Answering the Grow Question Part 1

It's time to answer the Grow question: How will we teach them how to follow Jesus?

The whole business of the church is to make disciples. Some have thought that the church’s primary business is the people business, and it is…to a degree. We work among and for the good of people, but people are not an end in itself. If connecting with people were our primary focus, we could be content with large crowds and whatever strategies might bring them.

No, our purpose is to make disciples—we have specific plans for what we want to see happen with the people we reach.  Ultimately, the dream is to help them find the path Jesus marked for all of us and encourage them to take those essential steps down that path.

Jesus defined discipleship in the simplest of terms. He said that we were to “baptize them in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost…and teach them what I have commanded you.” That’s it! Baptize to demonstrate their choice to follow Him and teach what we have learned so they can know how to follow. Frankly, it’s not that complex. After all, Jesus handed off this mission to guys who didn’t overpower the educational scale. It had to be reasonably simple to understand, right? But no one said it would be easy.