About the same time that Andy Stanley released his book Deep & Wide, which I touched upon last week, Francis Chan also released a book entitled Multiply: Disciples Making Disciples.
Within it he shares the importance of discipleship in light of the Great Commission, found in Matthew 28:19-20 and that we have all been invited to take part in the awesome privilege of inviting others into God’s story of redemption, and journeying with them on the pathway of life and faith.
David Platt in the foreword shares that; “From the start, God’s design has been for every single disciple of Jesus to make disciples who make disciples who make disciples until the gospel spreads to all peoples.”
Throughout the book Francis goes on to explain what a disciple is, how to become one, what it means to be part of the church, before expanding on the importance of studying the Bible and understanding the Old and New Testaments.
He explains early on how the church has unfortunately moved so far away from Jesus’s command that “many Christians don’t have a frame of reference for what disciple making looks like.”
I would even go so far as to say that within many churches, and Christian organizations people don’t necessarily see and understand who we are, as Christians, Believers, Soldiers, Salvationists etc. let alone who God is; as they don’t necessarily see and hear how God is at work anymore in our lives, let alone the world. Unfortunately all too often we are merely providing a service, event, activity or programme and don’t acknowledge God’s part.
Romans 10:14-17 (The Message) says; “But how can people call for help if they don’t know who to trust? And how can they know who to trust if they haven’t heard of the One who can be trusted? And how can they hear if nobody tells them? And how is anyone going to tell them, unless someone is sent to do it? That’s why Scripture exclaims,
A sight to take your breath away!
Grand processions of people
telling all the good things of God!
But not everybody is ready for this, ready to see and hear and act. Isaiah asked what we all ask at one time or another: “Does anyone care, God? Is anyone listening and believing a word of it?” The point is: Before you trust, you have to listen. But unless Christ’s Word is preached, there’s nothing to listen to.”
The thing is, discipleship is far more than a programme or ministry. It should be the driving mission of our lives. It should define us! Both as individuals and as faith communities.
We are all tasked with sharing the Good News of what God is doing in our lives and the lives of others – yet how often do we share it? Have we become ashamed of the Gospel? Is it what people see in us, or our churches, Corps, and mission stations?
Andy Stanley emphasises the need to create irresistible environments in his book Deep & Wide and says that “every ministry environment communicates something. There are no neutral environments. Environments are the messages before the message. The messages your environments communicate have the potential to trump your primary message.”
What do the people in our communities see? Do they see our primary message or something else entirely? Are we comfortable with what they see?
We are according to Scripture the light of the world and are here to illuminate the God-colors in the world.
Matthew 5:16 (The Voice) emphasises the fact that we are to “Let our light shine everywhere we go, that we may illumine creation, so men and women everywhere may see our good actions, may see creation at its fullest, may see our devotion to Christ, and may turn and praise our Father in heaven because of it.“
In the foreword to Servants Together: Salvationist Perspectives on Ministry, General John Gowans opens with this “Salvationists pride themselves on being ‘doers of the word and not hearers only’, and the emphasis we place on rolling up our sleeves and getting on with it is one with which I heartily agree. But action without reflection soon becomes mindless routine; we must continually review what we are doing and why we do it.”
The writers go on to share that; “William Booth clearly stated in 1879: ‘We are a salvation people – this is our speciality – getting saved and keeping saved, and then getting somebody else saved, and then getting saved ourselves more and more’ (William Booth, The Salvationist, January 1879).”
They go on to write; “We are called to mission. It is foundational to Christian discipleship to be in mission wherever we are. This is reflected very clearly in our task as Salvationists: we are ‘saved to save’.”
Have we watered this down when we proclaim that we as Salvationists are ‘saved to serve‘?
Afterall there are many service organisations in today’s word and it would appear that anyone can serve – people are employed to serve just about anything that we want, community food-banks popup all over the place serving the needs of their communities.
Now this theme of being ‘saved to save‘ is something that Lieut-Colonel Alan Burns picks up in his book Founding Vision for a Future Army – Spiritual Renewal and Mission in The Salvation Army, when he writes: “There should be nothing that matters more to Salvationists than to see God’s lost children found, reconciled to him and discipled for Christ. We need to be constantly focussed on this Kingdom priority. Any progress The Salvation Army makes that does not have soul-saving at the centre of it will not be progress at all. William Booth said he would prefer The Salvation Army to cease to exist if it lost its soul-saving passion. Unless we, as disciples, make disciples, who in turn make disciples, we will not fulfill our divine mandate.“
Are people in the community aware that we (as Christians, Believers, Soldiers, Salvationists) are in effect God’s people? Or do they look at us and recognise too much of the world? Has the Great Commission truly become the Great Omission?
The Gospel message is not something that we should be hiding from the world, often behind our service and actions – it should be front and centre on our lips and shown through our actions, every moment of every day.
In John 15:8 Jesus says that His “Father is glorified, that [we] bear much fruit and so prove to be [His] disciples.” (English Standard Version)
You see, God wants the seed of faith that has been birthed within us to grow and develop, for it to mature into fruit that then replants and multiplies itself into the lives of others.
Our faith needs to multiply and grow – The evidence of our own discipleship journey should be that others are attracted to what we carry.
Our service should be birthed out of a desire to serve God first and foremost and draw others to Him.
As we saw in the Discipleship = Relationships post, ‘God wants you and I to view the other Christians in our lives as partners in this important ministry. God has not called us to not remain in isolation – He has placed us in the context of a church community so that we can be encouraged and challenged by the people around us. And we are called to encourage and challenge them in return.’ (Adapted from Francis’ Book)
And he has also called us out – saved us to go and make fishers of men. To multiply our faith!
So, are you up for the challenge of a lifetime?
Multiply is a 24-session discipleship experience designed for one-on-one and group settings. It is a simple resource that has been made widely available to view, read or listen to each of the sessions. You can even download the book.
Blessings ’til next time 🙂
Ten years ago (2012) Andy Stanley in his book Deep & Wide shared some key questions that he and the original staff at North Point Community Church in Atlanta began wrestling with as they were exploring the mission and strategy statement of their newly formed church back in 1995.
Within the context of the Salvation Army, Major Ivan Bezzant in his Leadership Jesus Way resource explores how to train and lead disciples, and challenges us that we need to take on a kingdom mentality instead of the prevailing club mentality which unfortunately persists in many churches.
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