Disciple & Discipleship???

I have been hearing, reading, and studying about discipleship since my salvation in 1985. The unfortunateness of this is that is basically all that has been done. There is no doubt that the mission of the church, the primary emphasis in all we do, where our energy and budget should be placed is on “making disciples.” However, in our church culture of today it’s an “all you can eat buffet.” Here we can pick and chose from the different ministries of the church that will serve and satisfy us the best. We have subdued true discipleship for a superficial self-serve “community” that is program-driven and superficial at best. I put community in quotation marks because there is no authentic community absent the mandate to make disciples. Real, authentic community always happens around and centered on the Scriptures. There is a clear biblical call that discipleship doesn’t happen alone and we all grow as we learn from Jesus Christ and one another. Making disciples, as easy as it sounds, requires a high level of commitment and work. Our fast-food, instant-access church culture model may grow a church numerically, but it only scratches the surface and remains in the shallow end of knowing God versus delving into the depths and often dangerous depths with God.

Discipleship means, “If anyone would come after me (Christ), let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). Discipleship is a costly endeavor as Jesus again admonishes us to count the cost (Luke 14:26-35) and very succinctly states is verse 33, “So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.” All of this to state the obvious that churches are involved in many activities that could not be classified as disciple making. The one main thing is not the main thing if it’s even a “thing” at all.

We do, however, every now and then talk about and even emphasizes rightly evangelism. I’m all for that, but think about it for a minute. How many of those that are “evangelized” are in our churches? How many of them do we even get into the baptismal? By the way, there is no need to baptize someone unless they have become a follower of Jesus…right? Jesus also included in the Great Commission: “… teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you” (v. 20).

What the culturally comfortable church has done and is doing is sure, people can be a “disciple” and carry a Bible and have Jesus bumper stickers, and even post one man and one woman on Facebook; they could even teach in a small group or be a “professional” pastor if they so desire. What all that adds up to is a people who believe in Jesus as far as a mental assent to His teachings and to that of the doctrines of their particular denomination. They can do all this and decide NOT to follow Jesus. Many of our so called churches have relented to the ideals of what they have created culturally in their church – they have checked the block on the facts of the gospel, got their sins taken care of and have got their ticket into glory. But all of that does not come close to fitting what Jesus describes as His disciple.

The culturally comfortable church has reduced the gospel and hollowed out a new disciple’s natural response to the gospel, which is to follow Jesus and build his or her life around His practices. Receiving Christ as Savior is the beginning line, not the finish line. It means, “Whatever it takes.” What did salvation cost Jesus? His life! What does it cost me? My life! My life, then, is an answer; it is an offering, a living sacrifice. As Bonhoeffer so eloquently said, “We must not make cheap what cost God everything.” (Bonhoffer, 48).

What is the gospel? Does it have the power to save and to transform lives? Hull states, “The most common view of salvation does not require or include transformation. It creates the disturbing question for congregations, ‘Who is saved and who is not?’ or, more troubling, ‘Who is not saved and who has been taught falsely that they are” (Hull, Making Disciples, 12)? In other words, what Hull is saying is we make a mockery of the gospel when it does not require repentance and desire for a new life. The gospel has the power to make and keep those who are truly disciples. I would submit to you based on Scripture that those who made some kind of profession, signed a card, walk an isle and yet are no longer able to be found are indeed NOT a true disciple. Paul says, “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain” (1 Cor 15:1-2). The text is clear and needs little commentary, they have “believed in vain.”

I’ll stop ranting and sum it up this way. Our problems that we have in our lives, families, church, and in this country is that we are not Making Disciples. We must get back to what Christ defined as a disciple and those that are not going hard after that definition, I would ask you to “examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith” (2 Cor 13:5). And as for the local New Testament church, it needs to get back to making the main thing the main thing – Making [true] Disciples. That means we Go and preach and baptize and teach them to obey everything that Christ’s and the gospel commands.

Bibliography

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. The Cost of Discipleship. New Your, NY: Macmillian, 1963.

Hull, Bill. The Disciple-Making Church: Leading a Body of Believers on the Journey of Faith. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2010.