29. Practitioner's Podcast: What Are We Multiplying?

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the practitioners podcast, but we're applying Jesus style disciple-making to every day life, this episode, and all of our episodes are powered by navigators church ministries, which focus on helping churches, make disciples who can make disciples for more information, or to get connected.

Check out navigator church ministries.org. Good afternoon, Justin. Hello, Tony. You know, it's hard for me to believe that this is the second to last episode of disease, a hood to get emotional about it. I'm getting a little weepy. How are you feeling? It's hard to put into words, all my feelings around this.

Oh, that's so good. I'm with you though. I can't believe that we're at 29 today, 29 today. And, you know, obviously we do 29 and then episode 30 and then we're done for the season. And, we still have a lot to pray about if we're going to come back next season. It may just be a two season show. We don't know.

You never know. I'm be a cliffhanger. The best way to make sure that, you know, if we come back as to hit that subscribe button, wherever you listen to podcasts, iTunes or Spotify, leave a rating or review really does go a long way to share about what God is doing on the platform. So a random question of the day you got one for us.

I do. All right. Here's the question. If you could, uninvent something, what would you uninvite. I kind of jokingly want to say the designated hitter. Cause I hate that rule in baseball, but that's a little too niche. So instead I'm going to say the cell phone. I wish we could. Uninvent the cell phone because I'm tired of having it all the time, even though I love it.

And I, I, I have like, I just have a very, like a mixed relationship with it. So yes, cell phone. That's what I would say. Yeah. So mine is similar. I would probably say the internet, which is a lot of the same reasons, like with the cell phone, the pervasive connectivity, et cetera, et cetera. But maybe, maybe I'm more feeling like wifi.

Maybe, maybe that's what it really would. I think, because I don't think I'd mind the internet, if it was. Early internet where you had to like be connected by wires. That one. Yeah. AOL that's right? Yeah. That one. So let me ask you this. Let me ask you this. How many tabs do you have open on your internet browser right now?

Right now? 5, 5, 14. That could have been a random question. We could have used that for next episode. Well, here we are. And now we get to jump into one of my favorite conversations. You see how it just blew past that? Yeah, I noticed that's okay. And we today, we're going to answer the question. What are we multiplying now?

This, if you missed episode 28 of this season, it's an episode right before this one, you might want to go back and listen to it. Because last week we talked about multiplication versus addition. So when we talk about addition and multiplication, justice, Justin kind of break that down. So, yeah, last time we talked about addition, right?

So just bringing people to faith versus multiplication, raising up new disciple makers who can then go and do the same. and we, we looked at the different ways that it scales, right? So addition, while at first glance, it feels like it's going a lot faster. Multiplication actually wins in the long run by a lot.

So. Yeah. And it's so important to understand that we are called to be multipliers as disciple makers. And today we're going to dive into a little bit more about who we're multiplying and specifically new disciples. Now, when we think about the idea of new disciples, what we're talking about are converts people who are coming into the faith for the very first time.

Justin, can you kind of root us in some scripture about where we find that. Yeah. So, one of the big scriptures that come to mind for me is, Luke 1910, where Jesus says for the son of man came to seek and to save what was lost. And so that's Jesus really identifying the reason that he's here. The reason that he came to earth was to seek and to save what was lost.

The. the people who don't know him, the people who are separated from God separate from the kingdom who have been, you know, if we get into a gospel narrative around it, have been buried by the weight of their sin and have no way to access a relationship with Jesus. Jesus came to change that and the disciples to then, and us today, that is our mission is to expand the kingdom of God.

All over the earth so that all, everybody knows that the opportunity that we have to know Jesus to follow him and to be changed by him. for all of you. I love that. And, and kind of, the term that we have for this is what we call three dimensional moment right? And it's this idea that momentum is always going to move outward towards a loss inward towards the church in downward, in the life of the individual believer.

Right? So outward toward the law. Inwards towards the church and downward in the life of the believer. Yeah, absolutely. And I think really, as we think about what are we multiplying, it's three things and really that three dimensional momentum I would put as one of those three things. New disciples or converts would be another of those three things.

And the third one is new disciple makers, which we've talked a lot about in the past, not only in season one, but also season two, that it's not enough just to make disciples when needed to make disciple makers. But Tony, one of the things that I think you and I have both found. in the church and even amongst disciple makers and disciple-making ministry is that sometimes the disciple making is only happening with other people who are already, Christians they're already, they already know about Jesus.

They're already following. And really the, the difference that disciple making is make makes, and those people's lives is the downward momentum in the life of that individual believer, because they are deepening their relationship with him. They're growing in obedience and then hopefully they're moving outwards to help others, but they typically move outwards to help others.

With other believers first, now it doesn't mean they stop there, although some do, but normally that's kind of where they start, in disciple-making and that's one of the dangers I think, in disciple-making ministry is that the, the vision for the loss, the heart for the lost ends up being lost and they don't actually get to, those that Jesus came to seek this.

Yeah. I think one of the things that happens is as Christians, we become super insulated and we also become super center center focused like me-focused right. And so the downward part of our individual believer is something that we always want to work on. And we want to help people, especially in, you know, in my tradition, in the Methodist tradition.

We love to talk about sanctification, which is great, right? It's this idea of becoming more like Christ. And when we make disciples, we're helping people become more like Christ. But sometimes I think we leave that a little bit short. So let me give you a great example. I was working with a pastor not too long ago, and we were talking about this idea about disciple-making and I challenged him and asked him who he was spending time with.

That was a non. Cause that that's a really good way to evaluate if you're going to multiply any new converts, any new disciples, people don't even know Christ. It starts with evangelism, right? Arguing places, spaces that non-Christians hang out. Do you have any friends that are non-Christians one of the questions that you asked me once that was really profound several years ago.

Are you being invited anywhere by non-Christians, you know, and that's a really good judge. If you've got friends who are, who are in that world, so then that's evangelism. And then once they come to Christ, then it's our job to walk with them as they learn how to follow Christ. And so I was talking to this pastor about this very concept and his response to me was.

Was a little sad, but not surprising. He said, Tony, I'm just, I'm too busy working in the church to be around non-believers. And what's so striking about that is that the entire reason the church exists is to reach non-believers right. So it's kind of like, it's this weird conundrum that pastors often find themselves in.

Hey, the church exists to reach the loss and yet. Find anybody who doesn't know Christ because we're spending all of our time in the building. Right? Yep. And I think Tony is not just pastors. I'm thinking of a conversation I had with a church leader who. Everyday sorta guy, he worked in a corporation of some nature, and I was talking to him about this same idea.

Well, who are the last people that you are loving on? Who are you spending time with? And he just kind of shook his head and he said, I don't have time for that. And I said, well, what do you mean? He said, well, you know, I get home from work at five. You know, close the garage, have dinner, see my family for a little bit.

And then I'm off to church three nights out of the week. And I don't have time to, and the other nights of the week, I'm cutting grass or I'm doing this or that I don't have time, to pursue or to spend time with lost people. And that was, again, just kind of the same thing that you're saying with pastures and, you know, I've had pastors tell me the same thing you were saying.

And I asked them, I said, well, what do you think Jesus would say to you? If you were telling him what you were telling me. and I, I, and I asked that in the even, I mean, it sounds kind of a harsh question. I mean, it's a hard question. Let's not get around that, but sure. But I wanted him to see that this reality that he accepted as okay.

And normal was probably something different from that. Yeah. I think one of the things that happens is, is that we forget that Jesus styled disciple-making. Is a disciple-making vision that reaches the lost, you know, it it's, it's a disciple-making vision. There reaches those that aren't yet here that reaches the, those that, that are out there on the fringes of life.

That it's, it's part of it. You know, when we think about Matthew 28, for example, and we go go there for and make disciples of all nations. Well, we're not going to get to all nations. If we're stuck in our same community. Right. And when you came to Dayton, you had an incredible vision about what God was calling you to, as far as your ministry here with, with navigators, church ministries.

I mean, you know, this is a great time to share that vision and how it's kind of come to play out through a couple that you and I both. Yes, Tony. So one of the things that was really deeply on my heart was this idea of not only reaching the loss, but that churches would become healthy so that they are sending people out to the loss, not only in their neighborhood and their workplaces, but beyond to the places of the world where.

 many people live and die without even knowing personally, someone that follows Jesus and, you know, in one of the churches, I pray for the churches that I'm working with specifically as well as globally. but one of them, I was praying that God would raise up someone to go to the nations. And I pray that for the, all the church that were good, but there was one family and one, couple that.

Over a period of about two years, start to discern a call as they began to make disciples and grow in their faith, that God was calling them to reach Indians. and so they took a survey trip to India. They continued to learn about what it meant to, To minister, to Indian people. And then they moved, they moved from our area locally and they moved to kind of the Dearborn, Michigan for Indians.

So Dearborn, if you know of Muslim ministry, Dearborn is the highest collection of Muslims outside the Muslim world. And in North Carolina, there's a place for Indian people that is really kind of, kind of a mirror of that. It is where a lot of them have, have moved and reside. And they're now there.

Reaching, the Indian people, they might be listening to it to us now, which is kind of funny, but hello, if you are. and so that's the idea, right? Is we want people to have a vision, not just for their church and disciple-making, but a vision for how they are going to be a part of reaching the nations from wherever they are.

Yeah. And one of the things that happens is, is when we decide to own the vision of reaching the nations, when we decide to own the vision of reaching out to the lost, what ends up happening is not only does the person who we're discipling change, but we change it. Right. Because obviously when I'm discipling someone who's in the church, there's a conversation there that begins with a very similar language.

It begins with the same similar culture, right? When I'm discipling somebody who's new to the faith. Right? My dear friend, Zach, for example, he came to the faith and then I immediately started discipling him. Now that relationship started because of a connection with his spouse and the church. But when he came into my office the very first time he was a pro self proclaiming atheist.

Right. And so then that journey of faith walked in with him. And w what, what became so profound is that I was able to sh disciple him after Jesus in a way that hadn't been. Church baggage with it. Right? And so it was a different way for me to disciple someone because I was starting from a different place.

The, the kind of the apologetics of it all are, are different. The language is different. The understanding is different. So, you know, when I'm discipling somebody who doesn't know, who's never known Christ. You got to start with. Okay. Here's Jesus. Right. And you kind of started the very beginning. You know, there are 66 books in the Bible.

Here's what it means. Here's the old Testament of the new Testament. And here's why numbers and Leviticus are hard. And, you know, we, you know, we're having those conversations. That are, are so much more foundational, but the good news is is that when you're the one who's building the foundation, it becomes a little easier.

So here's a great example. My main Zack is, a rockstar at scripture memory, right? And, and so he was memorizing scripture and it was great and wonderful and all of a sudden. He got really down on himself. He was like, man, I only know about 10, 10 verses of scripture. And I was like, dude, that's incredible.

He's like, but I bet everybody in the church knows a lot more than that. Right. And at that moment I had a choice to make as a disciple maker. I was like, I wouldn't say that. I wouldn't say that I took a very passive response, but it's because. It's because he doesn't have the church baggage that says I'm just a consumer in the church.

He doesn't, he doesn't know that there's a tendency to lean that way, if that makes sense. So him being a new believer changed the way that I decide. Right. And the other beautiful thing about that is he looks at you as the norm, right? Just as children look at their parents as kind of, they just assume that's normal, whatever that thing is.

And they just do it and roll with it. And the same thing with new believers that, you know, they tend to just look at the person that's investing most closely in them and view that as normal and extrapolate that out to everybody else. And so this. Yeah, I bet lots of people know way more than 10 in the church.

I mean, I only know 10, but he's not yet familiar with what the unfortunate normal is in most churches. And so that's an awesome story, but that idea, right? What do we multiply? What is the fruit of disciple-making ministry? I think it's new disciples, right? We have to be making converts new disciple makers and then that three dimensional momentum that Jesus style disciple-making produces.

And the beautiful thing about that momentum is that it moves so freely across all sorts of boundaries, right? Whether it's social, racial, economic, or political. The gospel and that momentum that Jesus style disciple-making produces, moves through all of it and can reach people wherever they are. Tony, what else do you have to say?

Or maybe we're ready for our takeaway and action step. Well, I think before we jump into that, there's one more thing I wanted to say, not surprising to you. I'm sure that I had another thought and it's around this. We oftentimes talk about what it looks like to have a more diverse church. And this is a conversation that I have with pastures regularly.

If you want a more diverse church, the first thing that we have to do is make a commitment to Jesus style. Disciple-making multiplying and reaching the loss because churches attract the communities that they're in and the styles that people are comfortable to disciple-making is relational. And, can cross boundaries freely, would that momentum that you spoke of?

So if we, if we talk about diversity in the church, it really begins at an individual disciple-making kind of relationship level. If that makes sense. Yeah. That's awesome. All right. Why don't you hit us with that takeaway and access action step there, Justin. All right. So our takeaway, is this Jesus down?

Disciple-making. We'll always move out toward the law. In towards the church and downward in the life of the individual individual believer again, JIA style discipling will always move out toward the loss to end toward the church and downward in the life of the individual believer. And then our action step.

Where are you? Positioning your. To reach unbelievers. Where are you positioning yourself to reach unbelievers guys, thank you so much for being here today. We so, so, so appreciate being on this mission with each and every one of you hit that subscribe button, wherever you listen to podcasts, leave a rating review on Spotify or iTunes, and Hey, the best compliment you can give us.

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