Believer or Disciple?

Image via Wikipedia

Before Jesus leaves this earth to return to the Father, He gives his 12 catalysts the bulls-eye to focus on. Jesus commands them to "...go and make disciples..." and as they obeyed that command, they turned the Roman Empire upside down in less than 100 years!

I'll bet most of us could quickly come up with a list of differences between recruiting believers and making disciples. I'll bet our lists would look remarkably similar. But, I'm wondering if we've given much thought to the IMPORTANCE of focusing on the discipleship process in lieu of putting all of our efforts into only ONE step. To make disciples, we've got to share truth and ask unbelievers to respond and BELIEVE Christ's teaching. But, just believing doesn't make a disciple. In James 2:19 we're told that "even the demons believe." The process of building true disciples involves much more than changing belief systems. Merriam-Webster defines a disciple as "one who accepts and assists in spreading the doctrines of another." I can passively BELIEVE, but a disciple actively LIVES the message and serves as a catalyst to spread it to others.

I'm asking God to use me to raise up an army of young people who will yield to God and allow Him to use us to set the world on FIRE. That's gonna require more than passive believers. I ran across an excellent article on the process of discipleship. Here's an excerpt: "Disciple-making churches are action-oriented. They call, equip, and send people. They regularly call people to put faith in Christ, equip people to grow more like Christ, and send people to live for Christ through love and good deeds." Here's a link to the rest of the article by Patrick Morley -- http://www.maninthemirror.org/weeklybriefing/wb319.htm

A call to "believe" differently doesn't light a fire in most folks. But, people who've obviously crossed over to a different belief system and then LIVE as radically authentic followers of Christ are MAGNETS that attract others.

Let's help build Christ followers that BELIEVE His teaching and help spread the message by LIVING the process of discipleship.