakening come into this world. We must teach them to pray that the Kingdom will come “on earth as it is in heaven;” to know what the Kingdom looks like, and how to live as representatives of that Kingdom in their communities. 

We must show them their role in reaching others with the gospel early on, so that it will become a natural part of their Christian walk, throughout their lives.

In conclusion, please realize that this is just a general list of new discipleship topics to get you started. I am sure there are plenty of great pre-written curriculums available online or in Christian book shops near you that can help you go further in this area, but at least now you are thinking about the marks of a mature believer, and beginning to see what it will take to lead people there.

In our next post we will discuss Level 3 Discipleship, in which we help people to begin maturing themselves through personal bible study and prayer.

Photo by Timothy Meinberg on Unsplash

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4 Levels of Disciple-Making

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As we continue our discussion on creating a strategy for discipleship within your church or ministry, I want to look at four levels of growth people go through in the discipleship journey. (Click here for part 1 of our discipleship strategy series.)

These four levels will give us a grid for how to view our interactions with others, determined by where they are in their own journey with Christ. As we learn to keep disciple-making at the forefront of our minds in every interaction with others, this will help us to see where they are, and inform our efforts to help them draw closer to Christ and to maturity in Him.

Of course these four levels could be broken down even further into many sub-categories, but keeping it simple will enable us to grasp the challenges and opportunities we have with each group, and form a plan for raising them up.

1. The Non-Believer

While this is not technically a level on the discipleship spectrum, I want to include it here because it is the place all of us start from. In our efforts to make disciples, it is necessary to view every person in relationship to where they are in Christ, and so we might simply say these people are pre-Christ. They haven’t met Him yet. Which tells us how we need to be interacting with them .

Jesus loves the world so much that He gave up His own life to redeem ours. In Him, all of humanity has been called back to the Father and has a divine opportunity to be conformed to the image of Christ. Our interactions with non-believers should be intentional to speak in love, offering the life-giving gospel to them as the Holy Spirit gives us the opportunity.

The desired outcome of our time with these people is that as they would encounter Jesus through us, will be drawn to Him, and receive salvation.

2. The New Believer

Once someone has been born-again by putting their faith in Christ, the next step is to help them understand the foundations of the Christian life. They are no longer lost sinners, but unless there has been a supernatural breakthrough which brought them into salvation, they will likely still struggle with what it means to be a Christian.

It is at this stage that we must impart to the new believer the foundation of their new identity in Christ. The old man has passed away, and the new man is breaking through. Yet it is a process to see the new man come in maturity, so we must help them.

In developing a discipleship strategy for these men and women, it can be a good idea to use a topical approach in your discipleship meetings. We can use their hunger to grow, and take them to the basics of the Christian life. These would be things like:

  • what is salvation and repentance
  • how are we born again,
  • what does it mean to pray, 
  • how do you hear the voice of the Holy Spirit, 
  • why is Bible study important,
  • why they should join in a church fellowship.

This list can be much longer, depending on how the Holy Spirit leads you in developing your own teaching, and we will discuss this topic in more depth in a future post. But for now, we simply need to understand that the goal at this stage of discipleship is that these people would begin to leave the old life behind, and start taking steps to live as a follower of Christ.

3. The Growing Disciple

Once a person has integrated into the Christian life and is operating as part of the local fellowship of believers, there will come a day that topical lessons have less of an impact on their walk with the Lord. That is not to say that all believers cannot benefit from specific teachings on certain points of the Christian life. Simply that there will come a hunger for “the meat of the word,” and not the basic things – “the milk” – given to babes in Christ.

It is at this stage that we must ensure that these men and women can begin to walk out their own discipleship and growth, through the word of God and in intimacy with the Holy Spirit.

One practical way you can teach people to study the Word of God, as we have discussed in another post, is called the R.E.A.P. Method. While this is not original to myself, I love it because it is simple enough to teach and remember. You simply teach people that with every passage of scripture you should (R)ead, (E)xamine what it means and the principles it teaches, (A)pply these lessons to your life and decide how you will live them out, and then (P)ray for the Holy Spirit to help you do so.

As they are learning to pray for the Holy Spirit’s help, they must also be learning to hear His voice and discern His leadership in their lives. While your church probably has its own beliefs and convictions about how involved the Holy Spirit is in our daily lives, we must make sure we are not limiting Him through willful unbelief. We will discuss this topic in more detail in a future post as well.

The goal with believers at this stage is to let go of handholding Christianity, and enable believers to grow on their own. They will still need guidance along the way, but they cannot remain dependent on others for ongoing growth.

4. The Mature Leader

The final level of discipleship comes when a person has not only learned how to hear the voice of God and grow themselves in the Word of God, but they have a growing track record of practicing these things regularly.

When they reach the point of truly knowing who they are in Christ, and are living out a respectable level of Christian maturity, then the discipleship process turns to them becoming disciple-makers themselves. We might call this a vision-centered discipleship.

What I mean by this is that not only are they learning to walk in Christ more every day, but as their relationship with Him matures, they will begin to have God-given visions of gospel improvement to their family of faith, their neighborhoods and community, and even for national revival. They will no longer simply be pursuing their own growth in the Lord, but naturally they will being leading others toward growth in Him as well.

For these people, stepping into leadership may not be automatic, but it should be encouraged.

As far as it concerns a discipleship strategy, it is at this level that a church should be seeking to impart the vision and values of the ministry into the person, as they begin to lead others down the line. These people should learn what the greater vision God has given to the ministry and how the leadership strives to live it out.

For example, in my own ministry we have 5 “cultural values” which should mark every pastor, missionary, or leader in our ministry, and should be trickling down to every church member and short-term team member. These are things like “bible-loving” and “prayer-led,” which are vital to any ministry and to every maturing disciple. Yet we also have more distinct values such as “identity-driven” and “revival-longing.” Those things need pressed into people growing into maturity within our ministry.

Imparting things like their identity in Christ into the vision they have to serve others will prevent things like a spirit of competition or a poverty mindset. It is not simply a mental understanding of the new man that is necessary, but a practical outworking of their inheritance and authority as sons and daughters of God.

To teach them what it means to be revival-longing, is to impart the vision our ministry has for holiness, justice, community restoration, healing, deliverance, and mass salvations. These things drive how our ministry works from day-to-day, as well as how we pray and seek God as a team of ministers.

The point is that as a person begins to step up into spiritual maturity, our strategy must include a plan to help them become leaders within the church and community, and that means teaching not just the biblical theology and foundations of Christianity, but also imparting the specific callings and giftings that God has given to your ministry for your area of service. The goal is that they will continue the mission of making-disciples in the next generation of believers.

(Click here to begin exploring these four levels in depth.)

Photo by Andrej Lišakov on Unsplash

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Maturity in Christ: The Goal of Discipleship

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(This is Part 5 in our series on Discipleship. Click here for Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.)

If you examine global Christianity with a focus on finances, it is impressive how much the church spends every year, doing outreaches and events in the name of “soul-winning.” Millions, maybe billions, of dollars are spent every year on community outreaches, crusades, and various other evangelistic efforts. And it works. Millions of people, every year, pray a prayer of salvation, in hopes of having an eternity in paradise when they die. Yet all too often, that is where the church’s outreach ends.

As we have discussed already in this discipleship series, the Great Commission calls us not just to make converts, but to make disciples. The sad reality is, however, that too many churches make big plans with big budgets for getting people saved, but have a much lower priority in helping the people become Christ-like. Discipleship has a much lower priority, than winning converts.

Even worse is the fact that we now have multiple generations of believers in the church who are caught in a terrible cycle where, because they were not discipled themselves, they do not know how to make disciples of others. We have churches full of Christian converts who live in immaturity, making more converts who also continue to live in immaturity.

The Goal of Discipleship is that People would Become Like Christ.

Discipleship is the process of leaving who we were before salvation, and becoming who we are called to become in Christ (see Ephesians 2:10). It is a leaving behind of the old man; a putting to death to our sinful nature, in the process of conforming to the image of Jesus, who is the perfect image of God and man (see Ephesians 4:22-24; Colossians 3:5; and Romans 8:29).

If we have any plans in ministry, short of seeing people being transformed into Christlikeness, then we have completely missed the goal of discipleship, and need to reanalyze our motives. To be sure, it is a great thing to want to see hundreds or thousands of people get saved, yet that is not the finish line. Maturity in Christ is.

To use a football analogy, when trying to get someone saved, it is like playing the game on defense. Your only desire is to get possession of the ball before the other team can score (or in this case, to get the person saved before they die and go to hell).

When a person gets converted to Christianity, that is like the ball being intercepted and now rather than playing defense, you switch to playing offense. The strategy changes when you get the ball, but you still haven’t scored. You still have work to do to get the ball to the goal, which in this case, means taking the new convert from the point of salvation and leading them to maturity in Christ. Salvation is simply taking possession of the “ball,” but getting to maturity in Christ is the actual goal line.

So how do we know when a believer reaches maturity in Christ?

The Clearest Mark of Maturity is the Ability to Make More Disciples.

As with any living thing, the most recognizable mark of maturity is the ability to reproduce. When a human child grows up, they go through puberty and transition from adolescence to adulthood. It is a process, and takes time, and they undergo many changes along the way. They begin to look different. They begin to act different. They even begin to sound different. Yet the process isn’t complete until they can successfully procreate. Beforehand, they could not reproduce even if they tried, but after the maturing of their bodies, it becomes a natural part of life. 

The same is true spiritually! We are born again, then go through the process of transformation and spiritual growth, and then naturally, we will begin to lead others into the new birth and discipleship process as well!

Also, just as in the natural world, when we reproduce, we will replicate whatever is in our DNA. Cows give birth to cows. Birds give birth to birds. People give birth to people. So naturally, disciples should give birth to disciples. Disciple-making should be in the DNA of every believer. 

Maturity in the Body Means Everyone is a Disciple-Maker

The goal of discipleship is that as a believer grows in Christ, he or she will not only begin to live their lives by Christ’s example, but will begin reaching out and discipling others as well. As Ephesians 4 tells us: “we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ” – that is maturity – and “when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” The body of Christ builds up the body of Christ.

Earlier in the same passage, Paul tells us that it is the job of spiritual leadership – apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers – to equip every believer for the work of ministry (Ephesians 4:11-12).

It is time that we understand that we must be equipping every believer to become disciple-makers, walking in maturity, and pulling other people out of darkness and up to the standard of Christ, as well. His image in mankind is the goal, and any target less than that, falls short of the high calling of God.

As we continue in this series on discipleship, the next post will begin to look at practical steps in forming a discipleship strategy for yourself and for your ministry. Stay tuned…

Photo by Liane Metzler on Unsplash

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Why Discipleship Matters

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I live in East Africa as a missionary. What I have found where I live is that there is a passion for outreach and evangelism that is lacking in many parts of the world. In almost every church there is a willingness to gather together for open-air gospel crusades, door-to-door evangelism, and other forms of outreach. This is very different than where I come from in America. As a former leader in multiple churches in Bible-belt, Texas I know from experience that it is a difficult thing to get large numbers or Christians together for sharing the gospel, and if you try to do an open-air meeting, it is usually not-well attended.

In Nigeria and other places, Reinhardt Bonnke leads mega crusades attended by millions of people daily. It is an incredible sight, seeing the faces of people stretching past the horizon. However, a few years ago, I attended a Bonnke Crusade in Houston, Texas – one of the largest cities in America – in a stadium that only has about 22,000 seats plus whatever can be added at ground level. From my perspective, the stadium appeared to be one-third of the way full. I don’t think that is the fault of Bonnke. It is because the churches and believers in Houston weren’t unified to see the crusade become a success.

Here in East Africa, the church is good at outreach. They lead big crusades. Churches coordinate together to form mass choirs. Teams are able to canvas an entire city, door-to-door, in a few days. And it is common to see thousands of people put their faith in Christ. I am truly impressed at what I see here!

Can I tell you what the church is not good at in East Africa?

We are not good at bringing the harvest into the barns and preserving the fruit! All too often, the harvest is simply left laying out in the field where it was picked. Churches go out and lead many people to Jesus, yet do not do well (on a large scale) at turning those converts into disciples! 

This is not just an East Africa problem. This is epidemic! It is becoming a whole-church problem!

The Great Commission

“And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has  been given to me. 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.’”

Matthew 28:18-20, English Standard Version

The problem with the lack of discipleship strategy is that the commission of Jesus on the church was not to Go and make converts! It was never to simply to go, preach the gospel, and lead people in a prayer to accept Jesus as their savior. It wasn’t even to go and do signs, wonders, healings, and miracles so that people see the power of God!

All of those things are great, and we need to do them even more. However, until we take those who pray the prayer and those who are touched by the power, and bring them into the body of Christ and disciple them, we are failing at the mission given to us by Christ.

If someone gets saved, but does not get discipled, we are picking the fruit from the tree, but leaving it laying in the field. To say it another way, we are becoming spiritual fathers and mothers to people, long enough to give new-birth, then leaving them as bastard children in the world, with no nurture or guidance to help them grow.

Defining Discipleship

The Lexham Theological Workbook says: 

“Discipleship is the process of devoting oneself to a teacher to learn from and become more like them. For the Christian, this refers to the process of learning the teachings of Jesus and following after his example in obedience through the power of the Holy Spirit. Discipleship not only involves the process of becoming a disciple but of making other disciples through teaching and evangelism.”

So discipleship is the process of taking a lost person, seeing them saved by introducing them to Jesus, and then walking with them into maturity as a believer in their relationship with the Holy Spirit. 

I used to think that discipleship looked different: The first steps begin small – things like repentance of sin, baptism, church attendance – then as time goes on, the person should grow to learn to pray, study the scriptures, and serve. Eventually, they step into leadership and begin evangelizing the lost, teaching biblical truths to others, and discipling others in their own Christian walk.

Those things are good and necessary, but as I have grown in the Christian life, I have come to know that those things are only the actions of a disciple. They don’t make a disciple.

Converts vs. Disciples

Truly making a disciple is taking the now-saved person and helping them draw closer to the Lord; to Hear His voice; to walk in obedience to Him; to learn their identity in Christ, and leading them to fulfill the destiny God has for them in such a way that gives all the glory back to God. That will involve all the action steps listed above, but it is also so much more!

Let me break this idea down a bit:

Q: Should a new believer come to Church?

A: Yes, obviously!

Q: Is it the goal to simply get a new believer to attend church? Is that “success?”

A: No.

The goal is that the person learns to worship the Lord and serve God’s people! Church attendance is necessary, but it is not the final goal. Church attendance should lead the people into the life of worship and service.

I hope you can see the difference: A convert becomes a church attender. A disciple becomes a worshiper and a servant.

Our job is to take a lost person, bring them to Christ in conversion, and then continue the process of leading them to become mature disciples. This is how we preserve the harvest Christ has given to us.

Discipleship matters because the world is full of converts to the Christian religion, but God’s desire is mature sons and daughters. We have to do more than go into the field as harvesters, we have to invest the time, energy, and resources to preserve the harvest God has given.

We would love to hear from you in the comments: Have you been discipled by mature believers in your Christian walk, or were you left to struggle on your own? How are you investing in the next generation of believers to see them grow to full maturity in Christ?

In This Series

In this series on discipleship, we will look at:

As we go deeper into how discipleship works, I pray this series helps you as a believer to create a strategy for discipling others. Don’t forget to subscribe! You might also enjoy this video teaching I did recently on this topic, also called “Why Discipleship Matters.”

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