Root Causes of Our Discipleship Deficit
Aches and pains, a lack of energy, and fever many times point to an underlying illness. These symptoms in a child often cause parents to seek out advice from a physician. Physicians are trained to consider the symptoms and will often order tests to confirm their assessments by identifying the root causes of the illness. The test results also assist the physician in determining the proper course of treatment to restore the child to health.
An assessment of churches in the US, and in other parts of the globe, suggests that the church is not healthy with respect to its disciplemaking efforts. The question that should be asked based on this assessment is why. In other words, what is causing these symptoms to appear—what are the root causes of unhealthy disciplemaking in our churches?
8 Underlying Conditions that Negatively Affect the State of Disciplemaking in a Church
These root causes reflect beliefs, behaviors, and practices that have significantly contributed to the unhealthy state of disciplemaking in the church as a whole. If present in your church, they must be addressed in order for reproducible disciplemaking to become a common practice among your members. Pay particular attention to the first two as they may be the biggest contributors to the lack of reproducible disciplemaking.
1. Diversion from Primary Calling. A primary responsibility of pastors is to help church members discover, develop, and deploy their spiritual gifts so that they may minister to one another and in so doing build up the body of Christ.
Each member should be equipped and expected to play their part in building up the body of Christ. Unfortunately, most Church members believe that it is a pastor’s job to do the work of the ministry believing that this is why they are paid. This is known as the "Dependency Model of Ministry" because church members depend on the paid staff to meet every ministry need regardless of the problem.
Scripture teaches otherwise. “Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers, Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do His work and build up the church, the body of Christ, (Eph 4:11-12 NLT). As such, pastors are to “Prepare, train, [and] disciple ordinary believers (saints) for their place of service in the body of Christ. (Transforming Discipleship p. 42). More to the point, pastors are to equip the members of their church to carry out the Great Commission.
2. Discipling Through Programs. The church has relied on programs to make disciples which has led to superficial results. What are disciplemaking programs and why do they not work?
In general, programs are based on a structured group method designed to easily move large numbers of people through a system. Disciplemaking programs center on the transfer of information. From preacher or teacher to students either individually, one-on-one, or more commonly, from one to the many.
Disciplemaking programs require participants to process information in the same way and in the same amount of time. The underlying assumption is that we are all the same. Discipling programs require little accountability on the part of those being discipled. They are often simply about completing the assignment—filling in the blanks in a book or worksheet—rather than committing to, and being accountable for applying what is learned to their own lives.
In contrast to this programmatic approach, consider our definition of disciplemaking, as “an intentional relationship in which we walk alongside other disciples in order to encourage, equip, and challenge one another in love to grow toward maturity in Christ.”
From the definition we see that becoming a disciple is not about the transfer of information through a program. Instead, it is about spiritual transformation through a purposeful, relational process, centered on surrendering to the power of the Holy Spirit within, not on trying harder. This is a process in which Christ-followers encourage and challenge each other in love to apply biblical truths to their lives.
The Word of God must be processed—the meaning of a passage discussed, its application considered, in order for the Word to penetrate our hearts and transform us into fully devoted Christ-followers. This takes time.
Each person has spiritual growth needs that are unique. We grow at different rates. Some grow slowly, others more quickly. Each has different issues that must be addressed in order to move forward spiritually. Each must learn what it means to die to self and live for Christ.
Programs designed for “the many” will not produce self-initiating, reproducing, fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. This is best done in groups of three or four where there are opportunities for each member to share their thoughts regarding a passage, their insights, the challenges they face in applying it to their lives.
3. Reducing the Christian Life to a Focus on the Benefits of Salvation. In many churches the gospel has been transformed into one in which Christians are allowed, or even encouraged, to focus on the benefits we receive from Jesus rather than the call to be conformed to His life. When the gospel is presented, there is often a focus on two benefits we receive when we trust Christ as Savior: (1) forgiveness of sin and (2) life forever with Jesus. There is no emphasis on what it means to follow Christ the rest of your days.
This is contrary to what we see in Scripture. Jesus clearly declared to all in His hearing, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow Me [as My disciple].” (Luke 9:23, NKJV).
Further we read that those who have placed their faith in Jesus have been
“predestined to become conformed to His image” (Romans 8:29, NKJV).
Finally, we have been
“created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10, NLT).
Recall our definition of a disciple as one who is
“following Jesus, being changed by Jesus, committed to the mission of Jesus, and motivated by the love of Jesus.”
4. A Two-Tiered Understanding of Discipleship. Can you be a Christian without being a disciple? Author and Professor Emeritus Michael J. Wilkins likes to ask two questions when speaking on discipleship.
His first question asks people whether they can say, in the humble confidence of their heart, that they are a true disciple of Jesus. He observes that most are confused and hesitate to respond. Then he asks if they can say that they are a true Christian. Almost all raise their hands.
What does this tell us about the general belief regarding whether one can be a Christian but not a disciple?
The results from Professor Wilkin’s informal survey indicate that a great many Christians have been allowed to believe that discipleship is not for the average person.
In fact, many believe it is for “super” Christians. It is important to note that the word Christian is only used three times in the Bible. In each case it refers to followers or disciples of Jesus, though not in a complementary way. The word disciple, however, appears at least 260 times depending on the version of the Bible.
We must recapture the truth that all who place their faith in Christ are seen as disciples and are invited, by Jesus Himself, to commit their lives to Him as His followers and to go and make disciples.
5. Unwillingness to Call People to Discipleship. “Disciplemaking is too demanding and takes too much time.” Given the pervasiveness of the belief in root causes 3 and 4, it is not surprising that many church members in the US, and the West in general, have been conditioned to expect few demands on their lives.
According to a 2018 survey of US adults, those who attend services at least once or twice a month go to church to
“feel closer to God,” to “be a better person,” and to “get comfort in times of sorrow or trouble.” (Pew Research, 2017).
There is no mention of becoming followers of Jesus, much less committing one’s life to following Him.
Many pastors feel they are too busy to disciple and are not “rewarded” for discipling. They, either directly or indirectly, are encouraged to pursue an “attractional model” of worship that centers on music that is in step with the times, and to prepare messages that are uplifting and well communicated.
Further, pastors are often rewarded for the three B’s: bodies, budgets, and buildings, that is drawing people to the church, raising funds, and building facilities. They are not rewarded for making disciples. As such, many pastors are reluctant, even unwilling, to place the demands of being and making disciples on those who attend their church services.
6. An Inadequate View of the Church. Many who claim Christ as Savior view church as optional as they believe it is not needed for growing in spiritual maturity. Church is not viewed as a disciplemaking community.
Recall once more our definition of disciplemaking as “an intentional relationship in which we walk alongside other disciples in order to encourage, equip, and challenge one another in love to grow toward maturity in Christ.” This includes equipping the disciple to make disciples who make disciples.” Disciplemaking takes place when we walk alongside other disciples for the purpose of encouraging, equipping, and challenging each other to be better followers of Jesus Christ.
Again, this is confirmed by Scripture.
“All of you together are Christ’s body, and each of you is a part of it.” (1 Cor 12:27, NLT). “Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are My disciples.” (John 13:35, NLT). “He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.” (Eph 4:15, NLT).
The church is the living extension of Jesus on earth. We were created out of relationship for relationship. (See Gen 1 and 2). Therefore, it is in relationship—the spiritual community provided by the church—that we help one another grow toward spiritual maturity.
7. No Clear Pathway to Maturity. How do we answer a person who asks, “How do I become a fully devoted follower of Christ at this Church?” To answer this question, churches must connect a clear purpose with a clear, easy to understand, process for achieving that purpose.
The core mission of a Church, its primary purpose, is to produce disciplemakers–self-initiating, reproducing, fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. In other words, the primary goal of a church is to produce disciples who are disciplemakers.
Churches must connect the above purpose with a clear, easy to understand, process for achieving that purpose. The process should provide a clear plan and path for taking people from worship service attender to becoming a disciplemaker.
8. Lack of Personal Discipling. Most Christians have not been personally discipled. As such, they are not equipped, nor do they have the confidence needed, to disciple others. You cannot share what you do not have. Instead of attempting to grow our churches numerically, pastors should focus on growing people spiritually through an intentional reproducible process.
The State of Discipleship in the American Church
From our own root cause analysis of the current state of discipleship in the US and in many other churches across the globe we conclude the following:
Most Church members do not follow Jesus as true disciples because they have not been challenged nor equipped to do so. They have not been equipped to do so because pastors are doing the work of the ministry themselves.
Further they are not able to devote themselves to disciplemaking nor are they willing to challenge and call the members of their church to become disciples, much less make disciples. As such, they have not developed and communicated a clear path to spiritual maturity. Many have not been discipled themselves and so cannot share what they do not know.
Most church members believe that being a disciple is only for the zealous Christian not the average person. They believe that being an active member of a church community is not necessary for spiritual growth. As such, the majority of church members are not self-initiating, reproducing, fully devoted followers of Jesus. Consequently, their church is unable to carry out the Great Commission.
Two Recommendations
The study conducted for Discipleship.org referenced earlier made two recommendations that we believe are critical to moving a church toward the goal of becoming a disciplemaking church. They are:
- Create Clear Definitions. Create clear and easily understood definitions that reflect what the Bible teaches about disciplemaking.
- Senior Pastors Must Embrace Disciplemaking as the Core Mission of the Local Church. Their churches and personal ministries need to shift to a focus on Jesus-style disciplemaking as the core mission of their Churches.
We believe we have addressed the first recommendation by clearly defining disciplemaking terms. We have also clarified the primary goal of every church which is to make disciplemaking their core mission.
We also believe that when pastors and church leaders address the root causes described in this chapter, they will effectively address the second recommendation.
Addressing the second recommendation is the key to moving a church toward becoming a disciplemaking church.
The first, and likely the most difficult move Senior Pastors must make is to shift from a dependency model of ministry to a biblical equipping model of ministry. This begins when Senior Pastors begin to make disciples using Jesus’ relational approach.
Member discussion