Monday, April 25, 2011
Friday, April 8, 2011
Discipleship
"The best work is always done with a few. Better to give a year or so to one or two men who learn what it means to conquer for Christ than to spend a lifetime with a congregation just keeping the program going."
Robert Coleman in Master Plan of Evangelism
For many of us we are still struggling to effectively disciple people in our church. Some of us keep trying. Some have given up. We sometimes find it easier to just resign to the fact that we are working within a body that has become an institution and will never be anything more. I don't know about you but I am not willing to settle for that.
Coleman's words are some that are critical to understand and are key to effective discipleship/mentoring in our churches. Greg Ogden challenges us in his book Transforming discipleship that we can never get the job of making disciples done through classes or programs. Jesus did it through relationships. He poured His life into twelve men for three years. The effective was revolutionary.
The lesson is that perhaps we need to focus more on building mentoring relationships with a few to bring about growth that multiplies over time rather than programing something into the life of the body. If we are ever going to radically transform the church in order to radically transform our world, we are going to have to do it more like Jesus and less like the institutions of our day.
For additional reading on this subject check out: Greg Ogden. Transforming Discipleship. IVP Books, 2003.
Robert Coleman in Master Plan of Evangelism
For many of us we are still struggling to effectively disciple people in our church. Some of us keep trying. Some have given up. We sometimes find it easier to just resign to the fact that we are working within a body that has become an institution and will never be anything more. I don't know about you but I am not willing to settle for that.
Coleman's words are some that are critical to understand and are key to effective discipleship/mentoring in our churches. Greg Ogden challenges us in his book Transforming discipleship that we can never get the job of making disciples done through classes or programs. Jesus did it through relationships. He poured His life into twelve men for three years. The effective was revolutionary.
The lesson is that perhaps we need to focus more on building mentoring relationships with a few to bring about growth that multiplies over time rather than programing something into the life of the body. If we are ever going to radically transform the church in order to radically transform our world, we are going to have to do it more like Jesus and less like the institutions of our day.For additional reading on this subject check out: Greg Ogden. Transforming Discipleship. IVP Books, 2003.
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