Focus on Spiritual Growth not "Discipleship"

I got a request from a friend of mine who is in graduate school to do a brief interview about discipleship.  Since we don't really use the term "discipleship" or "disciple" the answers I gave are a little different.  Take a look at the questions and answers and let me know what you think.

QUESTION:  How do you define "disciple" or "discipleship"?  

We don't often use the word "disciple".  It is not because it is a bad word.  On the contrary it is a good biblical word that has been ruined because the cultural definition focuses primarily on increasing ones cognitive content and not on direction, mission or biblical spiritual maturity.  So we use the phrase "Christ follower".  We challenge people to become 3C Christ followers.  We believe there are three over-arching experiences of any follower of Jesus:  celebrate, connect and contribute. 

• We encourage people to celebrate on a daily basis personally and a weekly basis corporately what God is doing and who God is.
• We encourage people to connect with other Christ followers and do life together in community.
• We encourage people to contribute with their time, talents and treasures.  

QUESTION:  How do you "make disciples" (strategies, methods, materials used, etc.)? 

We “make disciples” by encouraging people to continue to grow spiritually from spiritual infancy to spiritual adolescence to spiritual maturity. 

• spiritual infancy – people who need to be fed.
• spiritual adolescence – people who have learned to feed themselves
• spiritual maturity – people who feed others

This means that we take a developmental approach where people are increasingly not only responsible for their own spiritual development, but for the development of other spiritual infants. 

QUESTION:  How do you know if you've been successful? 

We have a dashboard that measures what percentage of each ministry, each campus and our church are 3C Christ followers.  This is the most critical metric and we are constantly monitoring that number.

QUESTION:  What advice would you give to an emerging (just getting started) pastor?

Four quick pieces of advice come to mind:

1. Don’t buy into the way most churches divide discipleship and evangelism.  UGH!   People and churches need to do both…and a Christ follower is both a disciple and an evangelist.
2. Don’t create a dependency model of spiritual growth by constantly “feeding people” and never insisting that they grow up and learn to “feed themselves” and “feed others”.
3. Make it very clear what it looks like to be a disciple or as we prefer, Christ follower.  Some might think 3C’s is too simple.  But we believe you want something that is biblical, memorable and simple to get people started.  They will grow from there.
4. Find a way to measure the spiritual maturity of an individual and your church.  Anecdotes and stories are very important, but sometimes they are incidental and not reflective of the reality of the whole community.

Comments

[Tony E.]

Good post Dave. I agree, a lot of people do define the experience of discipleship as a cognitive, bible knowledge thing. The other common abuse is that many people approach discipleship as the pure checklist--reading the bible enough, praying enough, quiet time enough, etc. But I think a lot of it is semantics too. The only problem is that people have abused the word, as you said, and as a result have spoiled the experience.

While not every church may approach spiritual growth with the same principles CCC does, the good thing about CCC that cannot be denied is the fact that you have cultivated an environment that is action and growth focused--a holistic approach which is very much like the Hebrew mindset.

[Kathyj]

As always, spot on! I believe that CCC's success not only evolved out of these points you've delineated but has emerged out of leadership that has consistently exhibited authentic relationship with the heart of God and modeling their own spiritual growth. We can't impart to others what we don't already possess.

Just thinking...We are filled, molded and transformed in our vertical relationship with the heart of God through His Spirit. Is discipleship an organic, Spirit-filled, Spirit-empowered process? Is He the catalyst that opens and transforms the mind and will to be the Christ-follower that He has created us to be or is the catalyst a vision, program or ministry? Probably both? Is discipleship equivalent to sanctification? Perhaps discipleship is the human effort and sanctification the the Spirit effort?

[Melissa Salomon]

Dave,
What do you mean a "dashboard" to track the 3C followers? Can you share? Great post by the way...thank you!

[Anne]

I'd like to know more about the dashboard as well..

[Dawn Bodi]

I ditto the above thought. Can blog about how the dashboard works next?

[Darien Gabriel]

I love this! It's concise, comprehensive and keeps the responsibility where it belongs. That "Dashboard" thingy, I'd like to get my hands on one of them. Suggestions?

[Jeff Pessina]

Good stuff Dave! Lovin it!

What you shared...

* Celebrate on a daily basis
* Connect with other Christ followers
* Contribute with time, talent, treasure

...flows very much in parrellel with Dave Browning's book "Deliberate Simplicty", wherein he shares the story of CTK's lead Pastor, who demanded strict observance of 3 main things if he was to take the lead position of the Church. He made the church leadership sign an agreement that they would focus on:

* Worship (celebrate)
* Small Groups (connect)
* Outreach (contribute)

This concentration ("the art of elimination") has led them to huge success. Today I was discussing this with one of our leaders and was reminded of Jesus with Mary and Martha, and how Mary was commended for choosing the most important things, while Martha was corrected for being busy with too many things.

I am constantly amazed at how long it has taken much of the Church to wake up. Our heroes from "the early church" had no Bibles. No formal education. The early "church fathers" were mostly from the fisherman society. They didn't even know the real plan. Yet they spread like wildfire and reached the world in their generation by operating in unconsious competence... the simplicty of the early church is purely awesome.

How thankful we should be for the Chinese authorities for forcing the Chinese church to cherish God's Word (by making it illegal), and for forcing them to prioritize small groups (by outlawing public Christian gatherings). The Chinese Church has exploded under what could be considered a set of New Testemant priorities forced on them!

At Frontline we are being led more and more to prioritize small groups and leadership development (discipleship) in the context of relationship (small groups) where we connect with each other and with Christ (corporate and personal worship) and ministry (outreach).

We are very excited at the shift we see occuring in the Chruch today, and believe God is up to big things by welcoming us all back to the small time.

[Chris]

Dave,

Where does the "C" of Commitment and Counting the Cost and Bearing the Cross come into your view of discipleship?

Enjoyed the blog. Looking forward to the "dashboard" way to visualize progress made.

[Eric Haven]

Dave,

I'm interested in your "dashboard" mechanism. I've been wanting to create one of my own to measure critical ministry parameters. Are you willing to share your construct?

E

[Rev. Dr. Greg J. Monaco Dalle-Tezze]

The root of the word disciple means student. We are called to be students of like. We are gatherers. WE ARE NOT HUNTERS. We are challenged to grow and learn at every moment. This means we are to travel light and be graced (energized) by all especially those who are different than us. Good theology is still good theology. Cheap grace is still cheap grace. Believe in people not the institution. That might give us an idolatrous character. So in essence...what am I saying: "Don't need to build churches...build bridges." Don't make God a work order or a way for you to look good or "increase your flock." Deeds not creeds...your own personal characeter not numbers of people. Get a good education and theological traing from accredited schools.
We have good hearts. Follow your hearts.

[Dave Ferguson]

Thanks for all the comments. If you didn't notice I did a post on dashboards: http://daveferguson.typepad.com/daveferguson/2009/03/in-my-post-focus-on-spiritual-growth-not-discipleship-i-talked-about-the-dashboard-at-community-and-how-we-track-the-numbe.html

Enjoy!

Dave