Disciple-Making Activity in the Local Church

Introduction

The Great Commission sent out the apostles to make disciples, but not to build organizations¹. This is a fact that the modern church needs to keep in mind in the course of its activities. Making disciples is an activity that has changed greatly since the time of the Great Commission. The church appears to have forgotten that the goal of the Great Commission was to bring disciples together with the view of forming the body of Christ and then having them grow in spirit as a collective unit. Therefore, each member of the modern church has a role to play when it comes to making disciples.

On the other hand, the Christian community needs to readdress the disciple-making process because it is currently overshadowed by less-important aspects in the context of the modern church. The Christian community is the local church and all its constituents including pastors, saints, and the spiritual gifts that are contained therein. Therefore, this paper addresses how the local church should go about the activity of disciple-making by utilizing the input of pastors, saints, and spiritual gifts.

Efforts of the Local Church

In the context of the universal church, a local church is representative of the body of Christ, with Jesus as the leading light. Given that the body is the symbol of the church, it is also prudent to assume that it has several parts that make up the whole body. The authors of DiscipleShift propose that the local church should adjust its disciple-making strategies to include connecting, sharing, disciplining, and ministering². Therefore, it is assumed that the church engages with different groups of people on various levels. For example, when the church engages in an outreach program that consists of non-believers, it should do so on the sharing level, but not in any of the other levels. People who need salvation do not require any form of disciplining or ministering, they only need to get an invitation to the gospel of Christ. It is only after they accept the invitation that the potential disciples get to learn about obedience and spiritual growth.

Forming useful connections is another method that the local church can use in the course of making disciples. Scholars point out that “churches can reach out corporately through small groups, community groups, church services, and various ministries”³. These activities are all in fulfillment of The Great Commission as the local church seeks to update its methods of making contact with potential disciples. The local church is also tasked with teaching new disciples how to express their love to others. This lesson can be offered to new disciples through Sunday school teachings or in early mentorship programs. Consequently, the new disciples can have an idea of the rules and guidelines that they are expected to obey in their quest for high-level Christianity.

Another important role that the local church can play in disciple-making is by training individuals to minister. Training to minister is a detailed process that involves several steps, the first one being demonstrative teaching. Demonstrative teaching can be best explained using the methods that Jesus used when preaching including the use of parables and delegation⁴. Delegation involves encouraging individuals to engage in ministering activities and supplying them with the necessities of this process. It is the duty of disciple-makers to “give people time and a place when and where they can participate in doing something, or they will soon get bored and walk away”⁵. Delegations were part of various ministries as evident in the Bible including Jesus and Paul. Prior to any of these delegations, the disciple-makers took their time to coach their subjects, thereby equipping them with the necessary knowhow.

Role of Pastor in Disciple Making

The role of the pastor in disciple-making coincides with his position within the local church. Religious scholars reckon that pastors are expected to equip and train the saints so that the equipped believers can fully engage in the ministry⁶. Nevertheless, pastors do not add anything new to the disciple-makers because their role is to help them (believers) discover themselves. Every believer has a position to assume in the church as the body of Christ. However, it is upon the church ministers to ensure that all individuals take up the right roles in regard to the anatomy of the congregation. The ministering and equipping of believers is an overall way to strengthen the church as a whole.

In the epistles, Paul notes that all parts of the body of Christ are supplied by Christ himself who is the head. Therefore, all ministers including prophets, apostles, pastors, teachers, and evangelists are constituents of the church as the body of Christ. The health of the church depends on how well all its constituents are performing including the pastors. The job of a pastor is to act as the distributor of the gospel by ensuring there is an ample supply of disciple-makers in the church. Therefore, a pastor will train, teach, connect, prepare, and share the gospel with his/her main goal being the reproduction of disciples⁷.

The pastor can accomplish this goal in a number of ways including delegating some of his functions to the deacons and elders among other leaders. The pastor’s job as a disciple-making agent is to focus on individual members of the church. Consequently, the pastor seeks to help each individual to grow and take up a role in the local church. For example, a pastor will ensure that members of his congregation “are growing in their faith and they understand what their spiritual gifts are”⁸. Eventually, the role of a pastor as a disciple-maker is to influence individuals to find the plans that God has for their lives and what they can achieve through fellowship with Christ. Paul reiterates this point when he notes that a church leader plants the seed, another servant waters it, but it is God who makes it grow⁹.

The Role of Saints

Although the pastor acts as the coordinator in the church, the activities that he coordinates have to be carried out by other individuals. The saints are expected to carry out most of the minor disciple-making activities such as delivering teachings. In addition, saints have a responsibility to uplift each other and eventually build up the church. Being a saint is a matter of having a real connection with Christ. Therefore, for saints to be able to engage in disciple-making, they have to relate to their position within the body of Christ¹⁰.

The instructions to all saints are for them to go out there and become fishers of men. It is also important to note that as saints “our interactions with other people are one of the means God uses to teach us the truth and within our positions in the body of Christ, it is where we learn from others what a mature Christian life looks like”¹¹. In the book of Hebrews, saints are advised to think about how they may inspire one another towards love and good deeds, without neglecting the purpose of fellowship¹². This scripture is a great guide for saints when it comes to fellowship. For example, the friendships that flourish among members of the church are a good tool for fostering disciple-making activities.

Spiritual Gifts and Disciple Making

Spiritual gifts are the helpers that Christ sends back to His church to assist saints and pastors in their daily activities. Nevertheless, the gifts of the Holy Spirit have become distant to the context of the modern church. This shortcoming has left the disciple-making process deficient of some of the zeal that was there among Christians of the early church. On the other hand, some churches have had to overcompensate for their lack of spiritual gifts by mimicking them and their effects. For instance, cases of con pastors who lure followers through fake miracles have become common throughout the world. The actual gifts of the Holy Spirit are bestowed upon believers for the sole purpose of glorifying the name of God¹³.

Conclusion

The art of making disciples is not an individualistic activity but it is a concerted effort by the entire body of Christ, which consists of the local church, saints, and pastors. In addition, the entire process is aided by the spiritual gifts that are bestowed upon the members of the congregation. In the course of making disciples, the church acts as the accommodator, the pastors are the influencers, and the saints serve as the overall workers. When all these parts are aided by the spirit, it is possible for Christians to fulfill The Great Commission.

Bibliography

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works Vol 4. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2003.

Earley, Dave, and Rod Dempsey. Disciple Making Is: How to Live the Great Commission with Passion and Confidence. Nashville: TN: B&H Publishing Group, 2013.

Falwell, Jerry. Building Dynamic Faith. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2007.

Putman, Jim, Bobby William Harrington, and Robert Coleman. DiscipleShift: Five Steps That Help Your Church to Make Disciples Who Make Disciples. London: Zondervan, 2013.

The Holy Bible, New International Version. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1984.

Whitney, Donald S. Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2014.

Footnotes

1. Matthew 28:18-20 (NIV).
2. Jim Putman, Bobby William Harrington, and Robert Coleman, DiscipleShift: Five Steps That Help Your Church to Make Disciples Who Make Disciples (London: Zondervan, 2013), 153.
3. Ibid., 155.
4. Matthew 13:1-44 (NIV).
5. Jerry Falwell, Building Dynamic Faith (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2007), 48.
6. Dave Earley and Rod Dempsey, Disciple Making Is–: How to Live the Great Commission with Passion and Confidence (Nashville: TN: B&H Publishing Group, 2013), 754.
7. Ibid., 3537.
8. Donald S Whitney, Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2014), 8.
9. 1 Corinthians 3:6 (NIV).
10. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works Vol 4 (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2003), 45.
11. Jim Putman, Bobby William Harrington, and Robert Coleman, DiscipleShift: Five Steps That Help Your Church to Make Disciples Who Make Disciples (London: Zondervan, 2013), 140.
12. Hebrews 10:24-25 (NIV).
13. 1 Peter 4:10-1 (NIV).