“These people have been turning the world upside down…” (Acts 17:6, NRSV) The cry rang out from angry Jews before the city officials of Thessalonica (which is in modern-day Greece).

The accusations were against the young movement leaders that Paul and Silas had discipled in Jason’s house. Something was going on in this burgeoning Holy Spirit movement that caused an uproar that brought its leaders before city officials.

As modern readers, we have to ask the question…is our movement creating the same type of uproar today?

Asking this question fundamentally requires us to look anew at how we approach the story of Scripture.

When we think of these moments as simply historical events that came and went that we now read for devotional inspiration, little movement is required in our hearts. However, when we read these stories as the first chapters of a movement, a movement that began 2,000 years ago, and a movement that we are still a part of today that is still spreading to the ends of the earth, a different response is required.

And to do this, a different view of the Bible is necessary.

Scripture serves as a window into the world in which Paul and his contemporaries saw one of the most explosive Holy Spirit movements in human history.

The question is…do we read the Bible like it’s a textbook communicating to us facts about history or theology, or like a script in which we have a part to play?

Bible scholar Walter Brueggemann suggests that “[t]he Bible is a script waiting to be performed.” Similarly, NT Wright has several times suggested that the Bible is like a fantastic five act play in which we only have the first four acts written down and we are in the fifth act.

Do we dive into Scripture looking for facts and things to believe or do we dive into Scripture looking for the story we get to be a part of? The first option often leads to devotional times functioning as spiritual “pick-me-ups” where we are looking for cute verses or phrases to encourage us through the day.

The second option offers a far more radical, and dare I say risky, way to read.

The second option approaches Scripture from the perspective of saying “God, what were you doing then and what do you want to do today?” It requires fully diving into the world of the “then,” of how the gospel and the Holy Spirit himself moved and worked within the unique political, social, and economic climate of the first century.

When we grapple these realities, the question “God, what are you doing today?” becomes more and more real. We begin to look for ways in which the Spirit is moving in us and in the world around us. We then find our joy and excitement in living as a part of the story God began thousands of years ago.

I want you to invite you in.

In order the see the Holy Spirit moving in the world around us, we must first become familiar with how he moves in the story of Scripture.

While there are ways to pursue these ideas academically, I want to leave my readers with a devotional application:

As you engage with the story of Scripture today, consider these questions:

1. What is this story revealing about God?
2. What is this story revealing about me?
3. What am I going to do about it today?

I would be ashamed to count the number of times I’ve had an encounter with God at a conference or a camp and my life stayed the same afterwards. So many times, the challenge of Christianity is to turn those moments of encounter we have into real movement and change in our life and in the lives of others.

In Acts 13:3-4, the early church fasts, prays, and sets apart Barnabus and Saul (or Paul) for their missionary journey. This moment (or action) of fasting and prayer led to one of the biggest disciple-making movements in church history.

I want to suggest that the success of Christianity in our lives and in the lives of those around us is determined by how well we can put our moments of passion into lifestyles of practice.

So the question remains for us…how can we take these precious moments where God moves our hearts and turn them into real movement forward and change in our lives?

I would like to suggest that the answer is simple: Rhythms. Regular, repeatable, and realistic rhythms in the day to day or the week to week.

Nobody has ever changed the world by passion alone, there has to be a process of putting that passion into tangible practice. Sometimes we think that passion is enough but it isn’t. Feeling excited about something isn’t enough to enact real change on the earth—we have to do something about it.

Dreaming about feeding the hungry isn’t enough, we have to do it. Dreaming about ending sex trafficking isn’t enough, we have to do it. Dreaming about helping the homeless, fighting for social justice, and eradicating poverty isn’t enough. We have to do something about it.

Dreaming about making disciples of all nations isn’t enough, we have to do something about it.

For Jesus, dreaming about heaven on earth wasn’t enough. He did something. He healed the sick and raised the dead and trained his disciples to do the same.

For us, dreaming about living for Jesus isn’t enough. We have to connect what’s going on in a church service or camp to Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday morning. Is God still real for us while driving, while at work or school, in our families, in our neighborhoods?

What are rhythms you can establish right now for prayer, worship and Bible reading? What are rhythms you can establish right now for spending time in community? For inviting those younger than you to be in your life? For living on intentional and contagious mission? (Some ideas are listed below.)

Then, ask these three questions about those rhythms:

1. Is it regular? This means set a time for it. Commit to pray on the Monday morning drive to school. Fast lunch on Fridays.

2. Is it repeatable? In other words, can you do it every week, and could you disciple (or teach) someone else to do it?

3. Is it realistic? One of my leaders always encouraged me to set realistic goals in order to “get a win under my belt.” In other words, instead of trying to set up a quiet time seven days a week when you’re doing zero days a week right now, make your goal one or two days so you can make sure you’ve achieved it. That way, you won’t get discouraged for not doing seven (there are very few people who can jump from zero quiet times a week to seven and have it last) and the momentum of achieving that will gear you up to do the same the next week.

If God’s people could establish regular, repeatable, and realistic rhythms then maybe, just maybe, we would not just dream about God’s kingdom on earth, but we would see it happen more!

Some ideas…

Prayer and Worship Rhythms

Set aside 15 minutes to pray once a week

Pick a drive that you do every week (or day) and “sanctify” it (set it apart) as your prayer drive

Follow along with a Bible reading plan (Youth at the Rock has one on the app!)

Read a chapter of the Bible at the same time every day

Community Rhythms

Pick a night to hang out with a close friend once a week

Cancel other plans you may have to commit to attend church once a week

Ask a mentor to meet at the same time every week

Ask a person younger than you to hang out at the same time every week

Missional Rhythms

Make a commitment to make a new friend every time you go out

Pick a person that doesn’t know Jesus in your class/school and try and have lunch with them once a week

Pick a barista at your favorite coffee shop that doesn’t know Jesus and have one real conversation with them every time you see them

Participate in your church’s weekly or monthly outreach rhythm

In Luke 5, the Pharisees question Jesus about why John the Baptist’s disciples fast but His do not. His reply is simple—“The days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days” (Luke 5:35, NRSV). This is one reason why we fast—Jesus says that when He is gone, His followers will fast. Not might consider fasting when they feel like it, but will.

More than that, Jesus says this in the context of a rich history of fasting in the Jewish religion of which He and His earliest followers are a part and which we, too, have the invitation to join. While a full exposition of this is beyond the scope of a short devotional blog, one thinks of the richness of Isaiah 58 (worth reading if you are embarking on a fast), Daniel’s fast of obedience to the Lord in a nation that didn’t worship God (Daniel 1:12-14), or the reality that Jewish armies would often fast the day before a battle believing that they were winning the spiritual battle against demons before their physical battle.

Beyond that, there are some devotional reasons to fast as well. Here are a simple three that I can identify:

      1. Fasting says “I want God more than I want _______.”

At its heart, fasting is an act of declaring that we want God more than we want food or social media or Netflix or whatever else we happen to give up. Just like a young child might say “no” to her friend’s mom’s cooking in favor of the better meal she knows is waiting for her from her own mom, in fasting God’s kids say “no” to lesser pleasures of this world for the greater pleasure of saying “yes” to Jesus and what He has for them. Fasting isn’t really about the “no” to things, it’s about the “yes” to Jesus. When I’m fasting, I repeat this mantra every time I get hungry—God, I want You more than I want food.

      2. Fasting is a labor of love, not legalism.

Fasting is like prayer. Prayer doesn’t earn God’s affection or His approval, but rather it is an invitation to join in relationship with Him. I think about how Jesus taught us to pray:

“Our Father in heaven,

hallowed by Your name.

Your kingdom come.

Your will be done,

On earth as it is in heaven.”

Matthew 6:9-10, NRSV

God is already doing everything we are asking Him to do in the Lord’s prayer. No matter what, He is hallowed and his will is going to be done and on and on in the prayer. Why then would Jesus ask us to pray these things? I want to suggest that it’s less about forcing God to do something and more about joining Him in the doing. He doesn’t want to work apart from us, He wants to work with us. In the same way, fasting isn’t forcing God to move, it’s joining him in the doing. It’s becoming more sensitive to who He is and how He is moving by intentionally removing distractions. It’s a labor of love to join God, but never of legalism to earn His approval.

      3. Fast sacrificially, but not stupidly.

I’ll never forget when I zealously decided to go without food or water for a full thirty hours in hopes of achieving a more “anointed” fast. As I ate my bean burrito 30 hours after taking my last sip of water, I found myself not in deeper revelation or with the answers to my prayers, but instead on the bathroom floor as my stomach rejected what I had tried to put in it. I learned an important lesson that day: when fasting, health is still important. Fasting doesn’t have to abuse your body (a quick Google search of “is fasting healthy?” can turn up many doctors who are proponents of the health benefits of fasting). The most important thing isn’t zeal in the size of the sacrifice, it’s obedience to what the Father is asking you to give up. In other words, fast sacrificially (something that costs you something) but not stupidly.

We could go on and on about reasons and methods of fasting, but I think these three give some important frames of reference. A powerful model of this is the early church—we regularly see fasting and prayer in the book of Acts. My favorite story is in Acts 13:2 where before Paul and Barnabas are sent on their first missionary journey, the early church fasts and prays. I think of it like this—the missionary movement is preceded by a movement of fasting and prayer. If we want to see unprecedented missionary movement in our cities, it starts with unprecedented fasting in our churches. A movement of people willing to say “I want God more than I want food or social media or Netflix.”

What do you want to see God do?

What is He asking you to sacrifice to see it happen?

By Aaron Dolce

If you’ve been in the Pentecostal/Charismatic stream of the Church for very long, you’ve probably heard some stories of God doing some remarkable things through people. Healings, freedom from oppression, ministers who, by way of revelation, can tell someone they’ve never met details about that person’s life, and the list goes on. More often than not, these stories are either being told, or unfolding through, someone who’s in “professional ministry”. With that being the case, it’s easy to find ourselves thinking thoughts like “You probably have to be really holy for God to use you that way”, or “I really wish God would use me like that”.

The problem with this way of thinking is that it relegates the power of God to the professionals instead of to the people. I want to challenge this way of thinking, not by simply stating that everyone can be used by God in that way. I’ll do you one better and argue that signs and wonders are more than an option for the believer,  rather it’s intrinsic to the way we’re supposed to be discipled.

Matthew 28:19-20 is a passage we hear a lot, especially if your church is intentional about pursuing discipleship. However, there’s something a lot of us miss that I’d like to point out:

“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (NRSV, emphasis added)

The “what” of discipleship, the content, was supposed to be what Jesus taught and told the disciples to do. It was never a few classes over several Sunday’s leading to a confession or a baptism. Not that any of those are in any way bad, discipleship is just much BIGGER than that, but that’s another blog entirely.

Now, let’s hop over to one of the very clear commands Jesus gave to His disciples:

“Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment.” – Matthew 10:8 (NRSV)

If we’re going to become learners of Jesus, then part of what we have to do is learn to follow this command to heal the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons, and cleanse lepers. Far from being reserved for the professionals, signs and wonders, the miraculous, the power of God was always meant for ALL of His people.

So…

How can you follow this command today?

Who can you pray for?

And if you have no idea where to even start healing the sick, raising the dead, and so on, ask yourself, “Where can I begin to learn?”

Photo Credit: Elleanna Wahlberg

Have you ever not done something because you were afraid you wouldn’t do it well enough?

Have you ever procrastinated, stayed silent when you should have spoken, delayed the start of a project, or avoided a friendship because you were afraid you would do a bad job? Or because you knew you would never do it perfectly?

I call this being “paralyzed by perfection,” and it happens to most all of us. (And if it doesn’t happen to you, it probably happens to those you are leading.)

There are two ways to be “paralyzed by perfect”—the first is that you are paralyzed by the thought that you’ll never do it as well as someone else. Your project won’t be good enough, what you say won’t be helpful enough, or what you pray won’t be anointed enough. So you just don’t.

But really, at its heart, it’s actually a struggle of comparison—the only reason you’re not doing whatever it is you should be doing is that you’ve seen someone else do it in a way that you perceive is better than you.

So you don’t.

The second way to be “paralyzed by perfect” is actually something else I call the illusion of perfect. It’s the illusion that somewhere else, it’s better. Somewhere, there’s another church that has better community than yours (or better worship, or better teaching). In reality, you’ve probably never done daily life in that community, you’ve just visited for a conference (when they put their best on display) or you’ve watched a teaching or worship set online. That’s why it’s an illlusion—it seems perfect, but it’s probably not. (Nothing ever is except heaven.)

(By the way, this often works in reverse, too. Rather than looking to the future, we remember things in the past as better than they actually were. We remember an old friendship as better than it actually was, and then it prevents us from every actually enjoying the relationships that we are in currently because we spend so much time romanticizing an old friendship as better than it really was, even when we’re no longer in it.)

Have you ever heard the expression “the grass is always greener?” Where have you been believing the grass is greener? A job other than the one God has you in? A school other than the one you’re attending? A friendship that isn’t quite perfect? What’s behind this is actually a belief that God’s not in control and that He didn’t put you where you are on purpose.

What actually happens in these situations is the enemy robs us of our kingdom effectiveness. God is inviting us to lead, but the enemy can stop us from leading by paralyzing us with the illusion of perfect somewhere else, either in another person or another place.

When we empower this illusion, the enemy can stop us from going deep in community because we’re romanticizing old friendships. The enemy can stop us from praying because we’re afraid we won’t do it well enough. He can stop us from writing that book, preaching that message, or leading that person, because at our heart we’re comparing ourselves with what we’ve seen before rather than owning the calling God has put on our lives.

GK Chesterton once said, “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”

Where is the enemy stopping you from leading through fear?

Where in your life are you paralyzed by perfect?

What can you do this week to move forward?

“You need to get into a good college so that you can get a good job so that you can provide for your family.”

Maybe you’ve heard that tagline before. Maybe you’ve believed it. And maybe you’ve forgotten a cryptic saying from Jesus when he was on this earth: “You cannot serve both God and money” (Matthew 6:24).

He was, of course, referring to the Greek deity Mammon, who represented wealth, fame, and fortune.

My question is this: Is it possible that the endless quest to get a good job in order to provide for your family (or future family) is representative of a value system other than God’s kingdom?

The time you spend is like money put in the bank account of things that you value. Show me where you spend your time, and I’ll tell you what’s important to you.

The values of culture (finances and intellect) are demonstrated through time spent on activities contributing to these values—work, school, etc.

Values of the kingdom (relationship with God and others) are demonstrated through different ways of spending time—prayer, Bible reading, church attendance, and even just hanging out.

While all of these things are ultimately valuable, they should be prioritized in order.

You are a disciple that goes to work and school, not a student or employee that gets discipled when you happen to have free time.

Jesus put it this way: “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33).

What I think a lot of Christians actually believe (as is demonstrated by their time spent on these activities) is that they need to seek first their job, income, school and college degree over time spent with God and others—the kingdom.

What I want to give is simple: permission.

When the voice of the culture is screaming so loud, sometimes all it takes is a little permission to put our time back in line with the kingdom of God.

I want to give permission for you to do what I did in high school and miss out on an important school activity (and potentially better grades) in order to go on a mission trip to Mexico.

I want to give you permission to do what a student I met with recently did…he quit his sports team because it was taking away from his time with community.

What in your life could you possibly be prioritizing over time with the Lord and with your community?

For some of us, it’s time for a serious heart check. It’s time for us to get the time we spend in line with the values of the kingdom of God. Here are some practical suggestions on how to prioritize kingdom values over cultural values*:

-Sacrifice an hour of sleep in order to pray before bed or before going to school/work. (Valuing spiritual over physical)

-Do a little less than perfectly on a homework assignment in order to make it to a midweek discipleship group meeting. (Valuing relationships over intellect)

-Sacrifice a little bit of free time on your weekends to meet with a leader. (Valuing relationships over physical)

-Turn down a job offer that would require you to miss out on church attendance. (Hey, it’s even ok for you to apply for jobs on the condition that they let you have your youth group night off as both I and many of my friends have done.) (Valuing spiritual & relational over financial)

-Miss out on an hour of alone time (yes, even for us introverts) in order to disciple someone else (Valuing relational over physical)

-Sacrifice the need to do perfectly in school in order to be perfect in love (as Jesus actually commands in Matthew 5:48) by spending more time with your friends (Valuing relational over intellect)

Where are you spending your time? How can you prioritize investment in your relationship with God and others this week over school, work, and other things that should be prioritized second?

*I want to reiterate that I am not saying that finances and intelligence are not important. They are just not more important than your relationship with God and your community. They should get second place and never first.

For further reflection, I recommend Mike Breen’s Oikonomics, from which many of these ideas originated and the five values (he says “capitals”) came.

For many Western churches, discipleship has been relegated to a class, program, seminar, or book.

Thankfully, the Holy Spirit is restoring an understanding in the church that Jesus gave his disciples one commission: go and make disciples. He never tells them to start a class, program, seminar, book (or even a blog…).

In studying the way that the early church trained new believers (aka discipled them),* I came across some interesting practices that I think many of us would do well to return to as we dream about what it looks like to make disciples in the 21st century.

These are things the early church incorporated into their discipleship process:

1. Spiritual Moms & Dads

In order to be baptized in the first century, Christians had to have a sponsoring parent figure. Eventually this figure evolved to the “godparent” many of us are familiar today, especially in Catholic baptisms.

Basically, every convert had to have a leader that was committed to intentionally invest in them.

In other words, no one could enter the Christian community without being discipled.

What would it look like to see every believer in the body of Christ have a spiritual mom or dad that was committed to intentionally invest in them?

2. Commitment to Community

As part of an early Christian’s discipleship process, the entire community would fast and pray at the same time as them.

Not only does this demonstrate a commitment to prayer and fasting, it also represents their value that coming to Christ was never to be a solitary act; it always involved being welcomed into a larger church family.

No one silently raised their hand in a service, filled out a commitment card, and was counted as a number but not as a name.

A disciple’s commitment to Christ was always in tandem with a community’s commitment to them.

What would it look like to have a spiritual family so committed to one another that they feel like brothers and sisters?

3. Door to Door Evangelism

Get this–before being baptized, first century Christian converts had to prove their conviction through engaging in door to door evangelism!

While perhaps an intense requirement, it is clear that for first century disciples, there was no such thing as a non-missional Christian. To be a disciple meant you were committed to make more disciples.

What would it look like for every believer in the body of Christ to have people that they were committed to missionally reach out to?

4. True Freedom

Early Christians, before being baptized, had to renounce any agreements they had with Satan and (in later centuries) had to undergo a sort of exorcism ceremony.

While such language can be intense for Western ears, we must remember that Scripture attests that true salvation means that “He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son” (Col 1:13, NRSV). This means that before we were in the kingdom of light, we were actually under the power of darkness (some translations even say “dominion”).

While many can tend to assume that saying a simple “sinner’s prayer” can be enough to transfer us over, oftentimes there are leftover thought patterns and habits that are in agreement with the kingdom of darkness and not of light. Apparently, the early church thought it was important enough to verbally break agreement with these things as part of the larger discipleship process, and maybe owe it to ourselves and communities to consider the importance of this as well.

What would it look like for every believer in the body of Christ to walk in true freedom from habits and thought patterns that used to bind them?

5. An Organic & Movemental Model

In the first century, this discipleship process (officially referred to as the catechumenate) was largely a congregational responsibility. Spiritual moms and dads were lay leaders in the congregation, and the community owned its responsibility to train its new disciples.

By 313 CE, when Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire, the process had become centralized and organized (losing its decentralized, organic qualities) and the catechumenate could only be led by paid church staff (aka bishops). Many scholars argue that this actually led to a lessening of quality in disciples in the church very quickly.

Perhaps an organic, community-focused discipleship model is the key to seeing a movement with the same life-changing power that the early Christians saw.

What would it look like for a church community to see discipleship as their responsibility, and not that of the paid church staff?

What if commitment to Christ was met with an equal and resounding commitment from the community to the new believer?

What if the church once again operated as a family and not like a function–with spiritual moms and dads, brothers and sisters in Christ, and people walking in true freedom?

Perhaps then the church can recapture some of the power of the movement we are a part of that started two thousand years ago.

Who are people that God has placed in your life right now that you could intentionally invest in?

How can you do that this week?

*These thoughts came from an overview of the early church discipleship process of catechumenate, as expounded in the article “Catechumenate – Discipleship” in The Encyclopedia of Ancient Christianity.

Pasquato, O. “Catechumenate – Discipleship.” Pages 457-471 in vol. 1 of The Encyclopedia of Ancient Christianity. Edited by Angelo Di Berardino. 3 vols. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2014.

If you’ve said “yes” to Jesus, you’ve said “yes” to leadership.

Because if you’ve said yes to Jesus, people are watching you.

Your sports team. Coworkers. Drama club. Band. Family.

They’re looking to see how you are going to respond. Are you nicer, more loving, excited about life, or just the same?

You can’t escape it.

Think about it for a minute…who is watching you?

And if you never left the church building, guess what? There are younger people looking at you wondering how to worship, how to pray, how to love, and how to serve.

So the question is…are you cultivating this calling or are you cultivating cowardice?

Are you saying “yes” to leadership or are you still pretending like nobody’s watching?

So the questions are…

Who are you leading?

How are you leading them?

Is it working?

“You’re prideful.”

I’ll never forget these stinging words of a friend, said in love but with a sting of a challenge to change that I was unfamiliar with.

I will admit, in the beginning, my response was an embarrassingly defensive, “No, I’m not!”

Forty-five minutes and too many painful yet real examples later, I was convinced, and I began a process of what I thought was becoming more humble.

Basically, it looked like this…whenever I caught myself thinking “I’m awesome,” I would replace instantly with “I’m awful.”

Philippians 2 paints a picture of true humility by talking about Jesus. Paul writes that, like Jesus, we should “[d]o nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than [our]selves” (2:3, NRSV).

The ultimate picture of humility is Jesus, the best leader of all time, washing his followers’ feet (John 13).

Yet here’s where I missed it…even though Jesus committed himself to serve and love, he also moved from the affirmation of his father (Matthew 3:16-17) and never changed who he was for the sake of trying to serve others (Matthew 16:14-20).

Looking at the life of Jesus, here’s my conclusion:

Humility isn’t thinking condemning thoughts about yourself, it’s thinking correct thoughts about yourself.

Thinking thoughts like “I’m just a sinner, I’m not worthy, I’m awful” isn’t humility, it’s just incorrect thinking about who we are.

When the Bible says that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ (Romans 8:1), and that nothing can separate you from his love (Romans 8:38-39), it isn’t humble to think thoughts in opposition to those truths.

Humility isn’t thinking awful thoughts about yourself, it’s thinking appropriate thoughts about yourself.

Instead of thinking “I’m awful,” we could align ourselves with what the Bible says about our identity and think “I’m a child of God and I’m loved.”

Here’s why…it’s never selfish to believe what Scripture says about you.

Aligning yourself with Scripture is a way to avoid the trap of the “I’m awful” thoughts–it gets the focus off of the “I” and what we say about ourselves and onto what God says about us.

How can I think correct thoughts about myself this week, and align myself with what Scripture says rather than what I say?

Coffee dates don’t work because of just that…they’re only coffee dates.

In contrast to minutes in a coffee shop, I remember the joy of being invited over to a leader’s house for the first time—there was something that happened over the dinner table, rather than at the coffee table, that was transformative. I didn’t just hear sage advice from this leader. I saw how they interacted with their kids, treated their spouse, and even how they found bargains at the store yet could still cook a gourmet meal with them. Somehow, eating a meal was more transformative for me than a mentor meeting.

I think it was transformative because I learned how to live, and not just how to listen.

When we look at the way Jesus discipled, he taught them, but he also invited them to spend time with him in the space of life. Not once in the whole Bible does Jesus take one of his disciples out for a coffee date or enroll them in a 101 class.

Instead, he invites them into his life and gives them three things: teaching, training, and time.

As you can see, I don’t think that teaching isn’t important. It is. The original audience of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ manifesto for kingdom living, was the twelve (Matt 5:1).

However, discipleship is about more than just teaching. It’s also training. Jesus demonstrates healing before he sends them out to heal, and then debriefs the experience with them when they come back (Luke 10:1-20).

Just like teaching and training are important, time is as well. In fact, it might be the most important. In John, Jesus invites the disciples to the place where he is staying (John 1:38-39) and immediately life and ministry intersect. Jesus and his followers operate like a family, not a church function.

I think this is important because in inviting the disciples into his life, Jesus was more than just a mentor to them. He was a model.

And if we’re serious about being discipled by Jesus, he is for us as well. He’s not just a teacher to quote—he is someone we get to spend time with and model our life after. And if we’re serious about making disciples, we owe them more than a class or a coffee date. We owe them our lives.

How have you traditionally viewed discipleship—as teaching, training, or time? How can you intentionally invite those that you are leading into your day-to-day life more this week?