Discipleship in Missional Churches
Len over at NextReformation posted these two quotes from a July 2007 Leadership Network article titled “Authentic Discipleship in Missional Churches.”
Missional living is about spirituality before it is about strategy or congregational structure. So, the first big issue is the reclamation of authentic discipleship. Churches must rediscover spiritual formation for missional living and develop systems for encouragement and accountability of a living faith.
Becoming a missional church is about being–being conformed to the image of God, bearing His heart–before it is about doing. Therefore, leaders must connect their congregations with His heart via the Scriptures.
The first quote is good. Missional is not a strategy or congregational structure. It is very much about spiritual formation and “being.” The second quote appears to separate “being” from “doing.” This false dichotomy is one of the major errors practiced in many evangelical faith communities. Discipleship is equated with connecting to the heart of God primarily “via the Scriptures” (exclusively in many cases).
Discipleship of the bible is connecting to the heart of God both “via the Scriptures” AND by doing. It is the combination of the two that lead to spiritual formation and “being.”
And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. (Ephesians 4:11-13 — ESV).
Notice that it is both doing and the edification (teaching) of the saints that brings about unity and maturity. Can you envision an apprentice in one of the trades only spending time in the textbook and never going out daily to practice what s/he has learned under the supervision of a journeyman?
We need to reimage discipleship in terms of BOTH loving the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind and with all our strength AND to love our neighbor as our self. This is what authentic discipleship in missional churches will look like.
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Tags: Discipleship, Emerging, Missional Church
January 23rd, 2008 at 4:52 pm
Agreed….it is so sad that we have lost that subtle understanding in English that was native to Hebraic “knowing”–to know something was to fully experience it. There could be no knowing without doing.
Thanks for the good reminder.
January 23rd, 2008 at 6:34 pm
Right on!!
You’ve expressed what I’ve been saying for some time. You just did so more clearly! I’ve linked and really appreciated your thoughtfulness.
January 23rd, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Peggy: Good to hear your “voice” and thanks for the insight.
January 23rd, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Jeff: Thanks for dropping in and commenting. And thanks for linking.
January 24th, 2008 at 9:59 am
Rick,
I wonder if the second quotation is not more concerned with source and motivation. What I mean is that you can “do” without “being” but to truly “be” requires “doing”. In other words doing comes out of being but being does not come out of doing. Therefore the being must come first. It is about being before it is about doing.
Some people get off into the social justice “doing” without coming to know the heart of God. Once you know the heart of God it is hard not to “do”.
I agree that the false dichotomy is one of the major errors practiced in many evangelical faith communities. I think the problem there is thinking that you can discover the heart of God through a Bible study aimed at discovering doctrines.
January 24th, 2008 at 12:24 pm
Dan: Good comments and points. Good point about people that get off on the social justice “doing” don’t necessarily do so because they know the heart of God. Still, I’m not sure I’d agree with you that “being does not come out of doing.” That statement is true if all we do is “doing,” but when we balance learning (scripture) with doing, we come to know the heart of God and “doing” can’t come out of “being” because there is no “being” without “doing.”
Ouch, my brain hurts.
January 25th, 2008 at 4:41 am
The focus here must be on Jesus Christ. If we are truly following Christ, we will be doing. James makes that absolutely clear. However, if you are doing and Christ isn’t the focus, then you’re probably working in vain. Without him we can do nothing.
If a person calls themselves a Christian, but they aren’t doing anything to advance the Kingdom of God, and that includes healing the sick, feeding the hungry, helping the poor, then it’s time for some real fruit inspection. Except for short periods of rest, there should be something happening to advance the Kingdom. If not, maybe the person isn’t really a Christ Follower.
However, way too many people put that start out doing something “missional” like feeding the hungry or fighting for social justice, have elevated that mission above Christ. That’s idolotry. By the way, efforts like these almost always lead to divisiveness… us vs them mentality, etc.
The only way to keep a true focus is truth hmself, Jesus. We are called to follow him.
January 25th, 2008 at 7:50 am
Good stuff John. A lot of what we are talking about sounds like the old “faith vs works” conversations.
January 25th, 2008 at 7:55 am
All: Lets not get to far off of focus on this topic. It is really about authentic discipleship — is it only about connecting with Gods heart (or “being”) via the Scriptures (studying the textbook) or is “doing” an equally important aspect.
January 26th, 2008 at 8:28 am
Missional church has to be about structure, considering what Ephesians 4 says about the different roles of ministry and their purpose (building up the body for the mission). Missional church has to include strategy, as I’ve never seen any movement actually move without a specific direction. Of course a missional church has to be deeply spiritual. That should go without saying.
Being and doing go hand in hand, and I agree completely that it is wrong to create a dichotomy where none should exist. This has been the custom of most Western churches for years.
January 27th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
Yup, I agree Adam that much of what a missional church does has to be done within some form. I think what some of us react to is that a lot of missional discussions talking place in mainstream faith communities/denominations make missional a program, strategy or structure to be implemented instead of missional be an outgrowth of spiritual formation. I.e., that make it something you do instead of something you are.
January 28th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Hi Rick, long time no check in on my part since the Missional Order get together. Personally, I am wondering if this quote is not much different than all of us separating salvation from discipleship. Most of us do it even though if you look at the scriptures, it is very clear that anyone who accepts the gift of Jesus as Savior and Lord is expected to follow through on discipleship and activities. This separation intellectually happened about the time of the reformation based on a lot of the history of the church I have read.
In many of our churches, this separation is the piece that has allowed the eternal fire insurance gospel to become separated from a path of discipleship and worship.
To me, the second quote is driven by the idea that there is another step necessary besides just knowledge and then action. God sent His Son Jesus to us not just for salvation, although from our side of the deal, we tend to emphasize that, but to rebuild the potential for relationship with us individually and as the body of Christ. If we have lots of knowledge, do lots of good things, but do not have an intimate relationship with the one who would be our guide, this may lead us towards the scripture in Matthew where the petitioner talks about all the things he/she has done in God’s name, and God responds that He never knew them. I find that, in my walk with Christ, there are more things I could be doing ‘for’ God than I have hours in the day. But, there are specific things that the Holy Spirit calls to do. This may be where the second quote is going, if is it is…I would agree with it.
What do you think?
Richard Clarke
January 30th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Richard: I had such a wonderful and blessed time at the Missional Order gathering that I find myself impatient for the next one. I think we said something about March, but haven’t heard a firm date yet. Hope we can both make it.
Your comment that “If we have lots of knowledge, do lots of good things, but do not have an intimate relationship with the one who would be our guide, this may lead us towards the scripture in Matthew where the petitioner talks about all the things he/she has done in God’s name, and God responds that He never knew them” is spot on.
I’m not willing to let the author off the hook. I think they really ARE saying that all me need is to be in the Word more and all will be well. Each Sunday I see the overwhelming majority of our faith community sitting and absorbing the Word with no actionable evidence that it has had any impact. Discipleship, as you rightly noted, includes accepting His free gift, deepening our relationship with Him, life change reflected in the gift of the Spirit, and doing the works he prepared for us.
Should we spend more time in the Word? My gosh yes, but that along will not connect us with His heart. We need to experience Him working in and through us in real life situations to “know” “His incomparably great power for us who believe.”
As Paul wrote, “[For my determined purpose is] that I may know Him [that I may progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, perceiving and recognizing and understanding the wonders of His Person more strongly and more clearly], and that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from His resurrection [which it exerts over believers], and that I may so share His sufferings as to be continually transformed [in spirit into His likeness even] to His death, [in the hope].” (Philippians 3:10 — Amplified Bible)
How else will we “know the power outflowing from His resurrection [which it exerts over believers], and that I may so share His sufferings” if we are not heeding the Holy Spirit’s call to join God in His work outside the walls of our faith communities.