Making Disciples - Instruction

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Matt 28:18-20

I bet you’ve heard this passage before. Maybe you’ve even memorized it. They were the last words of Jesus as recorded by Matthew. When anyone wants to talk about reaching the lost, this is their go-to quote. Of course, it is a call to evangelize. But “making disciples” means so much more than just calling people to repentance and trust in Christ. As Jesus said in this same sentence, we are also supposed to be “teaching them.” As we observed in my previous article, teaching involves not only classroom-type instruction, but also modeling and apprenticeship. This leads to disciples in turn making other disciples (2 Tim 2:2). For this article, though, let’s just consider the instructional aspect.

What should the instructional facet of discipleship include? Although not every group of disciples will learn and grow in exactly the same way, there is definitely some basic education every group would—or should—gain. Obviously, learning the basic concepts of Christianity is essential. This includes the Good News, why it’s so important, and how Scriptures point to Christ. Notice that this is how Philip taught the Ethiopian eunuch, who already studied and knew the Old Testament (Acts 8:35). These days, we tend to skip over such instruction in a rush to make converts, although Jesus told us to count the costs before deciding to follow Him (Luke 27:14-33) and the early church required converts to go through instruction prior to baptism (Monroe, 550).

Such basic instruction is great, but we must be careful not to get trapped there. By nature, we tend to stick with the familiar: rehashing the basics of Christianity, looking at it from various angles and authors. Biblically, however, we should be delving much deeper into the mysteries revealed by God. As the writer of Hebrews explains, we need to move on from milk to solid food. He considered elementary teachings to include “repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment” (Heb 5:12-6:2). Wow. If this is elementary teaching, what would advanced teaching look like? Well, the Bible doesn’t have a checklist, but it would include extensive training in both Old and New Testament scriptures (2 Tim 3:16-17), spiritual development (Col 1:9-10), solid doctrine (Titus 1:9), basic apologetics (1 Pet 3:15), evangelism (Rom 10:14), spiritual gifts (Rom 12:6-8), and—I would contend—church history (to learn about the great “cloud of witnesses” who went before us, Heb 12:1), among others.

I know what you’re thinking. Whoa, that’s quite a list! It could take a lifetime to go through all of that in any detail. No kidding. Discipleship is not an overnight process. And guess what: none of us will become an expert in every area mentioned above. But, at the very least, we should be getting the basic instruction we need in those areas.

Having said all this, we must remember that the goal is not just memorizing information. It is transformation. Discipleship involves a complete renewing of our mind (Rom 12:2). We must combine instruction with the other discipleship aspects of modeling and apprenticeship, which we’ll tackle in upcoming articles.