Patrick Morley: "Discipleship is the Portal Priority"

A Call to Discipling Reformation

What does your church look like to the man who's fairly new to your congregation? From week to week, he may hear sermons that touch on topics from service to stewardship to social justice. On the surface, church appears to be an undifferentiated blob of disjointed activities. He doesn't see how it all fits together. The reason? The leadership may also have forgotten how it all fits together. There doesn't seem to be a dominating priority of how to run a church.

One week the man hears an incredible sermon on worship. He concludes worship is the most important thing. The next week he returns and hears a sermon on stewardship. That must be the priority. The next week he's attending a home group and hears someone from a crisis pregnancy center speak on rescuing unwed mothers and their little babies; he concludes the priority is social justice. Each time, he comes away from services a little more confused. In Sunday school class, he listens to a missionary speak and he wonders, is it missions? He attends an evangelism class and concludes, wow, if you really love Jesus you come to evangelism class.

Just what is most important? Worship? Service? Tithing? Evangelism?

The Portal Priority

Jesus did not say, "Go and make worshippers of men." Neither did he say to make workers or tithers. He said, "Go and make disciples of men."

Jesus is very interested in workers, worship and tithing, but Jesus also knew you don't get workers by trying to make workers. You don't get worshippers by trying to make worshippers. You don't get tithers by trying to make tithers. You get workers, worshippers and tithers by making disciples. Discipleship must be at the center of your church priorities. If your leadership fails to focus on discipleship, you begin to burn men out.

"This is to my father's glory that you bear much fruit . . . showing yourself to be my disciples . . ." How can a man worship a God he does not know? How can he evangelize unless he understands the Gospel personally and is trained how to share it? How can he know that his vocation is holy to the Lord unless he's been taught to understand that part of the Great Commission is meeting the needs of the poor (Galatians 2:10) . . . stewardship if he doesn't know that everything he has belongs to Christ? Or loving one another, or service or missions? Discipleship is the portal priority.

Methods for Equipping Men for Discipleship

A disciple is called to walk with Jesus, is equipped to live like Jesus and sent to work for Jesus. How will disciples understand how to serve if they aren't trained? Where will they find the verve to share the gospel if they only have enough of Jesus to meet their own needs? Unless a man is ministering out of the overflow of his faith, he won't be equipped to share it with others. He'll just be focusing on how to survive.

We need to preach to make disciples who know how to worship. We need to teach to make disciples who know how to be good stewards, husbands and fathers. We have to put Christian literature in the hands of men to teach them these things.

Some of the methods for creating disciples include:

•  Bible studies

•  Men's small groups

•  Mentoring

•  Seminars

•  Leadership training

All these methods teach men to do as unto the Lord. I've seen over and over again that a man will get hold of a book and the book will get hold of the man. Make discipleship your portal priority!