Say No to Discipleship?!?

I came across a free eBook by Jason C. Dukes titled, Say Not To Discipleship?!? It is a good simple definition of biblical discipleship that confronts the most common misconception we tend to have about discipleship - that it's a class or study about God, the Bible, etc. Here are some key paragraphs:

...The New Testament does not mention “discipleship.” In the American church, we have emphasized it as the process of learning that happens after evangelism efforts convert someone. We think of discipleship typically as a study for Christians in a classroom with fluorescent lights. What the New Testament does mention, however, is the command of Jesus to “make disciples." The way He taught it and, more importantly, modeled it, was highly relational and inclusive of evangelism and missions and ministry and service and worship.

Being a disciple who makes disciples of Jesus is about ongoing relationship. We make disciples out in the rhythms of the daily. Although a bible study can be involved at times, learning happens in the midst of living. We can study about the commands of God and teachings of Jesus, but a living Word comes alive in everyday living. Our selfishness is usually not exposed and called to accountability in a lecture from a master teacher, but rather is exposed and called to accountability in friendships centered around the Master Teacher. We learn enduring love and conflict resolution and gracious forgiveness and compelling compassion in the midst of relationships, not in the midst of a classroom.

To make disciples, in my opinion, very simply is to learn and live the ways of Jesus together. The "together" may be those who are to continuing to follow Jesus, who have just begun to follow Jesus, or who have yet to follow Him. But making disciples encompasses all of the stages of belief, because we never quit learning Jesus.

Francis Chan offers the allegory of commanding his daughter to go clean her room. In a popular YouTube clip, he suggests that he doesn't intend for his daughter to come back to him excited that she memorized what he said -"Go clean your room," Chan 1:1. Nor does he intend that his daughter return to exclaim that she gathered with some of her friends to study what he said and discuss its many nuances and implications. No, he intended for her to obey. He intended that she actually clean her room. What a novel idea. Jesus might actually want us to make disciples. Not just go and get people attracted to Him, as hyper-evangelism did. Not just retreat to study about why and how Jesus wants us to live and behave and sometimes make disciples, as personal discipleship did. But actually make disciples....