Alan Hirsch emphasized recently that:

Christ followers need to reestablish their core task as making
disciples--discipleship. Discipleship, training others to follow Jesus, is such
a core task that we should not envision the church as having a mission of
discipleship, rather we should see the mission of discipleship as having a
church to support it.

Discipleship is important for several reasons:
1. discipleship determines the quality of spiritual movements
2. whatever substitutes for discipleship is what the church looks like (in
America, for instance, consumerism commonly gets substituted for discipleship so
instead of making disciples, we work to satisfy consumers)
3. leadership is an extension of discipleship; the type of leaders you have
is determined by the disciples you are making.

In summary, Alan said we need missionally responsive, culturally adaptive, organizationally agile, and multiplication minded disciple makers. These types of disciple makers will create a movement that was characteristic of the first century church as well as the church in China in contemporary times. Although many say there are no widespread examples of this type of movement in North America, some small group networks at least have potential to morph into a widespread disciple making movements. Do you see this happening anywhere? And, if not, why?

Interesting idea...When Jesus was commissioning His rag tag gang of followers, He used what in Greek is called an "aorist tense verb" for "Go" meaning that "While you are, as you are going" do these things. Make disciples. Baptize them - and teach them about Me! Everything else is gravy.

borrowed from Craig Groeschel's blog...here are some good self-check questions as a Christian Leader:

Today we’ll examine some questions that surround our Relationship with Christ.

1. Is my burden for prayer growing or diminishing?
2. Does my heart break for the things that break the heart of God?
3. Have I grown accustomed to or accepted sin in my life?
4. Am I doing ministry out of an overflow of God’s work in my heart or out of my own strength? 5. Has my teaching and ministry deepened, changed, or evolved in a positive way in the last year?
6. Do I have a sincere peace that I’m living an authentic life of spiritual integrity?
7. Is my heart growing larger for people and God or is it shrinking?
8. Am I closer to God today than I was a year ago?
9. Do others comment that they can clearly see evidence of God’s work in my life?
10. What did I learn in God’s word this week?

Which of these resonate with you? What else would you ask?

The internet has rocked the way the world communicates. First we had antique-feeling dial-up to access our Juno/AOL/Netscape email. Then faster connections made email a common thing. Then chat rooms replaced coffee shop social gathering. Faster connections and familiarity gave way to instant messaging. Now it's crazy to not have 2-5 email addresses, a personal homepage, a profile on "social networks" (facebook, myspace, etc.), to share pictures and videos via the web and to communicate into the void of humanity with things like Blogs, Vlogs, Twitter or whatever comes next.

The question is always: does the medium or mode of communication get the job done. Is it truly improving our progress towards relational or general goals, or is it just adding more "stuff" we do? It's the same question we have to wrestle with as Christian leaders: do the programs and things we spend time, money, hours and mental energy on truly fulfill the commission of the Church (big C)? If not...why are we doing it?

So, my "bluzzle." It's a new term I'm copyrighting. That and it's root form, Bloguzzle. Combining "Blog" + "Puzzle." Blogs are a puzzle to me. Sometimes blogs start grassroot movements across normal borders - triggering daily "hits," countless "comments," and facilitating a dynamic discussion of ideas without the hindrances of time and location. Others become little more than a person talking to themselves, letting faint echoes register as conversation.

Which brings me to the Bloguzzle of this particular site. To date there have been about 1,400 "hits" or visits to this site. People from over 14 countries and more than 10 states have perused the content. Pretty cool, right? Sure, it sounds good. But, there are really about 5-10 people who frequently touch base and see what's happening. Yet, while there are 1,400 visits, less than 50 "comments" have been made. More than a dozen major postings, but little actual conversation. The cyber crickets are beginning to drowned out even the delusional echoes so common to blog sites.

The Bloguzzle begs a question: is a "blog" and this particular expression of a blog effective for our purpose of pursuing discipleship? Does the content truly help you in our joint cause? Does the format truly facilitate helpful exchanges of ideas? Is this addressing a need effectively...or, is it a worthwhile experiment that has failed to have results justifying its continuation?

In the Love & Respect marriage study we're doing right now at Grace Point, Dr. Eggerichs describes how "crazy" it would be for a person to stand at a wall flipping a switch up and down endlessly when the lights are obviously not coming on. He describes the lunacy of that scenario as an illustration of the craziness we often times live out in relationships and efforts - doing the same thing over and over expecting results that are obviously not coming. Is this bloguzzle a sign of the wrong light switch or just some other issue?

YOU are the litmus papers of this lab study. Pink or blue? Good or bad? Valuable or just "okay"? Let me know.

Paul says in Hebrews to loosen yourself from the "sins that so easily ensnare you" so that we can run more fully and freely towards Christ. Sometimes it's not just "sin" we have to loosen ourselves from, but less than effective investments of time and energy. It's a healthy leadership practice: to periodically run inventory on how you're stewarding the time God has given you for the purpose and life He calls you to.

Thanks,

Mike