Problems Blocking Discipleship
Today, we’re going to start mining for some ideas that get in the way of our discipleship, which we’re not normally conscious of, and how they impact what we assume about “church.”
What if Church isn’t a Church?
The phrase “The Great Omission” may be offensive to some people. After all, to suggest that modern Christianity has basically failed to live out The Great Commission is a slight to church institutions and movements worldwide.
Certainly, the Holy Spirit works and moves as He wishes, and ministry and transformations are happening.
Though that wasn’t Dallas Willard’s criticism. As we’re going to explore in the coming weeks, the formation of someone’s heart (or their spirit or character) is a holistic, comprehensive, long-term, messy, transparent journey in community.
In all of Willard’s travels and conversations, he had seen little evidence of a church or institution that had a program, ministry, community, or intentional experience designed to help form someone to be kinder, gentler, more self-controlled, more at peace, less anxious, less angry, and more relationally shrewd once they came into the kingdom.
That’s probably why he wrote that genuine discipleship looks a lot more like Alcoholics Anonymous than what most of us experience in Christian environments today. Again, much of modern Christianity is focused on assimilating correct information, which may or may not contribute to character formation.
That begs a question a pastor reminded me of last week: if a genuine church is an intimate community designed to help us become more like Jesus, how many of our churches are… well… churches? Perhaps we come together for an hour to hear a sermon and sing a few hymns or worship choruses, but is that “church”?
I’ve written elsewhere that church leadership’s use of Hebrews 10:23-25 to guilt people into coming to their weekend event presupposes that whatever happens at that event is what the writer of Hebrews intended. I’m not so sure.
From my little perch, I’ve yet to find evidence that Willard was wrong in his assessment. I interact with a fair number of pastors and church leaders, and none of them has ever remarked, “Yeah, we have this discipleship thing down. We have so many people running around who love like Jesus, you’d think heaven was here on earth.” To a one, they share how difficult it is to make disciples in the modern era.
More than one of these leaders has expressed deep concern that what they view as a shallow, transactional version of Christianity has been exported from the West to the rest of the world.
The Three Primary Problems
So, if you agree with this assessment of modern Christianity (and you may not, but thanks for reading anyway), it begs the question: “Why?” Why is forming genuine disciples so elusive in the current era?
Over the next several posts, I’m going to share at least Three Primary Problems that are subtly but surely making our spiritual journeys that much more difficult. I’ll introduce them here: The Discipleship Dilemma, The Formation Gap, and The Forgotten Kingdom.
The Discipleship Dilemma
We will struggle to become more like Jesus if we don’t know two people very well: Jesus and ourselves. It’s a concept called “double knowledge.” However, in many communities today, the idea of spending the necessary time and energy to explore our individual hearts and stories is ignored, derided, or considered sinful.
Ironically, self-knowledge is assumed in every other intentionally formative environment.
When I was a kid, I had a talent for the piano, though I also wanted to become a professional singer. After years of taking lessons, singing in various groups, and working on my voice and not getting very far, my long-suffering mother finally remarked, “Brian, you just can’t sing very well. Stop trying to be someone you’re not.” She was right. A little self-knowledge goes a long way.
Marriage is arguably the most formative human relationship on the planet. Any pre-marital counseling worth its salt dives into the stories of the soon-to-be husband and wife. Ask anyone who married someone with little self-knowledge, and you’ll find a miserable spouse. The long-term journey of becoming one in marriage requires each person to know who they are as individuals in order to give themselves to the other.
You are a hand-crafted image bearer of the divine artist. You are worth knowing and exploring. And it’s an essential and wonderful part of our spiritual journeys.
The Formation Gap
To be formed like someone else, five key elements must be intentionally and abundantly present: time, habit, community, intimacy, and instruction.
The Olympics just wrapped up, and these five elements were on extraordinary display. If your daughter wants to become a professional gymnast, she will intentionally become part of an environment consisting of substantial time (early morning practices at the gym each week), specific habits (untold numbers of exercises and workout routines), community (with other gymnasts to build teamwork and accountability), intimacy (rock-solid trust built with team members and coaches over time) and instruction. If your daughter wants to be formed more like Gabby Douglas or Simone Biles, she’s about to embark on a five-element journey.
The same five elements are present in New Testament discipleship. Jesus embodied and manifested all five as He formed His followers to be more like Him.
However, many of us today live in the Formation Gap. Our institutions and communities may not intend to form us, or our frantic lives leave us with little bandwidth or energy to be a part of spiritually formative gatherings. We may experience one or two elements, but few of us are blessed to be a part of five-element communities.
The Forgotten Kingdom
If you were to line up ten people and ask them what the Kingdom of God is, chances are you’d hear ten different answers. I’ve done it. Some people think the kingdom is heaven. Others think it’s a spiritual reality with no impact on the physical or present world. Many believe the kingdom is the worldwide body of believers (the church).
Yet the Gospel of the Kingdom is the primary theme of the New Testament and hinted at throughout the Old. Often, the word “Gospel” is paired with “of the Kingdom” in the Bible.
So what gives? Why is the primary idea of the New Testament a confusing and cloudy concept to many of us? And when we say “Gospel,” what do we mean?
As we’ll explore, the Gospel of the Kingdom is all about purpose: Jesus’ and ours. If we don’t grasp the breadth and depth of the kingdom, we’ll struggle to become more like its king.
Nothin’ but Good News
These problems haven’t characterized every age, but they do ours.
Many people want to become more like Jesus, but don’t feel they have permission or guidance to do the deep work of mining their own hearts. Millions want to be disciples but lack the long-term, intentionally formative communities for which we’re designed. And if we don’t understand Jesus’ cosmic purpose and how that purpose was catalyzed through the cross and resurrection as He inaugurated His kingdom, we’ll struggle to determine how our stories fit into the grand narrative God has woven.
Here’s the great news: if we come together with Jesus and others to solve each of these problems, genuine discipleship is likely to explode.
That’s why I continue to write and why, I hope, you continue to read.
