Disciple-making Is a Team Sport
If you read the literature on discipleship, you’ll often see exhortations to “make disciples the way Jesus did.”
That expression was off-putting for me at first. On its face, it seems absurd.
After all, Jesus employed the methods of training common in first century Judaism. He, the rabbi, called his men away from their vocations, trained them on the move for three years, then after his resurrection commissioned them as his apostles to fan out and tell everyone what they had learned.
Clearly, we can’t make disciples the same way a first century Jewish rabbi made disciples. But if that’s not what it means to “make disciples the way Jesus did,” what does it mean to learn from Jesus how to make disciples?
As I was thinking about this, I was also mulling over a parallel question: If Jesus’ Great Commission (to make disciples of all nations) is Job One for the church, why don’t we hear that mandate echoed throughout the New Testament epistles?
Why don’t we hear Paul, the great evangelist, exhort his readers along the same lines that we so often hear? Why don’t the epistles urge those early believers to “share their faith”?
But we know that the church did spread out and begin making disciples. By the end of the first century, churches were thriving throughout the Mediterranean basin and in places as far east as India.
Clearly, the disciples Jesus trained did begin the task of making disciples of all nations. But they didn’t do it exactly the way Jesus did it; they didn’t each call their own group of disciples and travel around from place to place training their men in ministry.
So how can we learn not only from Jesus but from the apostles how to make disciples in our own cultural context?
I think the New Testament does reveal the answers to all these questions, about how the early church carried out Jesus’ mandate and how we can learn from both Jesus and the apostles how to make disciples in our time and our place.
1. Jesus concentrated on the few to reach the many.
This is part of what the discipleship literature means when it tells us to “make disciples the way Jesus did.” Jesus had many opportunities to build a large following, to create a mass movement, to reach the multitudes. But although he had compassion for the multitudes, he focused a great deal of his energies on training his men.
Christian leaders naturally want to reach as many as possible as quickly as possible. But Jesus steadfastly refused to take that short cut. His strategy was long-term: in the time he took to train his men, he was setting up his new community for long-term growth.
In our Western obsession with numerical growth, this approach seems counter-intuitive, almost elitist. But the discipleship literature is right: when we tailor our ministries to reach the multitude and neglect the individual training of leaders, we end up with entire congregations full of people whose faith is a mile wide and an inch deep.
We see Paul replicating Jesus’ method of disciple-making in his ministry. His main thrust was church-planting, but he was always thinking long-term. That’s why we see so many names in the salutations of and closings of Paul’s letters: he was always training young leaders to expand the work and carry on after he was gone.
In fact, three of his letters were addressed to young leaders whom Paul left in charge of churches: two letters to Timothy, pastor of the congregation in Ephesus, and one to Titus, pastor over the churches on Crete.
Paul was both recruiter and coach for his ministry team. He understood that disciple-making is a team sport, and he excelled in creating ministry teams of leaders in training.
We don’t know whether the other apostles employed a similar method (perhaps they did), but there was clearly more to disciple-making in the early church than training leaders in small teams.
What other means of disciple-making do we see in the early church?
2. The early church created a vibrant community life that attracted people to join them.
This is the other part of what the books mean when the tell us to “make disciples the way Jesus did.” Jesus worked in the context of relationships, not programs.
And it is here where we see most clearly that disciple-making was a team sport in the early church. It was as those early believers “one-anothered” well that they cultivated the kind of vibrant community life that not only discipled one another but also created a hunger in outsiders to be part of that kind of community life.
There are more than fifty “one another” exhortations in the epistles. Think of the wide variety of exhortations clustered around “one-anothering” in the New Testament. A quick Google search (https://www.mmlearn.org/hubfs/docs/OneAnotherPassages.pdf ) brought up an impressive list:
Be devoted to one another (Romans 12:10)
Honor one another above yourselves (Romans 12:10)
Live in harmony with one another (Romans 12:16)
Build up one another (Romans 14:19; 1 Thessalonians 5:11)
Be likeminded towards one another (Romans 15:5)
Accept one another (Romans 15:7)
Admonish one another (Romans 15:14; Colossians 3:16)
Greet one another (Romans 16:16)
Care for one another (1 Corinthians 12:25)
Serve one another (Galatians 5:13)
Bear one another's burdens (Galatians 6:2)
Forgive one another (Ephesians 4:2, 32; Colossians 3:13)
Be patient with one another (Ephesians 4:2; Colossians 3:13)
Speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15, 25)
Be kind and compassionate to one another (Ephesians 4:32)
Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs (Ephesians 5:19)
Submit to one another (Ephesians 5:21, 1 Peter 5:5)
Consider others better than yourselves (Philippians 2:3)
Look to the interests of one another (Philippians 2:4)
Bear with one another (Colossians 3:13)
Teach one another (Colossians 3:16)
Comfort one another (1 Thessalonians 4:18)
Encourage one another (1 Thessalonians 5:11)
Exhort one another (Hebrews 3:13)
Stir up [provoke, stimulate] one another to love and good works (Hebrews 10:24)
Show hospitality to one another (1 Peter 4:9)
Employ the gifts that God has given us for the benefit of one another (1 Peter 4:10)
Clothe yourselves with humility towards one another (1 Peter 5:5)
Pray for one another (James 5:16)
Confess your faults to one another (James 5:16)
I heard a friend remark recently that our main job as believers in a fellowship is to encourage one another to keep trusting God. I think she was right. All of us are tempted to discouragement, tempted to wonder if we’re all wasting our time putting all our trust in a God we cannot see.
That’s why that list of “one another” texts is so important. Think of what a fellowship would look like – what it would feel like – if this kind of “one anothering” were deeply embedded in the culture, if these kinds of interactions were normal and customary for a group of believers, if we were always about the task of encouraging and edifying one another.
The early church grew so rapidly at least in part because outsiders saw this kind of community and knew they wanted to be part of it. As a result, they were more open to hearing the Good News about Jesus. Their vibrant community life created the itch and gospel proclamation provided the scratch.
3. There are different roles for each of us in making disciples.
If you go back over that list you’ll see another reason I say that disciple-making is a team sport. Although all of those exhortations are for all of us, no one could possibly excel in every one of the different ways we can one-another well.
This is why God’s Spirit has equipped each believer with a different set of skills and passions to carry out this disciple-making work. While all of us are enjoined to be devoted to one another and be compassionate toward one another, some are specially equipped to teach or show hospitality or serve or provide comfort.
This then is another way we can see how disciple-making is a team sport: each member of the team has a special role to play. Teams are made up of different athletes carrying out differing roles. Not every football player is a lineman or a quarterback or a linebacker. Not every baseball player is a catcher. In the same way there are various roles to play in discipling one another.
In two of his letters (Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12), Paul makes it clear that healthy Christian fellowship is nourished when every believer recognizes his or her peculiar set of spiritual gifts and employs them in our common task of making disciples.
So then, identifying the gifts God has given me is an essential part of me playing my part in the disciple-making that goes on in my fellowship. And I am responsible both to God and to the Body of Christ for how I steward those gifts. As Peter put it, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies” (1 Peter 4:10-11, ESV).
HOW A FAMILIAR CLICHÉ WORKS IN DISCIPLE-MAKING
I was in eighth grade when I first heard the old maxim from my soccer coach: “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” I’ve never forgotten that key insight into how team sports work. Although it’ true that we all succeed or fail together, each individual member has a crucial role to play and must play it well. Sure, there are players who excel and draw a lot of attention, but in team sports everyone has a role to play.
Jesus assigned us the task of making disciples. But none of us is sufficient to carry out that mission alone. We need one another to get the job done.
Let’s do our part, whether that means being involved in leadership training or contributing to vibrant community life or utilizing our gifts in service to the Body.
Persevere,
Paul Pyle
Discipleship Pastor