The subject of discipleship, both being discipled and discipling others, can be a strange and uncharted territory for some believers; and for others it can be territory that is filled with challenges.  The purpose of the Discipleship in Life  Blog is to help clear up the mystery, and to assist with helpful information and ideas, so that the believer may have a beneficial experience with discipleship.

    Since there are already many ideas and articles regarding discipleship, I won't add to the multitude except to provide three simple observations that may prove to be helpful.  First, discipleship is about conveying information - but not exclusively about conveying information.  Often we think that reading a book or attending a class is what being a disciple is all about.  We value information and we have include much of this information in our main site, Discipleship 101, to help meet this need.  But there is more to discipleship than aquiring information and then passing on that information to new believers.

    This is where the second observation is so important: discipleship is about interactive personal contact with another human being.  The most effective discipleship is one-on-one interaction with a newer believer in order to foster growth in their spiritual life.  This form of lifestyle discipleship is designed to let the new believer see what the walk of a dedicated believer is all about.  It means that a newer believer learns by observing how you deal with a multitude of situations, and from these examples they can learn how to live-out their faith in God, in their daily walk of faith.

    It is important to understand that we do not make disciples for ourselves, but rather we assist other believers to become the reflection of Jesus that they were intended to be.  This means that we do not indoctrinate them into dogma, but rather we model the Christian walk, we answer their questions, we pray often for them, and we become involved with their life.  This is the type of spiritual activity that can make you very vulnerable, for new believers will see that you are not perfect, but human.  It is not so much a matter of missing the mark, as it is a matter of how do you handle a situation when things are not perfect.  In this sense it is a lot like parenting.  No one is a perfect parent, but the children can learn positive lessons from how parents handle the various situation that come into their lives.

    I hope that the prospect of opening your life up to another person has not deterred you from pursuing discipleship, because the third observation is very important.  While you are out there, putting yourself on the line, exposing your flaws to another person; you are also learning from the person that you are ministering to.  It is a two-way street that occurs - when you give, you get.  In God's economy both parties win and gain valuable spiritual growth.  

    This Blog is for the expressed hope of promoting spiritual growth, and we ask you to comment on our teachings, to share your personal discipleship experiences, and to ask questions that may not have been covered in the material provided.  It  is our hope that Discipleship in Life may become a tool that will allow others to share their discipleship experiences, with the expressed hope to encourage and equip others to join the team.  Please feel free to send your comments and questions for posting.  I will leave you with the following scripture that expresses our mission, Ephesians 4:11-16 NLT:

   
    Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.  Their responsibility is to equip God's people to do His work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God's Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ. Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won't be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of His body, the church. He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.