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Disciple Men to Disciple Their Families
from Pat Morley
Volume 204
October 30, 2006
A few Weekly Briefings ago I wrote that we have amended the All-Inclusive Men’s Ministry concept to mean that the size of your men’s ministry is however many men you have in your church 15 years of age and older.
We must also extend our “All-Inclusive” thinking to the discipleship of complete families if we want to see lasting change. It’s not all-inclusive if a man gets discipled but the rest of his family does not—that would only be semi-inclusive.
Let’s say a 15 year old teenager in a dysfunctioning family was having problems, went to a counselor and was genuinely helped, but then returned to an otherwise unchanged family system. What would happen? The potential for real change in the teenager would be greatly diminished.
So the battle must be fought at multiple levels: the man, the teenager, the parents, the home, and all other systems to which the teenager belongs. But the most effective approach will be for the church to think intergenerationally. Discipling men to disciple their families has the most potential for systemic change—which is what we need.
As Paul put it: “And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others” (2 Timothy 2:2). So when we disciple men, let’s equip them so they can disciple others—especially their own families first.
His and yours,
Pat Morley, Ph.D.
Of the 113,00,000 men 15 and older, 10,600,000 were 15 - 19 years of age, and 10,800,000 were 20 - 24 years of age. The number of men 20 - 21 years of age were estimated from Census Bureau totals. http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/tables/06s0011.xls , retrieved September 29, 2006.
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