by George Patterson

Our Lord sends us to disciple every “nation” (people group) by training them to obey all His commands (Matt 28:18-20). This means that we disciple a “nation” only when it is permeated by obedient disciples who also disciple other unevangelized peoples. So we don’t fulfill the mandate by simply starting one missional community amidst a people. We, or those we send, must start the kind of missional community that grows and reproduces spontaneously as missional communities will, in daughter missional communities, granddaughter missional communities, great-granddaughter missional communities and so on. Spontaneous reproduction of missional communities means the Holy Spirit moves a missional community to reproduce daughter missional communities on its own, without outsiders pushing it (Acts 13:1-3).

I began training pastors in Honduras in a traditional theological institution and had the traditional problems for the traditional reasons. I assumed the bright young men I trained were dedicated because they came to our resident Bible school. Our plan was for them to return to their home towns as pastors. But the graduates found the gold lettering on their diplomas did not go well with the white-washed adobe walls back home. It enabled them, however, to earn more in the office of the Dole Banana Co. My raspy supervisor had the gall to blame us teachers; he told us, “Close the school; start discipling the people.”

“No,” I argued, “that’s too hard.”

“Excuses! They’re poor, semi-literate, subsistence farmers but you teach as though they were educated, middle class
Americans.”

I wrote my missionary buddies from language school, now spread all over Latin America, fishing for sympathy. They had the same problem!

“I’m a teacher without a classroom!” I complained.

“So,” my supervisor rasped, “teach by extension.”

“What’s that?”

He handed me a smelly old saddle, explaining, “You’re promoted. This is the Chair of Evangelism and Church Planting in your new extension Bible institute.”

After a few weeks of blisters on my south side I learned to communicate with the mission mule and announced, “Hey, I can do this TEE stuff. It’s great.”

My supervisor warned me, “Then your students had better raise up and pastor their own churches or we’ll close down this Theological Education by Extension, too.”

I took the pastoral studies to family men (Biblical “elder” types) in the poverty-ridden villages, mountains and cities. Unlike their single young sons, they had crops, jobs or family responsibilities that kept them from going off to our resident Bible school. They also lacked the education to absorb its intensive teaching. But these older men, with roots in their villages and barrios, could begin pastoring with the respect of their people easier than the single young men could. By God’s mercy I slowly learned to evangelize and disciple these elders in a way that enabled them to raise up and pastor their small village churches.

As will be the case in many of today’s remaining unreached fields, we began to see growth not through any one church growing big or fast, but through the slow, steady reproduction of many small churches. I could have avoided years of struggle searching for principles of church reproduction had I looked first in the operator’s manual. New Testament discipling principles, conscientiously applied, are enabling churches to reproduce in Honduras and many other fields. Field testing of programs based on these principles give consistently good results in Latin America and Asia, including hostile fields where evangelism is illegal.

We must distinguish between these general principles and culture-specific applications.[/blox]

We must distinguish between these general principles and culture-specific applications. Biblical principles themselves, if applied with culturally relevant methods, should enable churches to reproduce wherever there is plenty of “good soil.” Theologically speaking, good soil for the gospel seed to take root in and multiply is bad people, and lots of them (Rom 5:20-21; Matt 13:18:23; Eph 2:1-10).

The simplicity of the principles disappoints some educators. They expect something more sophisticated, at least new or expensive. Missionary or not, one can multiply disciples doing these four simple things:

1. Know and love the people you disciple.
2. Mobilize your disciples to edify immediately those they are discipling.
3. Teach and practice obedience to Jesus’ basic commands, in love, before and above all else.
4. Build loving, edifying accountability relationships between disciples and churches in order to reproduce churches.

1. Know And Love the People You Disciple

We must know and love a people before we can disciple them. When Jesus told His disciples to “Look at the fields,” they were finding it hard to love the Samaritans around them; they could not see them receiving God’s grace.

Limit Your Area of Responsibility to One People or Community

We must focus on one people group, the one God has given us. Paul knew his area of responsibility before God (2 Cor 10:12-16; Acts 16:6-10; Gal 2:8). He knew what kind of churches to plant and where. For a movement of church reproduction a church planting team needs a clear focus from God. My area was “the Spanish speaking people of the Aguan Valley and surrounding mountains.” It helps to be exact.

At home or abroad every discipler needs to ask: “For whom am I responsible?” If a missionary fails to do this, the geographic and ethnic limits of his ministry remain blurred. He will jump from opportunity to opportunity. I asked one of these wandering gold prospectors in Central America what his area of responsibility was. “Oh,” he said, “I am winning the country for Christ.” He goes from city to city preaching in prisons and army camps; he bombs villages with tracts from his Cessna. It’s fun and folks back home eagerly finance it. But he will never plant a reproductive church until he learns to hold the people of a community in his heart. Choosing your people in a new field needs study and prayer. Confer with other missionaries, nationals and God Himself for guidance.

Knowing a people means touching the heart of individuals. Laughing with those who laugh. Weeping with those who weep. Playing marbles with 2-year old Chimbo and checkers with his grandpa (or whatever they play in the town square). It may help if you let him beat you. This applies to arguing religion, too. It’s dangerous always to be “right” when you’re the new kid on the block. Learn to appreciate the people and their ways, even the toothless old men. Listen and learn until you have discovered those things in their folk religion or culture that help communicate the gospel.

Once you know your area and people, discern which segment among them is most receptive to you and to Jesus Christ. To penetrate restricted, resistant fields, aim first at the working class or an oppressed minority. This contradicts some popular church growth theories. We are not dealing with second generation growth in Pasadena, California, however, but the initial beachhead where people get a curved blade in their ribs for witnessing. Jesus did not begin His public ministry among the influential middle class and natural leaders in the political nerve centers of Rome or Jerusalem, but with the working class upriver in Galilee where they spoke Hebrew with a backwoods accent—otherwise He would have been crucified prematurely.

Let the Church Be of the People

Like most inexperienced church planters I started “preaching points” at first, instead of genuine New Testament churches. Someone went every week to a community where a group gathered to hear their pulpit oratory and sing (well, at least to sing). Converts were not baptized. Local leaders were not trained. The Lord’s Supper was neglected. No one knew for sure who were Christians. Obedient, sacrificial discipling gave way to entertaining (a tradition brought by American missionaries). Preaching points develop a personality of their own; they stubbornly refuse to evolve into obedient, giving, reproductive churches. They become sponges soaking up the time and efforts of outside workers and producing nothing—except where God’s sheer mercy overrides our routine.

Find what a church’s people can do and plan that, before planning its structure, forms and organization. I hope it takes you less time than it took me to learn that formal pulpit preaching is ineffective (often illegal) in many of today’s remaining unreached fields. You can preach the Word with power in many other ways, if you know your people. We used dramatic Bible reading, songs with music and lyrics composed by nationals, poems, symbols and story telling. They sang with more enthusiasm when they composed songs in the local style.

Let the new church’s self-identity be evident. Know exactly what you are aiming at within the community: a well defined body of obedient disciples of Jesus Christ. Once I made the mistake of allowing more outside helpers to be present than members of the community during the first baptism and celebration of the Lord’s Supper. The church died at birth. There must be a majority from the community itself, especially at the first baptism or worship meetings, or the church is not born as a distinct entity within the community.

Our converts felt that they had simply been added to some organization of the outsiders. I robbed them of the thrill of looking at each other and saying, “We are now the church here!” They must see the new church being born as a part of their community.

List What You Will Do to Reproduce Disciples Among a People

Let’s assume you research well all the factors: race, culture, logistics, urban versus rural backgrounds, language similarities, education and economic levels, etc. You learn the language. Then you go in a crowded bus to your new field, with a team of church planters as similar to the local people as possible in every aspect. Some or all of them may be from another developing country. You are happy because they do not have to make that long cultural leap that delays church planting by years (the less responsive the people are to missionaries, the more crucial this cultural fit). Now you finally arrive, unpack your toothbrush, take a deep breath, pray, step out the door and find fifty thousand people living around you who think Jesus was John Wayne’s cousin.

Now what?

What you do first often determines the direction of your work, for good or bad, for years to come. Will it lead to reproductive churches? The right steps will vary for each field but will always include teaching the converts first to obey Jesus’ basic commands (Matt 28:18-20). Take the shortest route possible to start a real church: a group of believers in Christ dedicated to obey His commands. In a pioneer field let it start small, perhaps with only three or four members. It will grow if you disciple the people as Jesus said.

Avoid institutions if possible at this beachhead stage (community development programs unrelated to church planting, clinics, etc.). It’s best to let these come later. In Honduras we developed community development work but it grew out of the churches, not vice versa. We taught obedience to the great commandment of loving our neighbor in a practical way. A poverty program can aid
church planting if the two are integrated by the Holy Spirit. But churches dependent on charitable institutions are almost always dominated by the foreign missionary and seldom reproduce.

To start a group, missional community, or church that will multiply in the normal way in a pioneer field with no experienced pastors nor organized churches, take the following steps (change them where local circumstances require it):

1. Witness first to male heads of households. We often told them Bible stories they could pass on immediately, even before being saved, to their own family and friends. We went with them to show them how. But why male heads of families? We worked in a macho culture (right where the word macho came from, where men carried sharpened machetes and used them readily). Female leadership, right or wrong, limited the outreach of brand new works. Later, when a church was established with male pastor and elders, women could take a higher profile. Be sensitive to your community’s norms, especially in the first impressions you give of the church.

2. Baptize all repentant believers without delay (entire families when possible). At first I acted as though a big buzzard were perched on my shoulder just waiting to pounce on our converts that fell away; I delayed baptism to make sure they were “safe.” But I soon saw that the very reason many fell away was my distrust. That’s the funny thing about God’s grace; He wants us to let it slop over on the unworthy (Rom 5:20-21).

3. Provide a style of worship that new elders-in-training can lead and teach to others. Don’t invite the public until local leaders can lead the services. Celebrate the Lord’s Supper weekly as the center of worship, especially until local men are mature enough to preach in an edifying, humble way.

4. Organize a provisional board of elders as soon as mature men are converted. Show them how to win and pastor their own people right away. Remember, this is for pioneer fields with no experienced pastors nor well organized churches. We, like Paul, must use the best men God gives us as the churches multiply, or the new disciples have no leadership at all (Acts 14:23).

5. Enroll these new elders in pastoral training on the job. Don’t remove them from their people for training. Meet with them every two or three weeks (more often if possible) until they are mobilized.

6. Provide a list of activities planned for the congregation, starting with the commands of Christ and His apostles. Let everyone know where he is going and what he needs to learn for each activity. Use this as a check list to monitor the progress of the elders you train, in both their studies and pastoral work, as they mobilize their own people in ministry.

This is part of a 4-part Series by George Patterson called 4 Practical Ways To Multiply Disciples.

Much of what we do is not meant to add things to the schedule, but bring intentionality to the things we are already doing.

As a part of the Soma family, we often speak of living out our gospel identity in everyday rhythms of life (know the story, listen, bless, celebrate & suffer, eat, rest & work). In fact, much of what we do is not meant to add things to the schedule, but bring intentionality to the things we are already doing.

The following lists are a few practical examples of simple things you can begin doing to bring gospel intentionality to your schedule. Hopefully as you are reading through these examples it will spark ideas for your own life.

5 PRACTICAL IDEAS TO EAT

• Start a monthly dinner night at your house that has an open invitation for anyone that wants to to join and bring people.
• Find people in your church community who love cooking and get them to help others grow in their appreciation for fine food.
• Set a goal to have more meals with neighbors/coworkers than you are currently having. Talk it out with your MC and get advice one what is a good starting point.
• Make a schedule each month with the nights you want to host people for meals. Prayerfully consider who you will share a table with (neighbors/co-workers/MC family).
• Start a supper club with people in your neighborhood or network of relationships. Have each person in the club signup to host a night. Have the host share the recipe with the rest of the group when they come over. Spend time during the meal sharing things you are thankful for building in a rhythm of intentionality into your meals together.

CONSIDER – LEVITICUS 23, MATTHEW 6:11, 26:17-30, ACTS 2:46-47, ROMANS 12:13

Question: Do you have any other practical ideas to celebrate and suffer? Tweet us at @VergeNetwork or comment below.

This blog post was adapted from a post written on the Soma Blog. Visit the Soma Blog for more resources and view the original post here.

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He says, “I’ve spent pretty much most of my adult life being reasonably obsessed with trying to unlock the codes of what makes for highly transformative missional movements. I mean I’m talking about those type of movements in history that really get it done—Get ‘er done. Is that right? I mean those ones with explosive growth and high transformation where whole societies are impacted.

I’m pretty much obsessed with that and tried to understand what makes them tick. What factors have to come together? How can we learn from them? What does it say about the church that Jesus has designed us to be? All those things kind of come into play. With some reflective authority, I don’t claim too much, but I’d say I’ve done a little bit of learning in this, I’d say this categorically that one of the clearly, most demonstratively true aspects, the keys about these movements, one of them is that they are obsessed—yes, that’s the word I’d use—obsessed with discipleship and disciple making. In other words if you took discipleship out of the equation of these movements they wouldn’t have been.

Discipleship is critical. Discipleship is the means by which it all happens. Unless we get discipleship right, whatever we intend to achieve through the rest of what we achieve in missional movement is never going to happen. If we fail in discipleship, it fails.”

[ Part 1 ]

Children are found in gatherings of God’s people throughout the Bible… So our communities embrace and engage children of all ages.

From Genesis to 1 John, children are seen in gatherings of God’s people – including sitting through the multi-day reading of The Law (a feat assumed unthinkable for kids today?!) and hearing instruction written specifically to young ones. As The City Church has incorporated children into our community’s gatherings, here are benefits of embracing and engaging children.

Kids Reveal Sin

Would it be easier, less messy, and more efficient, to have adults-only discussion, dinner, or service? Yes. And we love things to be easier, less messy, and more efficient – if we’re honest, most of us would even like our faith to be that way. But God uses kids’ involvement as a practical display the real messiness of living in relationship with him. Kids break down idols, and God has used them to grow folks in patience and service.

Kids Ask Questions

To realize kids’ joy, to see them relate to parents and other “grown-ups,” to watch them grow, learn, and share, and even to hear their comments, questions, and take on faith has taught our adults, in a few directions: at times it’s reminded us of the simplicity of faith, which many of us have lost. Sometimes it challenges our own faith, as we have to take a few minutes (or days) and find answers to questions they ask. These are just a few examples; there are literally dozens of things our kids have taught us.

Kids Feel Valued

To engage a child’s question, to have someone close to them who isn’t their parent validate their struggle and speak gospel truth into it, and to see adults listen to and engage their own opinion are a few of the most encouraging ways adults can come alongside parents in encouraging kids’ growth. It displays to children that you find them important. On the other side of the coin, it’s difficult to be challenged by a child, and humbling to be rebuked – biblically! – by a teenager. But engaging them in conversation emboldens their faith and encourages their growth.

Parents Are Blessed

The African proverb is dead-on: “It takes a Village to raise a child.” On many levels, your own child “has to” listen to you. But as your community lives life together, kids learn to respect, obey, do life with, and bless other adults. Other adults help you see patterns in your kids or in your parenting that you don’t. They give you advice on situations you don’t know how to deal with. They practically help by watching your kid for a last-minute date night or emergency. They bolster, exhort, encourage, or challenge your decisions and discipline. This isn’t always easy – and if I’m honest, it’s not always fun. But these things and more will push you and your child toward God. Raising a child in community allows others to speak into your kids, and to come alongside you in raising them.

Non-Parents Are Discipled

Parents-to-be, newly-weds, and even college-aged men – many of whom had no idea what to do with children of any age – are now miles ahead when God blesses them with their own kids, because they’ve learned how to interact with, lead, get a laugh from – and even change diapers, and discipline! – the kids in our missional community. This provides much laughter for the rest of us, and has provided a mess or two as well. But on a deeper level, they’re being discipled in what it means to be a parent, or a parent of “the next age,” through hands-on practice instead of a parenting book or class. That’s life-on-life discipleship!

Bottom line, we see kids as part of the family, so we engage them in as much of the community’s activity as is logical.

While this varies a bit by each of our church’s communities, here are some “best practices” we encourage leaders to develop, as we engage kids in community well:

• As young as is logical, kids should be involved in the activity of the community. kids participate in the life of the community – with the obvious exceptions of things like wine nights, conversations on more risqué topics, events after bedtime, etc. But in serving, in biblical discussion, in prayer and requests, in giving, in loving neighbors, in dinners and hanging out, in mission, and in most everything else, we involve kids, age elementary and older, into everything that the rest of the community does. They understand, interact with, and have great thoughts on far more than we often give them credit for.

• We only separate kids younger than first grade for periods of actual discussion. Our communities see each other many times a month. But in the times they meet to discuss scripture or other deeper things, older kids stay involved, but we do send babies and preschoolers into another room. But it’s just for that period of the meeting: we eat together, we pray together, we talk about life together, we plan mission and activities together. So in reality, youngsters are only separate for 30-45 minutes during those meetings. For the record, we rotate every week: an adult or two leads kids in playtime and spiritual conversation. And we simply remind adults that every activity our community does is worship – worship involves caring well for the kids.

• It takes intentionality to engage kids well, no matter what age they are. This is honestly why most folks don’t include kids in their communities: it takes time and effort in advance, and patience and flexibility in the moment.
  • Engage kids in conversation. This is especially easy before and during our meals together: if we share a glimpse of grace we saw that week, so do the kids. If we’re discussing our day, they jump in too. And so on.
  • Engage kids in prayers and personal encouragement. They have real issues, struggles, fears, and concerns. It takes time, and it takes seeing others – and even seeing dad and mom – be honest about their imperfections, but eventually they’ll start sharing their own.
  • For older kids who are involved in biblical discussion, we intentionally draw them out: “what do you think?” or “what would you do?,” followed by an affirming comment, does wonders to a kid’s spiritual thinking. At times, we’ll ask them to read the passage. And at times, we’ll ask them to comment on someone else’s issue: “what do you think [your mom’s friend] should do in that situation?”

About The Author

Ben Connelly (@connellyben) lives in Fort Worth with his wife and daughters. He started The City Church in 2010 and lives on mission by teaching public speaking at TCU. Ben sits on the board of a few city-focused organizations, trains occasionally across the country, and writes in spurts at benconnelly.net.

“I had a history of violence both across the border and on this side.”

Marco Deleon was born and raised on the border of the United States and Mexico. Growing up, Marco struggled with everything from violence to drug abuse to theft. Through God’s redemptive love, Marco turns away from the Machismo culture around him in pursuit of a better life in Jesus.

 These stories represent everyday people doing everyday things on mission to advance the gospel in their cities. More stories here. 

Much of what we do is not meant to add things to the schedule, but bring intentionality to the things we are already doing.

As a part of the Soma family, we often speak of living out our gospel identity in everyday rhythms of life (know the story, listen, bless, celebrate & suffer, eat, rest & work). In fact, much of what we do is not meant to add things to the schedule, but bring intentionality to the things we are already doing.

The following lists are a few practical examples of simple things you can begin doing to bring gospel intentionality to your schedule. Hopefully as you are reading through these examples it will spark ideas for your own life.

5 PRACTICAL IDEAS TO BLESS

• Bake cookies and pass them out to your neighbors with a note that lets them know you are praying for them. Let them know if there is anything they need you are willing to help.
• Start a lawn mowing group of guys that spends one Saturday a month mowing yards of people who need the help (widows, disabled, elderly, single moms, people without a mower) in your MC’s neighborhood.
• Create a gift basket with goodies in it for people who’s work typically goes un noticed around you (trash men, janitors, food service people, mechanic, etc.). Let them know your thankful for them and you appreciate what they do.
• Offer to keep the kids of another couple in your community once a month so that they can go out for a date night.
• Leave a couple favorite grocery items of someone else in your MC’s on their front porch. Don’t tell them its from you just say its from the MC family.

CONSIDER – GENESIS 12:1-3, EPHESIANS 1:22-23, 2:8-10, 1 PETER 2:12

Question: Do you have any other practical ideas to celebrate and suffer? Tweet us at @VergeNetwork or comment below.

This blog post was adapted from a post written on the Soma Blog. Visit the Soma Blog for more resources and view the original post here.

Every man wants to succeed. But for so many, life seems to get in the way. We all have friends—good men, followers of Christ even—who start out well but before long, they’re failing at relationships, bending ethical standards, or driving themselves so hard at work they’re losing the hearts of their wife and kids.

Click here to view the embedded video.

About the Book

In The Real Win, Colt McCoy and Matt Carter wrestle deeply and personally with the challenges of being an authentic man in today’s culture, then deliver down-to-earth, biblical answers. Based on their personal experiences and a close study of Scripture, McCoy and Carter show men:

• Why so much depends on who you trust, and who you serve
• Why every man is called to lead, and why every man can
• How to man up to temptation—and conquer it
• How to find the “win” even in your biggest failure

“The real win means trusting the Lord and walking with Jesus no matter what,” write Matt and Colt. “That kind of faithfulness is possible for any man who follows God with all his heart. No matter what circumstances threaten him, a faithful man is the most truly confident man in the room.”

Free Download!

Download the first chapter for free!

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Get the Book

For more details on the book and to learn where to buy it check out, the Real Win website!

What Others are Saying?

“I can’t speak highly enough about the way this book addresses manhood in our culture. Biblically challenging and radically applicable, it honestly addresses the deepest longings and fears a man faces.”

Matt Chandler, author of The Explicit Gospel and Creature of the Word

“Men hate asking for directions a little more than they hate to read. It isn’t that we can’t read; it’s just that we need something that keeps our interest and gives us practical help. Welcome to that book. The Real Win will help you grow in your faith so that you can be the man God has called you to be.”

Darrin Patrick, lead pastor of The Journey

“We live in a world full of scoreboards. Matt and Colt have experienced both wins and losses, and I’ve seen them both want God more than all of it. They are men who fight well, and they will lead you to fight well. This is worth it. In The Real Win, Matt and Colt will move you from a life of striving to one of fulfillment, living for the God who has already won the ultimate victory.”

Jennie Allen, Bible teacher and author of Anything

Click here to view the embedded video.

He says, “We live in a day where is means almost nothing to be a Christian. According to research almost 4 out of every 5 Americans identify themselves as Christians…But in this group of self proclaimed Christians, less than half of them are involved in church on a weekly basis. Less than half of them believe the Bible is true. An overwhelming majority of them don’t have a biblical view of the world around them. So researchers went even deeper then to distinguish men and women who are ‘born again Christians,’ as if there’s any other kind of Christian. But these are people who say they’ve made a personal commitment to Jesus, they believe they’ll go to heaven, because they’ve accepted Jesus as their savior.

And according to research nearly half of Americans are ‘born again Christians.’ But you look at this group of ‘born again Christians’ and researchers found that their beliefs and lifestyles and virtually indistinguishable from the world around them. Many ‘born again Christians’ believe their works can earn them a place in heaven. Others think that Christians and Muslims worship the same god. Some believe that Jesus sinned while He was on Earth. And an ever increasing number of ‘born again Christians‘ just describe themselves as marginally committed to Jesus.

So people you can use data like this to conclude that Christians are really not that different from the rest of the world. But I don’t think that interpretation of that research is accurate. I think the one thing that’s abundantly clear from those statistics is that there are a whole lot of people in our country who think that they are Christians, but they are not. There are scores of people—here and around the world who culturally distinguish themselves as Christians and biblically are not followers of Christ.”

It’s the question we get in The City Church more than nearly any other. It’s a conundrum asked in both frustration and good humor. It’s one of the biggest enigmas in the missional community world. You’ve heard it; you’ve made up answers on the spot; you may have even developed a strong system for it.

But the question remains: “What do we do with the kids?”

A survey of the Bible’s teaching on how children were raised and trained in the community of God’s people reveals four overarching principles:

1. Parents are the primary disciplers of their children
2. Children are found in gatherings of God’s people throughout the Bible
3. Jesus valued children, even – or especially! – if they were distracting/unwanted
4. There are things about God that only children can teach us

Each of these four principles helps answer the “big kid question”; I’m explaining each over the course of four brief articles; this is the first.

Parents are the primary disciplers of their children… So our communities must equip and come alongside parents in raising their kids.

Focusing on the right things
The focus of a “kids ministry” shouldn’t actually be kids; it should be parents. Whether preschool or high school, the same principle applies: churches and leaders who put time, effort, money, resources, and intentionality into equipping parents instead of merely entertaining children accomplish two significant things:

• They help develop the whole-life spiritual maturity of the children
• They put parents back in the place the Bible places them.

Churches with Sunday-focused kids ministries spend 50-100 hours per year (of the 8,760 hours in any given year) with your kids. Minus vacations, sickness, and other reasons to miss, trained workers teach kids biblical concepts for an hour or two on Sundays. And even the most intentional churches might host a second age-specific gathering sometime during the week.

In those few hours, trained leaders must cram in entertainment, music, a snack, and often a Bible story that immediately transfers into a life lesson. “Discipleship and spiritual growth” become limited to a few hours a month, and generally limited to one “style”: in a group, with lots of energy, listening to a teacher teach a broad lesson.

What about the rest of the week?
But what happens in the rest of a child’s week when the teacher isn’t there? Who hears about getting made fun of on the playground? Who’s there to encourage the student in the midst of a specific high school struggle? If a child is in school until 4pm and goes to bed at 8pm, parents interact with their kids 1460 hours a year!

Parents see the daily struggles. Parents have conversations in the car. Parents are asked the hard questions. Parents deal with the specifics, the scenarios, the struggles, the sins. Parents meet their child – every single day – where the real-life rubber hits the road.

Those are the moments where faith is tested and proven. That’s the idea of developing a child’s whole-life: kid ministry leaders and missional community facilitators don’t see a kid’s whole-life, so they can’t develop a kid’s whole-life.

Putting Parents in Their Place

The fact that parents are with their kids more than church leaders isn’t scary, and the fact that church leaders can’t develop a child’s whole-life isn’t a bad reality: it’s biblical! It’s most clearly seen in Deuteronomy 6, as God gives one of the most well-known and beloved commands in the entire Hebrew scriptures:

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. – Deuteronomy 6:4-7

God doesn’t tell his people to farm spiritual instruction out to “experts.” And he doesn’t command them to limit it to a few hours, in a controlled setting, as parents often do today. “YOU shall teach them diligently to your children…” Who should? “YOU! Any reader of this passage. Every parent is instructed to teach God’s Law to your children!”

And the venue for this spiritual instruction is in the midst of everyday life and activity: when you sit, when you travel, when you go to bed, when you get up. In the midst of normal activity, a child’s whole-life spiritual development occurs.

Bottom line: parents, disciple your kids; leaders, equip parents to do so.

Parents, you’re the primary discipler of your child:

This principle isn’t isolated in the Old Testament – it’s echoed throughout the Bible. Giving that responsibility to “the church” is to abdicate your biblical role. That’s a dangerous place to be.

Church leaders, train parents:

When you focus on entertaining children instead of training their parents, you potentially prevent parents from fulfilling their biblical command, and you unintentionally limit children’s spiritual development. That, too, is a dangerous place to be.

Here’s one way this can work:
(NOTE: The City Church has tried various methods over the past three years, but here’s the one that seems to fit our church family best – we’re no experts, but I offer it in case it helps)

Every week our kid ministry leader sends a Bible story, memory verse, and questions (answers included) to parents, to read and discuss with their kids before our communities gather. In this way, our leaders equip parents, and parents are the first to introduce biblical concepts to their children. Later in the week, the community comes alongside parents in reinforcing the same scriptures – with new questions and activities – as young kids have their own discussion in weekly community meetings. We also host quarterly trainings and help parents disciple their children in various ways.

About The Author

Ben Connelly (@connellyben) lives in Fort Worth with his wife and daughters. He started  The City Church  in 2010 and lives on mission by teaching public speaking at TCU. Ben sits on the board of a few city-focused organizations, trains occasionally across the country, and writes in spurts at  benconnelly.net.

Click here to view the embedded video.

He says, “Talking to a guy last night, good friend of mine, great pastor, man of God, just going, ‘man,’ as we’re talking about rejoicing, ‘I honestly don’t remember the last time I just had joy doing ministry. It’s like I have to escape ministry to have joy.’ And as I thought about it I wonder how many of us in this room have just been in this survival mode. Because it’s tough. And making disciples is hard and this focus on discipleship is difficult. I mean, one of the most difficult things is you can spend so much time with one or two people and then they go off the deep end…And it’s not fun. You know where there’s other things in ministry that give the appearance of life and fruit…yet discipleship it’s difficult and can get depressing…So I would love to just pray a prayer of joy over you and really believe that that could happen, because God says, ‘Rejoice in the Lord always. I’ll say it again—Rejoice.’

<style=”text-align: left;”>And sometimes, even conferences can feel burdensome, because we hear all these messages of how we’re just doing everything wrong…I want this to be a time of rejoice, because remember who we are…God put His Holy Spirit inside of us! We’re temples of the Living God. We’re children of God. Almighty God is up there in heaven looking at us, His adopted children that he thought about before the creation of the world. And we can’t walk around with this lack of joy! That’s not what He wants for His kids. He wants us so blown away by His truths that with great joy we proceed…”

How do you find joy in difficult times of disciple making? Comment below or tweet us @VergeNetwork.