Discipleship requires time, relationships and intentionality
It’s the day after Christmas. The music, the lights, the anticipation, watching kids unwrap their gifts and time with family and friends create some of my fondest memories. Most importantly, Christmas provides an opportunity for us to celebrate the birth of Emmanuel, “God with us.”
When we view it in light of the cross and the empty tomb, it’s really good news, but at the same time there’s a lot of activity in the Christmas season. If you’re in church leadership, it may feel like you just finished a marathon.
When my wife, Allison, and I were first married, we realized our extended families celebrated some Christmas traditions on the same day. Our relationships with our family and friends are important to us, so we had to open up our calendars, move things around and be intentional with our time to make memories with the ones that we love.
The same is true with discipleship. It won’t happen by accident. It requires our time, investing in relationships and intentionality. Before I can be a disciple or make disciples, I have to define the word disciple.
In Matthew 4:19 Jesus states, “And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” The verse shows me that it is impossible to disconnect being a disciple of Jesus from being on mission with Jesus.
In their book Discipleshift, Jim Putman, Bobby Harrington and Robert Coleman use this verse to define discipleship. “(Follow me) A disciple is someone that loves and follows Jesus, (and I will make you) is being changed by Jesus and (fishers of men) is committed to the mission of Jesus of seeing people saved from their sins.”
Those who follow Jesus are called to become fishers of men. When you read this verse and others like 2 Cor 5:20, it reminds us that we are Christ’s ambassadors and he’s making his appeal through us for people to be reconciled to God. Romans 10:17 tells us that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of Christ. Those verses show the necessity for evangelism!
God called my family to plant a church in 2015, and we set out with a desire to reach as many people for Jesus as possible. As a pastor, I love to preach the gospel, but I have to say that sharing the Gospel with someone one on one is my favorite thing to do! However, with that zeal I made a horrible mistake in the “pre-launch” days of our church.
We did a number of evangelistic outreaches from block parties to passing out waters on hot days, to evangelistic surveys, to giving away fans at local concerts, passing out plants door to door and doing anything that we could to meet needs & share the gospel. It was great, but I was so concerned that we might become inwardly focused that I didn’t take time to intentionally disciple our launch team. Evangelism and equipping believers through disciple making are not at odds with one other. They are both integral parts of discipleship.
Jesus doesn’t just call us to simply win converts to Christ. He clarifies the call in the great commission of Matthew 28. We’re called to go and make disciples, baptize them & teach them to obey everything that he has commanded us, and he’ll be with us always. Disciples that obey everything Jesus commanded are mature disciples. That obedience goes right in line Colossians 1:28 which states, “We proclaim him, warning and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.” Part of being a disciple means I’m sharing Jesus with lost people, and I’m investing what God has taught me into the lives of my family and other men.
This requires time. If you’re going to be a disciple that makes disciplemakers you have to open up your calendar. Are there things that need to change in your priorities to spend time with Jesus, with your family, in corporate worship, in community with other believers, sharing the Gospel or investing in other people? Do you need to get up early or give up something good to do what’s best? Plethos has a great resource for this called Eight Priorities, which helps us know what appointments to keep. We live in a culture that thrives on being crazy busy. We must slow down to make time for what’s most important.
It requires focusing on relationships. We can’t give away what we don’t have ourselves. It is imperative that we make time to abide or dwell in Jesus through prayer, the Word and other spiritual disciplines daily. Jesus tells us in John 15:5, “I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without me.”
We must prioritize relationships in our homes (Deut 6:4-7), in gathered worship with our church family (Hebrews 10:25) and in a community group or Sunday school (Acts 2:42-47). These relationships allow us to live out the 59 “one another” commands with other believers. We also need intentional, accountable disciple-making relationships with others, with a clear goal of multiplying faithful disciple makers.
Discipleship doesn’t happen by accident. It requires you to be intentional. The Word of God is our primary textbook (Hebrews 4:12-13, 2 Timothy 3:16-17), and when we meet for the purpose of discipleship, we need to be intentional in our focus. Praying for one another, sharing what God is teaching us in the Word, memorizing scripture, holding one another accountable to what the Word says and passing it on to others are all a part of disciple making. Jesus was intentional about praying all night before calling his disciples in Luke 6:12 and then he invested in those men's lives. Paul was intentional about calling Timothy to entrust what he had been taught by him to faithful men that were also able to teach others (2 Timothy 2:2).
There are so many great tools available for discipleship from ministries like Plethos, but at the end of the day you have to take action. Step out in faith and obedience by giving your time, investing in relationships and being intentional to make mature disciplemakers for Jesus Christ.
Pastor Shea Allen
First Baptist Church Charlestown, IN
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