{"id":476,"date":"2020-03-31T09:37:11","date_gmt":"2020-03-30T23:37:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/disciplingasyougo.com\/?p=476"},"modified":"2020-04-02T11:08:13","modified_gmt":"2020-04-02T01:08:13","slug":"come-follow-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/disciplingasyougo.com\/?p=476","title":{"rendered":"Come follow me"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The following article is a good read and is written by Micah Dodson<\/strong> who lives in the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Discipleship. What is it? Why is there so much talk about it these days? Recently I\u2019ve been reading specifically on this topic. Discipleship has never been my favourite subject. I know, that seems weird because it\u2019s so foundational and essential in what Jesus challenges his followers to do, \u201cgo make disciples\u201d or \u201cAs you go, make disciples\u201d (Matt 28:19-20). As a pastor, I have devoted most of my adult life to leading people in following Jesus. I now wonder why the evangelical church has often reduced discipleship to a knowledge transfer for people who are already followers of Jesus. Once you graduate into Christianity 101, you\u2019re invited to a discipleship class. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strangely this approach to discipleship doesn\u2019t seem to match Jesus\u2019 simple approach of calling his first disciples. His invitation was to simply drop your familiar nets and \u201ccome follow me\u201d (Matt. 4:19). Three simple words that lead to a transformed life! It sounds more like an apprenticeship (even simply put) friendship. Notice, what he says after that invitation, \u201cand I\u2019ll make you fishers of men.\u201d  There\u2019s no emphasis on teaching, but rather training. Most of Jesus\u2019 teaching was cryptic at best and was intentionally delivered in parables that contained deeper esoteric meaning. Note, He says, \u2018come follow me and I will \u2018make you\u2019\u2026\u201d He doesn\u2019t say, \u201ccome follow me and I\u2019ll teach you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, here\u2019s the tension: when I think about what churches (in my experience) have called discipleship and what Jesus called and lived as discipleship, I am struck with two very different images. One picture is an invitation out of the world into a classroom where people are taught a new vocabulary and concepts about God and human behaviour. The other is a picture that happens in the world as we experience how God would live our lives if He were us. It\u2019s less about teaching and more about modeling. Follow me, I\u2019ll show you a different kind of fishing. (Again, the picture of modern \u201cdiscipleship\u201d often shows Christians who know far more about the Bible and theology than they put into practice.) The other picture again, a group of Jesus\u2019 early followers being sent out two by two and told to bless people and stay with those people of peace that receive their blessing (Luke 10). Remember Jesus\u2019 earthly ministry was only about 3 years. These early followers didn\u2019t have time to go off and get trained. Jesus counted on an approach to training that would quickly put their hands on the wheel (or the plow). His invitation to \u201cmake them fishers of men\u201d was the focus. He enlisted his disciples in gathering the food that he would multiply for thousands. He sent them out as sheep among wolves to declare the good news of God\u2019s kingdom. He invited them to fish as they followed and he put the nets in their hands. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, I need to pause for a moment and make a little disclosure. I\u2019ve gone to Bible College and Seminary. I\u2019ve been \u201cdiscipled\u201d in numerous schools of discipleship. I\u2019ve read dozens of books devoted to the concept of discipleship. I was both discipled and have been the discipler of others. All of this discipling was in the context of North American Evangelical Christianity.  So, my self-disclosure is that, while I see the discrepancies in these pictures of discipleship, I have been an invested part of the modern picture that looks strangely unlike the Jesus picture. In fact, after having \u201csuccessfully\u201d planted a church in the early 2000\u2019s, it hit me that maybe there was something about how we were making disciples that was actually fostering consumerism more than it was discipleship. Much of our ministry approach could be summed up in \u201ccome to us and we will give you the spiritual goods and services you need.\u201d Mature and maturing Jesus followers were portrayed as those that would give back by supporting the ministry with finances and time. The discipleship process was so intermingled with consumerism that to separate the two seemed more difficult than splitting the double helix strands of human DNA.  During that season, there were two little books that kept finding their way onto my desk. The Master Plan of Evangelism by Robert Coleman and Jesus With Dirty Feet by Don Everts. Both of these books and a new little friend of mine called As You Go \u2026Make Disciples by Colin Noyes emphasise a very simple key that I am beginning to think may be the silver bullet to discipleship. Noyes calls this concept imprinting.  Whatever approach we choose to employ, discipleship is at its core a connecting with Jesus. There are undeniably a lot of spiritual dynamics and implications to this. Pause for a moment and think about what was most impactful in how you were discipled. My guess is that it was not a program or some study, you, like me, think of a person. A person who was willing to invest time as you grew closer to Jesus as Lord.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Micah Dodson<\/strong> lives in the United States and is a church planting strategist who has served in church planting for over 20 years, largely in post-Christian contexts. He and his wife Kristen have over a decade of experience running Church Planting Assessment Centres. Micah\u2019s strengths are in coaching, training, and assessing church planting leaders.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following article is a good read and is written by Micah Dodson who lives in the United States. Discipleship. What is it? Why is there so much talk about it these days? Recently I\u2019ve been reading specifically on this topic. Discipleship has never been my favourite subject. I know, that seems weird because it\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":478,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nCome follow me - Discipling As You Go<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/disciplingasyougo.com\/?p=476\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Come follow me - Discipling As You Go\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The following article is a good read and is written by Micah Dodson who lives in the United States. Discipleship. 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