He Said Make Disciples

Many of us had our first experience to Christ begin as follows; someone invited us to a worship service or our parents/grand parents made us attend. We heard a message and at the end of that message an invitation was given to "join the church." We walked the aisle, made an uninformed confession, and were told we had accepted Christ as our Savior. We were taken to a room, given some information, and extended another offer to be water baptized. Once water baptized, we may have received our first Bible and that was it. We were launched into a spiritual journey without additional instruction on what it meant to be a believer.

Consequently, nothing much changed in our lives. We endured the same struggles, used the same language, practiced the same bad habits, and made the same poor choices. We were not assigned to anyone who would invest in our spiritual maturity and help us grow our relationship in Christ. We may have attended Sunday School. We may have joined some youth group to make friends and establish relationships. Discipleship was about attending worship on Sunday hoping we may hear a word to inspire us and renew our minds.

Today we struggle in our relationships with Christ, not because we aren't committed to a better life. But because no one took the time to explain to us what it meant to be a believer and how my life must change if I want peace, love, and joy. We made important life decisions on a lack of knowledge and our lives have not been what the Lord desires. Our marriages, friendships. parenting, careers, ministry, and wealth pursuits have all been delayed or denied because we have pursued life our way, not the Lord's way. Many of us don't know what the Lord's way encompasses. As we have aged, our hearts and minds have conformed to the world and switching to the conformity of the kingdom has been painful and difficult.

Jesus gave us one commandment before He left the earth. He said go make disciples. He did not tell us to make church members. He wanted us to replicate His love in the earth by leading people to salvation, then committing our lives to helping them grow and mature their faith. Discipleship requires an ongoing commitment to sharing our love, faith, and experiences with people to assist them in spiritual maturity. I look back on my life and am so thankful the Lord used many women to help me mature in Christ. They invested their time in me, taught me how to pray, study, memorize scripture, and serve the Lord. At certain times in my life, the Lord sent women to sow seeds of knowledge and understanding that prepared me for my work in the ministry. There are too many to name, but the chief of these was my mother.

If you never had someone to disciple you, you may lack the foundation and understanding of faith needed to have a rewarding life. You may find disappointment in trusting man more than the Lord. You may be frustrated in the delays of your life. You may be heart broken because no one showed you how to hear from the Lord regarding your prayers and petitions. You may have missed great opportunities through the deception of satan, not knowing how to recognize his evil schemes assigned to kill and destroy you. These are the lessons we learn in discipleship. Without this understanding, we will spend our entire live pursuing what is real. We will rely on our own understanding and miss the perfect will of God for our lives and our families.

It is never too late to be discipled. Pray and ask the Lord to send you to someone who will make the time and investment teaching you God's word and how to apply it to your life. Once you have matured, the Lord will send you to people to make the same investment so others will be who God has chosen them to be.