What do Pastors Ponder?

In our Churches there is a horrible misnomer - We constantly challenge "Christians" to become disciples. When Biblically there is no such thing as a Christian who is NOT a Disciple. The problem is we call everyone who makes a decision at an altar, a christian. I am not minimizing this important step, but a decision for Christ is not the end of evangelism, it is merely the first step in the process of being evangelized. What is evangelism? It is the process of converting a life from a sinner by lifestyle into a disciple by lifestyle.

Truth be told many of our churches are filled with people that are in the process of becoming converted, most of our churches are not necessarily filled with converts. Which means most of the people that attend our services are still in the process of being evangelized. This is the time when they get to count the cost.  The crowds followed Jesus and heard him preach, they heard every sermon. Jesus never made an altar call after his sermons, why?, because he knew His sermons were an opportunity for the people to count the cost. With every sermon and with every testimony, our members in essence are being evangelized, they are counting the cost whether to become a disciple or not.

You see, the problem is most of the people in our churches believe in their mind they are already Christians, they act like the world but they believe their christians, they are still living the way they have always lived, but they believe they're Christians, why? Because WE told them they were.  Yet they had never really counted the cost. Why has the American church produced so many "backsliders"? Because we called Christians people who were never christians to begin with, they were merely in the process of being evangelized yet decided the cost was too high. "Narrow is the gate that leads to salvation and few are they that find it." Can a person be truly converted from one day to the next? Certainly, but most "Christians" we know are still being evangelized. We could say, some of the biggest harvest fields are within our own congregations.

IS DISCIPLESHIP A PROGRAM?

When we consider the challenge of discipleship and the mandate to make disciples of the nations, it is hard to conceive of packaging all of this into a program. In fact, isn’t discipleship another way of describing the ongoing life of a follower of Jesus? Therefore the making of those disciples should be almost synonymous with life in the community of believers. 

Of course there can and should be classes or programs that are designed to focus more intensely on aspects of the Christian’s life with Christ, and these may incorporate the valuable tool of mentoring typically associated with discipling ministries.  My question is whether we should define that as “discipleship,” as though the rest of the worship and work of the church is something else. 

For example, isn’t the opportunity to thoughtfully and prayerfully plan a worship service with a worship team a remarkable opportunity for a disciple to grow in understanding of who God is? Or shouldn’t we think of the effort involved in being part of an Adopt-a-Block ministry or a Food Pantry or a short-term missions team as great occasions for making disciples. In fact, I have heard of several instances when those kinds of opportunities were the time of conversion of those participating.

There is a vitally important discussion going on of what it means for our churches to be missional in outlook (as opposed to including outreach and missions as one part of our ministry) and the matter of incorporating discipleship in all we do it is a key component of that discussion. To be missional in outlook doesn’t necessarily mean everything we do is specifically designed to reach out, but it does mean we are “doing church” with a constant awareness of our mission (actually Jesus’ mission) to be advancing the cause of his Kingdom.