We Need a Discipleship Revolution!

I have reflected on some of the disturbing statistics from various sources regarding the decline of churches, not only of Southern Baptists, but of other evangelical groups as well. I agree with Avery Willis who said, “Discipleship has fallen on hard times.” (http://www.averywillis.org/disciples_partone.aspx) In his web article he said that the church has tamed discipleship from what Jesus intended. The remedy is a new revolution in discipleship, which is why I created Simple Discipleship (SD). Simple Discipleshipis more than a weblog posting in which I vent and express my overflowing passion for making disciples. Simple Discipleship is a new paradigm for church organizational development that provides pastors a simple and easily communicated process for focusing the church on making disciples.

As I work with churches I ask four questions:

1. What is your church’s process for making disciples? (Most don’t have a process.
2. How do you measure the effectiveness of your church’s disciple-making process?
3. How do you know it is working?
4. Do all church members know what is expected of them and would they give consistent answers to that question?

I recognize that few pastors have an understanding of systems design or church organizational development (COD). Some of my other articles speak to COD. As pastors we just want to preach! I once asked a pastor friend what process his church used to make disciples, and he began to tell me about his preaching plan. Yeah. I recently interviewed for a discipleship pastor position in a mega-church. I asked the leaders the same questions. They became somewhat defensive and started talking about how great their preacher is. Yeah. They did not offer me the job, and I know I would not have fit because I am wanting to launch a new revolution in discipleship. Most churches want to maintain the status quo as I mentioned in my previous article: Innovation: Where Has the Church Gone? Pastor, if you think your preaching is the sole ingredient in making disciples, I would say you need to check your pride level. Preaching is one element in the process of making disciples. Here is a question for you. Perhaps a measure of the effectiveness of your church’s discipleship is how many members and small groups were actively helping in recent disasters in your community? That is an active definition of the word “missional.”

I have always been passionate about both sides of discipleship–baptizing and teaching. Many churches are good at one side, baptizing. However, the reason the baptism numbers are declining across the board is because of the lack of attention to the other side of discipleship–teaching. Discipled Christians make better evangelists! Discipleship is the missing link to achieve more baptisms and reverse the decline in church growth. Discipleship activates and empowers the whole Christian army instead of just the officers.

In 2006 I read Simple Church and went to work to take Thom Rainer’s and Eric Geiger’s work to the next level. Simple Discipleshipis the result. It is simple. It uses the same design for evangelism, discipleship, ministry development, and leadership training–one simple design to move the church to become missional. To me missional means involving all church members in living life around the cross daily and impacting the lives of people in their two or more communities–where they live, work, go to school, and where the church is located.

Pastor, the best of preachers is not discipling people very well with just his preaching. Sorry, that’s reality. Read Acts–it’s in there! Frankly, I’m frustrated. It is hard to launch a revolution, and I detect some frustration as I read Avery Willis’s article. This is why I am passionately calling on churches to launch Simple Discipleship and for larger churches to develop Christian Life Coaching ministries. As a teaser allow me to share teh long definition of Simple Discipleship:

  

“Simple Discipleship is a comprehensive (values-based) strategic process designed to move people, classes, and the church toward greater spiritual and numerical growth (movement). It is a simple process that provides clear and visible (expectations) for individuals (clarity), small groups, and the congregation (scalability). The process empowers ministry and mission projects at all levels (missional). A unique survey is used allowing each level to monitor progress (measurability). Use of the process will infuse the church culture with biblical expectations moving people to greater participation (chosen accountability). The process encourages easy-to-understand steps for spiritual growth creating momentum (synergy) as ministries are arranged within the process (alignment). Simple Discipleship assists the leadership with the ability to maintain attention on making disciples (focus). The process may be used for evangelism, ministry, and discipleship (multi-use). Designed around four primary values, WORSHIP, WORD, MINISTRY, and MISSIONS, use of the process insures that each value receives proper attention (balance).

Help me, Avery Willis, and many others launch a discipleship revolution, or better, restart the revolution our Lord began 2000 years ago. Don’t let your church tame discipleship to a one hour program one or two evenings a week. Being a disciple of Jesus Christ is living life around the cross 24/7-366! Also, I ask for your prayers as I seek God’s direction for ministry where I can make disciple-making disciples.

SD Blessings!

Dr. Tom Cocklereece

6 Comments

Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI