Steve Murrell's Article in Ministry Today

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Whats happened to

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get back on track

The GreatThe GreatCommission

101CAMPUS MINISTRY


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36 MinistryToday September // October 200936 MinistryToday September // October 2009 By Steve Murrell

The GreatCommission

DISCIPLESHIP IN AMERICA


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September // October 2009 MinistryToday 37

It was a small gathering with a big name. The World Apostolic Summit. February 1999.

Singapore. Thirty apostles from around the world spent three days answering the

question: What do you feel God is saying to His church?

As usual, I was the youngest in the room and the only one wearing jeans. I was

simultaneously inspired and intimidated as I listened to these spiritual giants talk

about what God was doing in their nations. I felt like a lion in a den of Daniels.

When it was finally my turn to suggest what I feltthe Lord was saying to His church in 1999, I said thatHe was probably saying the same thing He said in1899, in 1599, in 999 and in 99: Go and make dis-ciples. I wasn't try ing to be smar t. But sadly, I was theonly one in the room who mentioned anything aboutmaking disciples.

Why do church leaders spend time doing everyt hingbut making disciples? Why do we try every church-growth gimmick known to mankind, yet ignore the

one strategy Jesus endorsed? Shouldnt His last mes-sage be our fir st option?

Discipleship isnt supposed to be complicated. Dif-ficult sometimes, complicated never. Two thousand

years ago, discipleship was so simple that a carpenterexplained it to uneducated fishermen in one sentence:Follow me and I will send you out to fish for people(Matt. 4:19, TNI V). Those simple fishermen followed,fished and changed their world.

If modern discipleship is confusing or complicated, itis because we have strayed from biblical principles andthe simple biblical process that Jesus lived and taught

His disciples. Sadly, the fruit of this departure is glar-ingly evident today in the United States (see WhatsGoing Wrong).

For Jesus, discipleship was and still is top priority. Yes, He fed the hungry and healed the sick. But Healways gave the 12 disciples His prime time. His final

word to them before He ascended into heaven was acommission not just to be disciples, but also to makedisciples. Like the original followers of Jesus, we aresupposed to be disciples and we are supposed to makedisciples. In others words, we are supposed to follow

Jesus and we are supposed to help others follow Him.

Shhh ... Dont Say the D-WordEver wonder why its so rare in the modern church to

hear leaders talk about discipleship? Or why its evenmore rare to see a leader prioritize discipleship? Weve

gathered huge crowds, built massive buildings, pub-lished books, recorded CDs, preached on TV and radio,and exerted political power. Weve had heali ng revivals,laughing revivals, crying revivals, repenting revivals,manifestation revivals and offering revivals. Weve builtfaith churches, chari smatic churches, nondenomina-tional churches, megachurches, cell churches, housechurches, organic churches and emerging churches.

Yea, weve done it all during my 29 years in ministry,but have we made disciples?

Unfortunately, not very often. The problem is that although most Christians agree

Whats happened to real discipleship in America

... and how we can get back on track


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that discipleship is important, even

essential for Christian maturity, few

understand biblical principles and

even fewer apply a biblical process

when it comes to discipleship. We

seem to prefer random acts of minis-

try a nd call it being led by the Spirit.

Copying methods and models can

often seem easier than understandingand applying biblical principles and

biblical process. In the never-ending

search for a perfect model, countless

desperate-for-growth leaders copiedDavid Yonggi Chos Korean cell model

in the 80s, Ralph Neighbor and Law-

rence Kongs Singaporean model in

the 90s, only to t urn to R ick Warrens

Purpose-Driven model or Bill John-

sons miracle model ... or whatever the

latest greatest get-big-quick method

thats come down the pike.Its time to stop copying methods

and models, and instead start under-

standing biblical principles and bibli-

cal process.

Methods and models are unique to

a particular time and location. Prin-

ciples and process can be applied in

every ministry context, at any time

and in every nation. They are univer-

sal. The trick is to understand the

principles and the process. Rather

than copying something that workedat Saddleback or in Korea, why not

discover the same principles that War-

ren and Cho discovered and do the

hard work figuring out how to applythem in your community?

Simple Steps for Anytime, AnywhereNo matter what you call it, heres a

basic step-by-step disc ipleship process

that was created by applying biblical

discipleship principles. This process

is universal and timeless.Let me reiterate one thing, however:

Discipleship isnt complicated, but it

can at times be difficult. And the dif-

ficulty lies in applying the following

steps to your specific contextwhich

is ultimately the key to the process

success.

Simply put, heres how anyone

young or old, male or female, pastor

or entrepreneurcan make authentic

disciples.

?Despite pockets of progress, many wonderful local stories and sev-

eral dependable models, the American church as a whole is still failing

in the very thing Jesus emphasized most in His final words on earth:

making disciples. Dont believe it? Heres a snapshot of the fruits of

our discipleship efforts: Seven out of 10 born-again Christians dont believe in moral abso-

lutes, while only 10 percent base their moral decision-making on the

principles taught in the Bible. 59 percent of Christians believe that Satan isn't an actual being but

simply a symbol of evil, while 58 percent say the Holy Spirit is merely

a symbol of God's power or presence. Another 39 percent think Jesus

sinned while on earth. 61 percent of 20-somethings who had been active in a church

youth group are now spiritually disengaged, while only one-fifth

remained as spiritually active as during their high school years. Among those raised as Protestants who become unaffiliated with

any denomination or religion, more than half say it's because they

"stopped believing its teachings," while 71 percent "just gradually

drifted away from the religion." In addition, almost 40 percent of those

who no longer attend church remain unaffiliated because of their spiri-

tual needs not being met. Six out of 10 Christians have shared their faith with a nonbe-

liever in the last year. However, a full two-fifths say they dont have aresponsibility to share their faith with others.

81 percent of the overall Christian population believes spiritual

maturity correlates to "trying hard to follow the rules described in the

Bible." And among born-again Christians, only 30 percent mention

having a relationship with Jesus as one of the characteristics of spiri-

tual maturity. Nearly 90 percent of pastors say a lack of spiritual maturity is one

of the nation's biggest problems, yet a minority of them believes this

isn't the case in their own church.

(Sources: The Barna Group, Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life)

Studies prove were failing in our discipleship effor ts

38 MinistryToday September // October 2009


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September // October 2009 MinistryToday 39

1. Engage your community and culture. When Jesus told His original 12

to go and make disciples, they didnot interpret His command to mean,Find people who are already follow-ing Me and help them become bet-ter followers. They interpreted Hisgreat commission to mean that they

should go and find people who werenot yet followers and help them knowand follow Jesus. Evangelism anddiscipleship were not two separatedepartments in their church. Rather,evangelism was the beginning of thediscipleship process.

Today too many people see disciple-ship as a program to help church mem-bers become better church members.

As long as the evangelism departmentdoes the outreach and the discipleship

department does the discipleship,both will be ineffective.

The starting line of the disciple-making process must be evangelismthat engages both our community andculture. Far too many sermons and

ministry methods seem to target acommunity and culture that no lon-ger exists, except in our memories.

The more we do away with outdatedmethods in order to engage those liv-ing around us in a shared culture, themore effective we will be in evange-lism and discipleship.

2. Establish spiritual foundations.While changing planes in Singapore

a few years ago, I noticed a billboardthat underscored the importance offoundations. On this sign was a hugepicture of the Leaning Tower of Pisa

with the tagline: Good faade, badfoundations.

Only three stories into its construc-tion in 1173, the Italian bell towerbegan to tilt and continued tilting

until it had to be closed in 1990 forfear that it would topple. After almost12 years of work and a whopping $25million in renovations, the tower waspermanently anchored with a 13.5-foot lean.

Like that infamous tower in Pisa,many Christians have a good faadebut are dangerously unstable becauseof poor foundations. Even the slight-est temptation sends them crashing tothe ground. On the other hand, Jesuspromised His disciples that storms,

winds and floods would beat against

their lives, but they could survive ifthey built their foundation on therock (Matt 7:24-25).

If we want our disciples to survivethe storms of life, we must help themestablish spiritual foundations.Thisessential groundwork includes repen-tance, faith, water baptism and thebaptism in the Holy Spirit (see Acts2:38-41). Once these basics are estab-lished, we need to begin to developtheological foundations such as eter-

nal judgment and resurrection fromthe dead (see Heb. 6).

3. Equip all believers to minister.Several years ago the church I lead

was in the painful process of equipping


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40 MinistryToday September // October 2009

a new worship leader named Carlos.He was a talented singer and musician,but his first few times in the spotlight

were rough. After a staff meeting (that didnt

include Carlos), the head of the wor-ship department suggested that heswitch Sundays with Carlos the fol-

lowing week since we had a big-shotforeign guest preacher coming. WhenI asked why, he reminded me that thelast time Carlos led worship it was for-gettable. I said that I was well aware

we were hosting the big-shot Ameri-can and that Carlos wasnt our best,but I did not see any reason to bumpCarlos from the schedule. The discus-sion ended with me reminding ourentire staff that we werent trying to

impress our guest speakerin fact, hehad better impress us or he wouldntbe invited back.

For me, its more important to equipa worship leader than to have a per-fect worship service. I knew that if we

rescheduled Carlos, it would shatterhis confidence and set the equippingprocess back a few months.

When Sunday came around, Carlosled and our guest preached. Sure, the

worship was less than average, butCarlos went on to become a great wor-ship leader and church planter.

We hear the phrase all the time:Every member a minister. Yet often,because of our performance-drivencultu re, we have little tolerance for the

messiness of the equipping process. We do church as if only professionalministers should do ministry. The bib-lical job description for professionalministersapostles, prophets, evange-lists, pastors and teachersis to equipthe non-pros for ministry, then getout of their way (see Eph. 4:11-12).

Let me ask you a probing question:Do you spend more time ministeringto people or preparing people to min-ister? Do you spend more time prepar-ing sermons to preach or preparingpeople to minister? Pastors are callednot just to minister, but also to equipGods people to minister. When weforget that, we forget one of the pri-mary reasons God cal led us to serve inthe first place.

4. Empower all disciples to make disciples. Jesus expected all of His origi-

nal disciples to make disciples. Heempowered them, knowing they

would make mistakes. The call tomake disciples (see Matt. 28) was

given to people who were far from per-fect. They had questioned, disobeyed,doubted and even denied Jesus.

Too often we act like only full-timepastors or people who have beenbelievers forever can make disciples.But we must not forget it is progress,not perfection, that qualifies one todisciple others. Because Jesus expectsall His disciples to make disciples, wemust not only equip them, we mustalso empower them.

Equipping without empoweringproduces disciples with head knowl-edge. Empowering without first equip-ping produces disciples who nevermature.

The church I lead was established25 years ago in Manilas inner cityafter a 30-day summer mission trip

with 65 American university students. As the time approached for the sum-mer mission team to return to theUnited States, it was my job to equipthe new Filipino altar counselors

who would replace the Americans.The only problem was that they wereall new believers. To build their confi-dence, I explained that they had beensaved three whole weeks and those

who would respond to the gospeltonight were newbies, so they were

really spiritual giants comparatively. We had told all the new believers

to start reading their Bibles in Mark.Some had finished Mark, Luke and

John. Others were already in Romans. After surveying the Bible-readingprogress of my 3-week-old disciples,I simply told them to stay one chap-ter ahead and they would be able todisciple those who would get savedtonightbut if the new believers got to

Acts before they did, then they would

become their disciples. Years later when people ask me

why our church has so many anointedministers and mature leaders, I tryto explain that it is the fruit of anempowering church culture.

So what is God saying to His peoplein America in 2009? I believe Hes say-ing the same thing He said to me inthe Philippines in 1999 and 1989, andthe same thing He said to His follow-ers in Jerusalem 2,000 years ago:

Go and make disciples of al lnations, baptizing them in the nameof the Father and of the Son and ofthe Holy Spirit, and teaching them toobey everything I have commanded

you (Matt. 28:19-20, NIV).

ST E V E M U R R E L L is the senior pastor of

Victory in Manila, Philippines, a director of

the Real Life Foundation, and the co-founder

of Every Nation, a worldwide family of

churches and ministries.

Steve Murrell's Article in Ministry Today

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