Unity and Making Disciples 3

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I just got off the phone with a missionary to remote China.  The struggle for the missionaries has not been the language, the food, or the culture; but rather the relational tension between the missionaries on their team.  They feel a loss of creditability in sharing the gospel because of their inability to get along with one another.  Jesus words, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” taunt them.  One wonders why unity even among committed believers is difficult.

The community of believers in which a disciple finds himself is by design.  In his sovereignty, the Holy Spirit knows with whom each disciple needs to interrelate.  As Inagrace Tieterich correctly states:  “The role of the Holy Spirit is to form loving community: to create a people for God’s name, who bear God’s likeness in their character, as that is seen in their behavior” [1]. This community designed by the Holy Spirit will not only expose each person for who he is, but it will also give each individual the opportunity to learn how to lovingly relate to other believers in order that their relationship with one another can be a witness of the gospel to the world.  My friend Bill Greene says that he knows where the Lord is at work in his life based on who the Lord places into his immediate world for him to love; those from whom he cannot escape.

Robert Bellah sees living in community as an essential component for our own growth and for the benefit of others.  He writes:  “We find ourselves not independently of other people and institutions but through them.  We never get to the bottom of ourselves on our own.  We discover who we are face to face and side by side with others in work, love, and learning.  All of our activity goes on in relationships, groups associations, and communities ordered by institutional structures and interpreted by cultural patterns of meaning” [2]. It was no accident that Jesus made disciples in a group.

A couple closing thoughts:

  1. Conflict in a community of believers is not a disruption to the purpose of God but rather they are an opportunity to teach your disciples how to love each other, how to build unity and therefore expanding the kingdom of God.
  2. Your disciple’s interaction with the others in a community will help you know your disciple.  It is more difficult to get to know a person apart from community.
  3. Each individual, no matter how difficult, is an essential element in the Spirit’s building unity in the group.  (Be careful not to think, “This could be a good community if only Jessica were not on the team.” In reality, Jessica may be the key to building the unity on the team that the Lord intends.)

[1] Inagrace T. Tieterich, Missional Community, Cultivating Communities of the Holy Spirit, Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North American (Grand Rapids:  Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1998), 148.

[2] Robert Bellah, et al., Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life (Berkeley:  University of California Press, 1983), p. 84.

Unity and Making Disciples 2

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The best defense against hypocrisy is to make disciples in a small community, as Jesus demonstrated. How your disciples relate to one another in a group is an indicator of how each relates to God as an individual. The reason I disciple in community is because the only real way to know a person is based on how he interacts with others. A person can say that they love God with all their heart and that they worship him with a total abandon, but if he does not relate well with others, he is a liar (1 John 4:20).

The test to see if a person is a child of God and if he knows God is that he lovingly relates with others. “Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love” (1 John 4:7-8). My relationship with God cannot be separated from my relationship with people; it is a direct indicator of my relationship with God.

Disciple making is not just an equipping course on how to do ministry, at its core disciple making is learning how to relate lovingly with God and with others. For this reason conflict and disunity among a group of disciples should not be looked upon despairingly by the discipler; but rather it is an opportunity to instruct his disciples on how to love one another.

(This is also why the family is an optimal place to make disciples. Within the home the parents have the opportunity to observe how their children relate with one another and then are able to teach the children how to love one another from a young age.)

Here’s what I do:

  1. I talk privately with each disciple about their relationship with each member of our group. We then discuss how he can affectively love each individual of the group. (We have found “The Five Love Languages” has been helpful in teaching our disciples on how to love one another.)
  2. I make sure that the group members spend one-on-one time with one another.
  3. Generally, when there is a conflict I do not address the entire group, but rather only those individuals involved.

Unity and Making Disciples 1

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It was C. Norman Kraus who said, “The life of the church is its witness. The witness of the church is its life. The question of authentic witness is the question of authentic community” [1]. Our unity and love for one another as followers of Jesus is a proof to the world that the heavenly Father sent Jesus to earth. Jesus prayed for his future disciples that “they would be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me” (John 17:23). Our unity is a proclamation of the gospel.

When the world sees our unity, it resonates with their innermost being because man was created not to live a detached existence, but rather to belong. Our unity may even make the world uncomfortable as it exposes their disconnection with others and with God.

Unity is at the heart of making disciples because it is rooted in the nature of God. Jesus came to earth to introduce the kingdom of God through demonstrating the unity he had with his own father. He said, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?” (John 14:9-10). But he also worked for nearly three years to cultivate unity among his followers knowing that their relationships with one another would be a picture of the gospel to the world. He confronted anything that could cause disunity (e.g., arguing among themselves who was the greatest, Mark 9:33-34) and encouraged anything that would build unity. (“Love one another as I have loved you.” John 13:34-35)

Kevin (not his real name) was an atheist who had become friends with our group of disciples. Kevin later became a follower of Jesus and told us that the group’s love for each other was something that he had longed for his whole life. He had never had a place to belong. This love caused Kevin to re-investigate the very claims of Christianity that he had been earlier refuting.

Some closing thoughts:

  1. Be intentional in building unity among your disciples. Talk to your disciples about unity. I have worked on 4 church staffs and 2 para-church organizations and do not recall ever having a deliberate plan to cultivate unity among the believers.
  2. Believers love for one another and unity as disciples may be one of the best ways to reach atheists.
  3. Making disciples should be done in a community (as Jesus demonstrated both with the twelve disciples and the other disciples in his home town of Capernaum.) It is in the interpersonal relationships among the group that love is learned and demonstrated.

[1] C. Norman Kraus, The Authentic Witness: Credibility and Authority (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978), 156.

Making Disciples as a Team

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Christianity is struggling in Chicago. Evangelicalism has spent thousands of dollars on advertising, church planting, and evangelistic outreach with disappointing results. Although the gospel is powerful, I wonder if we are hindered by our method. Christianity continues to approach Chicago as it has always done with church planters and missionaries working as “Lone Rangers,” even though we have the example of Jesus building and ministering from a team. Training His men, Jesus used fishing as a picture for making disciples. We envision a lone person with a rod and reel, while in the first century, fishing was a group effort netting multiple fish. It was no accident that Jesus wanted fishermen on His team.

The Holy Spirit gives each person an ability that works in harmony with the other team members. In our own community Jeremy is the energy behind us serving one another. Ryan and Abbie remind us of the lost people around us while Dan keeps us authentic. Prayer is Maureen’s passion, Randall leads us to give, Leah keeps us in the word, and Rachel has a hug for everyone. It is living in community that we have learned how to work together and how to love a variety of personalities. Unity is a choice that requires humility and hard work to keep a sure grip on the net.

The basis for this team approach is found in the nature of God. God is made up of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They exist in harmony, and out of their relationship flows an infinite love to the world through the cross of Jesus. A discipling team is a picture of God to the world by their love for one another as John describes in 1 John 4:12: “No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.” The team embodies our message.

Our mission is no more difficult than the Roman world of Jesus. As He faced the challenge by forming a team, so we also should form teams believing that our unity is the point of engagement with our culture. Our unity is how Chicago will be convinced that the Father has sent Jesus into the world. “May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:23).

Fear and Making Disciples 2

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My fear obstructs the making of disciples. A discipler is to love his disciples, but if I am insecure it is difficult to love others. I have experienced the pain of rejection which has caused me to become fearful and leery of relationships, I even fear those who love me the most. The voices of insecurity and shame boom in my head something like this:

  • “I can’t even get my own act together, how can I help someone else?”
  • “I have disqualified myself from ministry.”
  • “If this person finds out what I am really like, they will not want to continue in this friendship.”
  • “I can’t afford to go through another relational disappointment, so I had better play it safe right now.”
  • “Why would they want to spend time with me?”

Christianity has tried to accommodate this fear by creating ministry systems and programs which require a minimal amount of relational investment. The problem with these approaches is that the kingdom of God was founded upon and still advances on sacrificial love. There is no place for fear in my life, because fear disrupts my relationship with others so that I can no longer love.

The obvious question is, “how do I remove fear from my heart?” First, I need to understand that wrong thinking is the cause of my fear. My view of God and my perception of how he views me are incorrect which has resulted in me having a fearful outlook on life.

So then, the antidote for my fear is a right understanding about the Lord’s love for me. Jesus takes the initiative to love me first, which in turn removes the fear from my heart, (because love drives out fear, 1 John 4:18) so that now I am able to love others as Jesus has demonstrated through his own death on the cross.

Fear and Making Disciples 1

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The fears that your disciple is being forced to face is an indicator of where the Lord is at work in his life. One cannot follow Jesus and fear. Jesus confronted the fear in the hearts of his own men by leading them directly into their fears. One day a lake storm came up while he was asleep in the boat; he was frantically awakened by his disciples who were afraid for their lives. He was amazed at their lack of faith, for all fear is the consequence of a void of faith (Matthew 8:24). Even today, as a man seeks to follow Jesus, the Holy Spirit will lead him into his deepest fears in order for him to face and root out those fears.

When your disciple faces his fear it can have an adverse affect on his attitude and behavior. People respond to fear differently, some lash out (possibly at you!), some withdraw, and others self-medicate. During these times of fear it is not only an opportunity for you to teach your disciple the power and love of God, it is also an important time for you to affirm your own love for him.

Here are a couple of suggestions as you walk your disciple through his fears:

  1. Pray for the faith of your disciple, that it will remain strong.
    • Luke 22:31-32 “Jesus said, ‘Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.'”
    • 1 Thess 3:10 “Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see you again and supply what is lacking in your faith.”
  2. Do not project you own fears on your disciple, nor minimize the object of their fear. We do not all fear the same things.
  3. Love and fear are incompatible. Clearly communicate both God’s love for your disciple, as well as your own.
    • 1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

Love and Making Disciples

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Early in my life Ann Morrow Lindberg (Mrs. Charles Lindberg) gave words to my own discipleship experience.

“To be deeply in love is, of course, a great liberating force and the most common experience that frees…The sheer fact of finding myself loved was unbelievable and changed my world, my feelings about life and myself. I was given confidence, strength, and almost a new character. The man I was to marry believed in me and what I could do, and consequently I found I could do more than I realized.” [1]

Evangelicalism is obsessed with teaching techniques, programs, and curriculum in disciple making. We place our hope in some new program with a creative curriculum believing it will release a flood of disciple making. There is only one way and there will always only be one way to make disciples and that is to love.

Jesus sums up disciple making in a word – love. Jesus and his relationship with the twelve during their early years are recorded in the books of Matthew, Mark and Luke. John’s gospel spends little time on these years but devotes six chapters on Jesus’ last hours with his men. Judas the betrayer is out of the room. Jesus gathers the eleven together and says, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13: 34). Later in the evening he adds: “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. So remain in my love” (John 15:9). The Father loves Jesus, Jesus loves the disciples, and in the same form of love the disciples were to love fellow disciples.

All are created in the image of God. God is love. Jesus is God. To be a follower of Jesus is to love. Proverb 19:22 says “What a man desires is unfailing love.” To understand my behavior I recognize my need to be love and to love. A person is only spiritually complete when he receives loves and gives love. Discipleship at its core is demonstrating to another how to love and be loved.

[1] Hour of Gold, Hour of Lead: Diaries and Letters of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1929-1932”, (Wilmington: Mariner Books, 1993), Introduction.

Singleness Insight #3

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There is a bias against singleness in the evangelical church.

How many senior pastors, church elders, church staff, evangelists, or missionaries do you know who are single? Although the American single adult population leans towards 50 percent, this is not reflected in the leadership of evangelical churches or organizations. I believe there may be several reasons for this, but after 30 years of being involved in ministry, I have found that many in evangelicalism hold marriage as an unspoken qualification for ministry. We feel more comfortable with a married individual working with our teens, leading our worship, and conducting a marriage ceremony, than we do a single. Many perceive singles as incomplete and some would even see singleness as a disqualification for many kingdom leadership roles. Few places in society use marital status to determine leadership capabilities as we do in evangelicalism.

Marriage is a good thing, but then also is singleness. I agree with people that the Lord has been good to them in providing a wonderful mate and beautiful children, but God is no less good to me in not providing a wife or a child, for he has given me a good gift called singleness (1 Cor 7:7). I doubt at the end of Paul’s life that he felt regret or remorse because he had not married. Paul encourages singles to remain single, if possible, so that they can serve the Lord with an undivided devotion (1 Cor 7:35). It would seem that singles would be a good hire for kingdom work because their focus will be on serving the Lord and they will not distracted by the many concerns that a family brings.

Singleness Insight #2

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Singles were on the cutting edge of the first century kingdom movement.

Key leaders of the kingdom of God in the first century were single, notably Paul and Barnabas (See 1 Corinthians 9:6). What is striking to me in reading the Biblical account is how little the marital status of a person plays into kingdom leadership and responsibility. Paul was quick to snatch up a single Timothy to add to his team based on the qualification that his fellow disciples spoke well of him. Sure, many leaders were married, but some significant leaders were not.

Here are a couple of possible applications:

  1. Integrate singles into all aspects of the church and ministry. Nowhere else in society do we separate singles from the married except in the church. (I believe there is no place for a singles’ ministry in the church. Imagine the apostle Paul trying to get his mind around a typical church’s singles’ ministry.)
  2. Consider hiring a pastor or staff member who is single. The best leader in or for your church maybe single. Marriage is not a qualification for kingdom leadership.
  3. As a married person your best friend maybe a single, and for singles your best friend maybe a married person.

Singleness Insight #1

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I am 51 years old, single, and have never been married. I recently spoke at a singles’ retreat which caused me to dust off some thoughts on singleness. The Bible is not silent on the topic as both Jesus and Paul directly address the issue of singleness.

Singleness is the eternal destiny of all the children of God.

In the kingdom of God, singleness is the eternal state of all of God’s children, for in eternity there will not be marriage. Jesus teaches, “At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven” (Matthew 22:30).

All begin their lives as single, and though marriage may be a part of their story, all will be single throughout eternity.