What Are the Critical Elements for a Successful Disciplemaking Journey?

 As the saying goes, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” What does it take to complete a successful journey? As pictured above, the successful journey is to grow a movement of “disciples who make disciples.” A movement implies that a culture has formed in your church or ministry where there is momentum and energy because the value of making reproducing disciples has become a way of life! I am not talking theory. We have witnessed it firsthand.

Three Critical Elements for a Successful Journey

Vehicle (Relational Environment)

To travel you need a vehicle, which is the relational environment. We keep the groups small (3-4 people) because the most important element in the relational environment is transparency and openness built upon radical trust. Transformation through the power of God’s Word occurs when we lay our lives out before God and each other and apply truth to our growing edge. Without applied truth, you have information without transformation.

Driver (Intentional Leader)

Every vehicle needs someone behind the wheel. The intentional leader is the point person who has two primary initial responsibilities:

1. The initiator of the group prayerfully seek the Lord’s discernment as to who God is calling to be in this group. Just as Jesus prayed all night and then chose 12 apostles from a larger group of disciples, so these groups are based upon invitation or call after prayerful consideration (Luke 6:12-13).
2. The leader gathers the group around a mutual covenant and helps them own shared commitments in the presence of each other. This raises the level of seriousness about the disciplemaking process.
3. Then the leader models group process. Since transparency is vital for life change, the leader models vulnerability. The leader guides the members to share their insights in the biblical content that contains the power to transform. Without a short period of time, the group members take up leadership so that then can then have their own groups upon completion of this one.

GPS or Map (Reproducible Process)

To complete a journey you need a way to get to your destination (the successful journey). The GPS, or map, is the biblically-based disciplemaking curriculum that lays the foundation for a maturing Jesus follower. The curriculum also becomes a transferable tool so that the growing disciples have a means of discipling others.

As groups multiply a movement slowly forms until a tipping point occurs. After 3-5 years of multiplying MicroGroups, disciplemaking becomes infused into the life of the community so that behavior is normative. This the way we make disciples.

Successful Journey

Yes,  “A picture is worth a thousand words.” To complete a successful journey to make disciples who make disciples, the culture needs to change a few at a time. Now there is momentum and energy because the value of making reproducing disciples has become a way of life! No longer is this a theory, a class, a program, a "one-and-done class." Disciplemaking is a lifestyle change.