Making Discipleship a Way of Life, Not a Program

by Jim Johnston on November 19, 2009

Craig Mintz experienced first-hand what an intensive discipleship experience can do in a person’s life while at the University of North Carolina. So, he took what he learned on the college campus and put it into practice at First Baptist Church, Sevierville, Tennessee.

“What’s missing so many times is the relational part of Christianity,” said Mintz, the pastor of discipleship and singles at the church. “Growing in your faith alongside a friend who is doing the same thing really makes a difference.”

That’s the genesis of Disciple3, a movement—not a program—that Mintz has seen more than 270 people walk through in the past three years. Its genius is in its simplicity.

A Disciple3 participant asks two people of the same gender to meet together for an hour each week for six months. The group commits to reading through one chapter of the Bible each day. The first five months cover Luke through Romans and Proverbs. The sixth month is spent in a book of the Bible of the trio’s choosing. Everyone in the group is encouraged to write down what they learn through the readings.

Each time they meet, the group discusses a short list of questions, prays for each other, and hangs out together.

The questions are basic:

1.What is one thing you learned from reading God’s Word this week that can make a real difference in your life?

2.How has your life this week demonstrated that Christ lives in you?

3.Is there any temptation or sin you’ve battled this week that you’d like us to pray about?

4.Is there a lost person in your sphere of influence we can pray for this week? How can you be salt and light to that person?

“I didn’t want it to be sin management,” said Mintz, who was an International Mission Board missionary in Western Europe and a newspaper reporter before coming to FBC Sevierville. “We just wanted to give people a way to grow in their faith with some of the basics that Jesus taught.”

After the group completes six months or so together, each of the three is asked to start a new group where they walk through a similar plan. The discipleship plan starts anew every six months.

The biggest obstacle to making Disciple3 work is time. “It’s just hard for people to carve out an hour every week,” Mintz said. “You put it off for a week, then it becomes two, and then a group falls apart. You have to work hard to set a time everyone can live with up front and make sure you stick to it.”

The most enthusiastic group to get involved with Disciple3 has been 20-somethings. It satisfies a need that’s not easily met for them in larger discipleship groups and Sunday morning Bible study fellowships. “So many of them have never had this kind of relationship with another believer,” Mintz said. “I never had this until I went to college. I didn’t know what it meant to be discipled. I think they’re finding it’s a great experience to draw near to other Christians, and they want to share it with others.”

Classes and Bible studies aren’t enough. Community by itself isn’t either. It’s the pairing of community, depth, connection, and responsibility that helps young adults move from new followers of Christ into vibrant growing disciples who can reach out to others and make a difference in the world through the power of Jesus.

Article from: Making Discipleship a Way of Life, Not a Program

The Atmosphere of Vision

by Doug Hunt
As you begin to disciple someone you must help them see their true identity and potential in the Kingdom.

The atmosphere of vision happens early in the relationship between Jesus and His disciples. Jesus has not revealed much about Himself to them yet but He is grabbing on to the moment and helping the disciples see life beyond themselves. He is telling them something that is almost impossible for them to believe about themselves. Robert Coleman in the book Master Plan of Evangelism describes the disciples this way.

“By any standard of sophisticated culture then and now they would surely be considered as a rather ragged collection of souls. One might wonder how Jesus could ever use them. They were impulsive, temperamental, easily offended and had all the prejudices of their environment…Not the kind of group one would expect to win the world to Christ.”

But imagine the sense of wonder and confidence that must have overcome them when Jesus looked them in the eye and said, “You will be fishers of men”, “You ARE the salt of the earth…YOU ARE the light of the world… …because of who you are people will worship God.

The atmosphere of vision is you helping a person see their life from the reality of who they are in Christ. It is helping them see that they are defined by God’s truth about them not what the world says. It is helping them see the things they don’t see about themselves; helping them see things they see wrong about themselves. Helping them see misperceptions about God and replacing them with Truth’s like Ephesians 1 that says

“God chose you before the foundations of the world to be holy and blameless before Him to praise of his glorious grace.”

“In Christ all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form and in Him you have been made full.”

Maybe it is just looking them in the eye and saying “I love you. I believe in you. You matter to God.”

When you help people discover their identity in Christ you are casting vision into their lives to do great things for God. It’s the atmosphere of vision.

Here are few questions that I often ask early in the discipleship process to help cultivate the atmosphere of vision.

1) Have you ever thought about how God could use you to change the world?
2) If you had unlimited resources and guaranteed success, what would you do with your life?
3) What do think it means to follow Jesus?
4) What do think could hinder you from being all that God wants you to be?

Originally posted at http://www.clemsonbcm.blogspot.com/
Friday, October 23, 2009

 

Sacred Roads: Exploring the Historic Paths of Discipleship

Throughout history, people have gravitated toward different methods of discipleship. For a while, discipleship was entirely relational—early church small groups. When Christianity became the legal religion of the Roman Empire, discipleship became experiential—cathedrals, Stations of the Cross, iconography, and taking mass. With the Reformation came intellectualism—people started studying the bible for themselves and emphasized the conversion of the mind. Later it became personal—the onset of the personal quiet time. Finally, discipleship became incarnational—occurring while serving or through missions.

Sacred Roads takes a look at a few faces of discipleship including: relational discipleship, experiential discipleship, intellectual discipleship, personal discipleship, and incarnational discipleship, finding the worthwhile attributes of each and providing practical ways to implement each expression into our modern pursuit of Christ.

Chapters:

• Introduction: Dare to Explore
• Session 1: Relational Discipleship
• Session 2: Experiential Discipleship
• Session 3: Intellectual Discipleship
• Session 4: Personal Discipleship
• Session 5: Incarnational Discipleship
• Conclusion: Discipleship Next

Topics:

• Relational: the early church, value of small groups, accountability, missional friendships People grow in their relationship with Christ as they grow in relationship with others and are influenced by those relationships.
• Experiential: the Catholic Church through Reformation, pilgrimage, stations of the cross, experiential worship People grow in their relationship with Christ when they are immersed in an experience with Him that propels them in some area of their faith formation.
• Intellectual: Reformation era, inductive Bible study, academic and educational approaches to discipleship People grow in their relationship with Christ as they develop the mind of Christ through the reading, study, meditation, and memorization of Scripture.
• Personal: 19th and 20th centuries, rise of personal devotional/quiet time, practice of spiritual disciplines People grow in their relationship with Christ as they incorporate and practice spiritual disciplines into the context of their everyday lives.
• Incarnational: 19th and 20th centuries, missions, service, social justice, compassion ministries People grow in their relationship with Christ as they seek to follow His model of servant leadership and become His hands and feet in sacrificial service to those around them.

Find out more on Sacred Roads at http://threadsmedia.com/store/studies/sacred-roads/

Discipleship Blog from Clemson University

I’ve found great encouragement and challenge to make disciples from my friend, Doug Hunt. Doug is the campus minister for BCM in Clemson, SC. Check out http://www.clemsonbcm.blogspot.com/ for a great discipleship blog.

A few things he covers…

--Creating an environment for life transformation

--A philosophy of Life Community

--Building blocks for making disciples

--Biblical love