“INTRODUCTION TO DISCIPLE-MAKING”

The word “disciple” describes a learner, a pupil, a student, a scholar, an intern, an apprentice, an adherent (one who binds himself like adhesive tape to another, to capture his heart and his vision and to learn his expertise and his skill). In the New Testament, a disciple is a Christian-in-training, enrolled for life in the school of Christ, and under the tutelage of a maturing discipler. At least one text in the book of Acts indicates that a new believer in Christ was expected to become a disciple at the moment of his faith in Christ (Acts 14:21, where the word translated “taught” in the KJV is the Greek word for “discipled”).

From the moment of his conversion, the new believer is expected to maintain a student attitude throughout his remaining life on earth. This “student profile” calls for him to be a regular attendant in the required “classes,” a notetaker who retains in writing the truth so that he can study through it again and again, and a practical model of the things he is learning. What parent of a first-grader would send him to school without a notebook, pencil, and other materials, and expect him to return in time with a textbook and assignments, etc.? Every Christian should see himself as a lifetime “student in the school of Christ,” following the same vocational regimen as a serious student in school.

Thus, the disciple’s very first vocation is to “learn to learn.” It is amazing to note how many college graduates were never taught somewhere along the way how to study and how to learn. It is equally amazing to see the difference in the life of a person who knows how to study, how to learn, and how to maintain studying and learning as lifetime habits after graduation from school (in fact, many accelerate the pace of their learning after graduation; I was one of them). Blessed indeed is the believer in Christ who has had a Christian discipler who has early-on introduced him to the basics of the Christian life and walked him through the learning process with a Bible, a notebook, a prayer list, and books for basic Christian reading. Hopefully, these exercises will lead him to a lifetime vocation of learning, one of the distinctives of a true disciple of Jesus Christ.

One of my favorite writers is C. S. Lewis, the great British scholar of Renaissance literature and lay-apologist for the Christian faith. At every reading of one of his books, I have been impressed with the sheer mental genius of the man. Early on, I purchased the big book of personal letters which Lewis exchanged with Arthur Greeves, a young man of similar mind and literary tastes, a volume entitled They Stood Together. One of the great values of the letters was that they exposed Lewis’ growth stages, or his growing edge, in the early part of his life. One of his growing edges was in how he learned to learn. He received his greatest help from the atheistic headmaster (what a sense of humor God has!) of a boys’ school he attended, a stern man whom Lewis affectionately called “the Great Knock” (so-called because, as they said, he knocked the inability to think out of his pupils and the ability to think into them). This man, William T. Kirkpatrick, systematically attacked slouchy thought and slouchy expression in his students. Lewis learned to think with steel-trap logic, to learn, and to be perfectly reasonable in expressing himself under the iron hand of this early teacher. All the while, God was using this time of learning to prepare him for the arena of faith and the battles to be fought and won there. Lewis’ testimony has challenged me again and again to “learn and re-learn to learn.”

When Jesus said, “Learn of me” (Matthew 11:29), He meant either “learn from Me” as your Teacher, or “learn about Me” as your Subject. He probably (surely) meant both. By definition, a Christian disciple is one who fulfills that mandate, pursuing both possible meanings. There is one additional proviso. The New Testament installs two intermediaries between Jesus and the believer in the process of a believer’s learning One is the indispensable Teacher, the Divine Holy Spirit, and the other is the human agent who “makes disciples” (Matthew 28:19). These two assigned teachers should work in close association in advancing the learning of the disciple. The Holy Spirit has enlisted the disciple-maker, and the disciple-maker should know and practice absolute dependence upon this “Stay-within Friend,” the Holy Spirit. The discipler is a kind of assigned tutor or mentor, an agent of the Holy Spirit, who qualitatively triggers the process of total Christian learning/incarnating/living/testifying/soul-winning/teaching/disciple-builing into the life of a new Christian. Jesus played this role with His Twelve, as did Peter with John Mark and Paul with Timothy and many others. The dimensions of this role are so many, so big, and so dynamic that face-to-face communication is required in small-scale settings where assignments, give-and-take, accountability, etc., can be maintained. When Jesus did this with His twelve men, He often spotlighted one or two of the twelve for special attention, determined by their personal needs or the demand of special occasions.

I am personally persuaded after much careful study and much experience through many years that Christ’s Model is definitive for fulfilling His Mandate to “turn people into disciples.” While being very deliberate and intending to be very alert in observation, I have never seen any other model produce the full-blown New Testament disciple on a consistent basis, but I have never seen His Model fail, when followed carefully. Jesus ministered to the masses, teaching (the imparting of Divine information), preaching (the imparting of Divine information, inspiration and invitation) and healing (Divine intervention to correct the many “diseases” of life), but He recruited selectively for His Kingdom’s sake and concentrated almost all of His private ministry (which someone estimated to be maybe 85% of His total ministry) on Twelve Men. Many recent students, teachers, preachers and evangelists (including Billy Graham) have advised pastors and leaders to re-institute this model in their ministries. Since Jesus did not explain the meaning of “turning people into disciples” when He gave the Great Commission, and since His hearers had been subjected to The Process for at least two and one-half years of day-and-night qualitative disciple-making, we may be absolutely sure that His Model was intended to provide their understanding of Their Mission.

However, most Christians today are so oriented to auditing lessons in Sunday School and auditing sermons in an auditorium that they unwittingly abort the intention of Heaven for the communication of truth. Note the take-off on the words for “listening” (auditing, auditorium). This “listening” in an “auditorium” (place of listening!) typically ends with the moment of listening and has little or no future productivity beyond that moment—which means that, when the staggering potential is considered for future productivity through such a moment of teaching/preaching and audience hearing/learning, God largely “wasted His breath” in speaking in that service. Obviously, passive, casual listening (listening that has none of the vast productivity He calls for in communicating His truth) has replaced active (true, dynamic), controlled and committed listening, the listening that generates dynamic active study and repetitive teaching—and inferior replacement is just the beginning of the sterility that proceeds from such reduced listening. No wonder that Jesus talked so much about “hearing,” and said such strange and devastating things about it!

In 1978, English actor Alex McCowan did a theatrical performance in New York City of the Gospel of Mark. Time magazine reported that it was “a feat of remarkable skill.” It seems that McCowan strolled on stage casually dressed, opened his mouth, and dramatically recited the entire Gospel of Mark from memory. Time called it “compelling theater that is at the same time non-theatrical.” The final paragraph of the reporter’s article said, “As delivered by McCowan, Mark is a triumph of the human voice and of the English language.” It was apparently quite good theater, but the words hadn’t taken root. They really weren’t supposed to. After all, they were part of a performance delivered by an actor in a theater. They were spoken for dramatic, theatrical effect, not for practical results. Can such a thing happen in church as well?? Not only can it happen, it almost always does, at least for a great majority of the people, because they have never learned to learn (and repeat) according to the standard of Jesus. They unwittingly sin through presumptuous listening—every time they go to church! When this happens, Christians become crippled in their ears, and the ailment tends to spread through their other spiritual “senses,” getting worse with each new trip to church (see James 1:22ff). Judged by the test of “a fruitful crop” (God’s stated standard), it is evident that many regular attendants in church have tragically not learned to learn (that is, they have never been qualitatively discipled after the Model of Jesus). I would like to invite you to email me for the study on “how to hear,” the one subject to which Jesus devoted more of His attention than any other single subject.

God’s intent in broadcasting His truth in any setting is the same as His intent in sending His Son, Jesus—the Word given is to become flesh so that it can return to (articulated) Word again through a redeemed person on its way into the “flesh” of another person , and the movement is to be Word-to-flesh-to-Word-to-flesh-to-Word-to-flesh, ad infinitum. Most auditors-in-church have never really “learned to learn” in such a way as to make them the multi-generational multipliers of other disciples mandated in the New Testament.

Consider the potential of the truth shared in a teaching/preaching setting as contrasted with the actual result. Suppose each auditor had learned to capture the truth (by taking notes, holding himself accountable to master that truth so that he can repeat it without notes, then actually repeating the truth heard as soon as possible and as often as possible to potential disciples/disciplers/world-impactors) with total world impact as his goal. This is Biblical procedure. “The Word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach” (Romans 10:8, and note the context) It is God’s intent that the Word proclaimed be preached into the heart and mouth of every listener (and a third crucial part of “spiritual anatomy,” the feet, are mentioned purposefully in the same passage; Romans 10:15), with eternal fruit being the goal (and fruit naturally multiplies itself). Someone said, “Most church attendants are like Halloween pumpkins, or Jack’O Lanterns—a lot of smiles, but no feet.” What pastor/evangelist/preacher/teacher would not rather know that his sermon/study session was skillfully repeated a thousand times beyond the service where it was first heard, and to the ends of the earth, with massive soul-winning and disciple-building results, rather than that it be merely audited in church, never to be thought of or mentioned again shortly after the service? This is a part of a disciple’s learning to learn. Quite obviously, it seldom happens unless people are discipled into it.

Every Christian is intended to see himself functioning in a vocation (Ephesians 4:1). The Latin word is “vocare,” and that word is an education in itself. You can easily detect the similarity between the Latin word and our word “vocal.” The word “vocation” involves: (1) A speaking. For a Christian, God is the Speaker, though He often speaks through assigned human speakers as well. (2) A hearing. For a Christian, this entails the in-depth listening commanded by Jesus. (3) The acceptance of a “calling” (which is the Christian understanding of the word “vocation”). Dear Christian, you are in a vocation, not on a vacation! On a vacation, everything is done on a luxury and leisure basis. There is plenty of leisure on a vacation, and vacations are essential, but they should be temporary, not the lifestyle of a Christian listener. In a Christian vocation, everything must be done on a Lordship basis. Vocational workers apply themselves in learning and in living. They are always “on call,” they are never merely “on their own.” I hope that you will take this book in hand as a vocational catalyst, or as a vocational readjustment—and that you will join the enlarging army of disciple-makers who will impact the world to the ends of the earth until the end of time. Indeed, an enlarging army of such people are already incredibly impacting the world. Praise be to God, who “gives the increase”!

May I say it plainly: every Christian is commanded by Jesus to “turn people into disciples,” and is expected (again, a command) to have multi-generational impact for Him (II Timothy 2:2). The verse cited here is by no means the only place in the New Testament where multi-generational disciple-making is seen. Let me remind you that the verse just cited from Paul’s letter to his own disciple, Timothy, was written to a man who went from “Mr. Timid” to “Mr. World-mover” through the discipling of Paul. Let the timid Christian of today who would “begin to make excuse” realize that there are many ways to “turn people into disciples,” and to learn the way to which he is best adapted—and to practice it continually--is a part of learning to learn. Do you begin to see how qualitative is the process of teaching the disciple so that he will learn to learn?

Several years ago, I wrote the prequel to Fox Fever, a primer on disciple-making entitled, Tally Ho the Fox. It was a simple and stumbling effort to express my findings about being a disciple of Jesus and about building other disciples of the same kind. The book is not marketed at large in Christian bookstores. It is only marketed out of our home in Memphis, Tennessee. With that limitation and without publicity except through the words and efforts of disciples/disciple-makers, I have been astounded to watch as the book has travel into many, many places throughout the world. Many individuals have ordered entire boxes of the two books (again and again), and have given them to other Christians whom they see as potential disciples/disciplers/multipliers. The first book has already been used as a textbook in two Christian colleges in classes on missions, evangelism and disciple-making. Almost daily, I receive letters, notes, requests and contacts from the most distant and unexpected places as people inquire about the book and seek copies of it. It has now gone through five printings. I see this as a miracle of the Holy Spirit. It also reflects the vast number of surrendered Christians who want to obey Jesus in the true fulfillment of His Great Commission, which commands each follower to “turn people into disciples in all nations.” I have become increasingly convinced that it is incumbent upon every disciple who understands the Commission to aggressively carry the Strategy and Standard of Jesus into every nook and cranny of the globe—to “the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts 1:8). As I write, I have just returned from an eighteen-day trip to the Philippines and China, where the team saw miracle after miracle of communication and transformation. My partners on that team remained in China after my departure, joined there by five other teaching team members and intending to penetrate three or four more teaching venues for another six days of teaching before returning to the U.S. It has been my personal privilege to travel some 168 times at this date to foreign countries to train pastors, teachers, leaders and “laymen” in being and building disciples. On most of these trips, I have been attended by teaching disciples who have been “equipped” (Ephesians 4:12) through the disciple-making process. On such trips, I “tandem-teach” or “round-robin teach” with these capable disciples/disciplers. These efforts have been remarkably anointed and blessed by the Holy Spirit, and a world-wide network of disciples/disciplers/multipliers has emerged. The email network that keeps us in contact with thousands of them has become almost impossible to handle. Our goal on each of these trips is to see at least one motivated disciple and aspiring disciple-maker emerge from the trainees (we will take ten or one hundred, but you can’t have two until you have one, so we ask for at least one), and thus to begin a movement of disciple-making that will soon begin to impact the churches and the culture around them.

Let no one misunderstand this goal. Some distant observers have said that we surely must neglect or ignore evangelism in emphasizing disciple-making. Nothing could be further from the truth! I have personally taught in disciple-making sessions again and again some three or four tools or standards for soul-winning, and have personally used one of them hundreds of times in witnessing to and/or winning people to Christ. On several overseas trips, I have seen thousands of people respond to the Gospel invitation. In a team effort of some thirty lay evangelists on one trip stretched over ten days and climaxed with a weekend crusade, we saw well over 5,000 people register “decisions for Christ.” In another church-centered crusade, I saw 2,300 people respond to my own preaching backed by the team effort of thirteen lay-evangelists. On one trip to Sri Lanka, I even saw six pastors in the discipleship training sessions respond to an impromptu Gospel message (oh, it was strongly prompted by the Holy Spirit!) on Hebrews 7:25 on a Thursday afternoon, with each of these four men brokenly declaring that they had never been saved and were coming to Christ in repentance and faith that day. This was my third trip to Sri Lanka, so I asked for one of the pastors who had been thrice-trained in intensive disciple-making sessions to begin immediately to disciple these four men. A very capable pastor who had also become a skilled disciple-maker took them into a side classroom and spent the rest of the day, probably four or five more hours, discipling them! Anyone who knows my heart knows that I have never neglected evangelism. It is my heart to “witness to everything that moves and looks human” in any setting. That motive and practice are crucial parts of the disciple-making process. When these lay-teachers go on a trip with me, they always preach in services (at least) on Sunday, preaching evangelistic sermon(s) which I have discipled into them. The entire standard is the most gratifying ministry I have ever been involved in over some 55 years of being a Christian, with 54 of them spent in the preaching/teaching ministry.

When a person is first exposed to the life-transforming strategy of Jesus, certain questions are invariably asked. “How do I/we do this?” “What do I do with a disciple?” “Just exactly what procedure do you follow in building a disciple?” These questions simply cannot be answered in propositional form; the answer must be finally seen in practice. Christian strategy is incarnational (remember the Word-to-flesh formula) before it is informational (remember the flesh-to-Word formula); it is personal before it is propositional. Dynamic processes do not easily reduce to formulas. Jesus’ training was done on-the-job and on-the-move. One writer has written of “Jesus’ mobile Bible college.” The word “college” sounds almost too institutional to accurately reflect the practice of Jesus, but you get the idea. Again, do not misread me at this point. I believe that the local church is the focus of Christ’s purpose and movement in a community and in the world, but I believe that it is to be more the base for the movement than the place of the movement. I am sure that Jesus intended tidal waves of influence and impact to emanate from the local church and from each individual Christian (with no exceptions, no exemptions and no exclusions!), and I believe that this spiritual tsunami is to inundate the entire world. The problem is that most “Christians” are spectators instead of participants, observers instead of actors, mere supporters instead of mighty catalysts for world impact, local pew potatoes instead of global strategists. This is a total caricature, a full-fledged distortion, of the standard of Jesus. He will never encourage or endorse that strategy—for any of His followers.

I have sought to follow the admonition which God gave to the prophet Habakkuk as I have written this book. Habakkuk wrote, “The Lord said, ‘Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run who reads it” (Habakkuk 2:2). Here are the “eight Rs” of Habakkuk 2:1-3 for planting and implementing the disciple-making vision: Revelation (vision), rebuke, repentance, ’ritin, readin’, repeatin’, runnin’, and ’rithmetic” (multiplication). I have sought to “write the vision….plain upon tablets.” I pray that it is plain enough, and motivating enough, “that he may run who reads it.” And I pray that he may understand the strategy well enough that God will use him (you personally) to create an army of multiplying disciples who will impact the world to the ends of the earth and until the end of time.

Some years ago, I saw the movie, Camelot. I was absolutely captivated by two scenes in the movie because of their illustrations of the Gospel. One was the scene of King Arthur in heavy inner conflict at the Round Table because of the betrayal of the two people he loved most in all the world—his wife, Guinevere, and his favorite knight, the idyllic Lancelot. Arthur was in the throes of agony because of the dilemma their betrayal thrust him into: “Shall I spare them because of my love for them, and thus destroy the righteous foundation of my kingdom; or shall I judge and destroy them for their sin, thus protecting the kingdom, but thus, also, torturing my own heart with the endless agony of being bereft of the two people in all the world I love most?” The poignancy and pathos bleeds through the scene as Arthur tearfully ponders his choices. How like God’s dilemma—how to be just and yet still be the justifier of sinners (see Romans 3:26). Arthur was too weak to resolve the problem, and the Camelot dream faded. It was indeed a problem that suited a God, and the God of the Bible solved it like the God that He is. The glorious Gospel of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus is the Divine Resolution to an “impossible” dilemma.

The other memorable scene in the movie, the closing scene at the end of Camelot, will remain long etched on my memory. Arthur’s weakness and inability to resolve the conflict in him about Guinevere and Lancelot have ended the “impossible dream” of the Camelot eutopia. As the story closes, the entire plot is captured in the last scene as Arthur and his remaining loyalists are waiting, in fog and mist, the questionable outcome torturing everybody’s heart.

A young boy who calls himself “Tom of Warwick” appears in the scene, a “volunteer” for the Camelot dream. Arthur explains the dream to the boy, and then gives him an assignment. Arthur refuses the boy his request to fight as a knight of the Round Table, and tells him instead to go and tell the Camelot dream to others, and thus keep the dream alive. He tells the boy to run, to run and tell the dream. The film dies from your sight with the throaty voice of good King Arthur shouting at the departing boy, “Run, boy, run! Run, boy, run! Run, boy, RUN!”

How I wish we could hear our Good King Jesus shouting in our souls today. “Take the Mandate of My Commission as your personal assignment, and Run, child of Mine, run! Run…child…RUN!” Godspeed, dear Christian, as you read and run.

“And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified” (Acts 20:32). “Sanctified” to Whom? Sanctified to what? Set apart to Him, to be sure, but also set apart to His revealed Purpose. The word “sanctified” is as much a utilitarian word as it is a personal piety word. Biblically, things, places, days and persons are called “holy” or “sanctified”—and three out of those four don’t even have a moral nature at all! Those things are sanctified to a Person, certainly, but they are also sanctified for a specific practical sacred purpose. This is true also of every believer in Christ, and surely one of the ultimate practical purposes for each believer is defined by the Great Commission of Jesus Christ. No human being is Biblically “sanctified” who is not ready for any use to which the Sanctifier may want to put him.

I hope these words have whetted your appetite (as they have mine) for this “whirlwind tour” through some ideas about the theory and practice of being and building disciples in obedience to the Great Commission command of Jesus.
(Copied from Herb Hodges)