Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Practitioners podcast where we're applying Jesus style disciple making to everyday life. This episode and all of our episodes are powered by navigators church ministries. For more information or to get connected go to navigatorschurchministries.org. Friends today we are going to try something a little different a little out of our comfort zone.
Normally when Justin and I hit record we have already kind of put together an outline for what we're going to talk about. And we were very intentional about making sure that we bring you the most amount of content in the least amount of time 20 minutes or less. If you've been with us you know that this is kind of our model and the architect of that model is Justin. So today Justin came up with this great idea that we should have the conversation about today's episode while we're recording. So this is IRL in real life in real time.
Justin why don't you tell us a little about the episode itself and what we're going to dive into? Yeah. So the episode itself is does everyone always need a disciple maker? Does everyone always need to be discipled? Now Tony I don't even know.
We haven't talked about it. As you just said we're doing this kind of live and I don't know where you stand on this but you've probably heard and maybe you've said that hey everyone should be discipling someone and everyone should be being discipled by someone. And it's spoken as like this normal thing that everybody should have these things in their life not just for a period of their life but always in their life. And if you're not being discipled you need to find someone to disciple you. And you know it should be kind of an ongoing thing.
and I'm just not so sure about that. You just got to drop the bomb. Okay? You're not so sure about that. So.
So here's the thought that I've said before. Everyone needs a Paul and everyone needs a Timothy right? Because when we look at Paul and Timothy's relationship if you read first and second Timothy clearly what you see in the text is Paul is the elder statesman and Timothy is the man who is up and coming in the faith and in the ministry. Paul is discipling Timothy. Now here's where all I'm going to lean in a little bit on this.
I believe that every person needs mentors or disciple makers in their life but I think how the relationship looks is oftentimes nuanced. Oh my gosh. My dog keep going. That's never happened. And I record a lot of podcast episodes.
The dog is freaking out. My apologies. Okay so let me just say this again right. Every person needs to have people in their life that they can reach out to when they have something that they need to sort through. And I'm going to say that maybe it's not as intentional as beginning disciple making but it is intentional.
What do you think? Yeah so I think that the problem I have when people talk about that is we always need someone to disciple us or we always need a Paul in our life as if you know we need to paul in Timothy. Well that was a disciple making relationship just as you just said. Right. But I think it comes back to a lack of clarity on what disciple making actually is.
Right. So I think it would be laughable in Jesus day and time for someone to say you always need a rabbi discipling you. Because I think what we've seen and we've looked at it previously this season is that the purpose of the rabbi disciple relationship was to prepare the disciple to become just like the rabbi and to go out and be a rabbi and be discipling others. Now I don't believe that at that time when the disciple became a rabbi that he cut off all ties with all the other rabbis and like lived independently and all that sort of thing. But I don't think this idea of being a perpetual disciple in a discipling relationship of course we're perpetually disciples with Jesus but I don't think that would have made any sense at all in Jesus day and time.
But I do agree. I think it is like yeah we need people in our life that hopefully are a little further along than us that we can go to and continue to learn from. We need others in our life that are kind of near or at the same place as we are both as spiritually so but also just in life. Right. But I think it gets it communicates some things that make me pretty uncomfortable when we say no.
We always need somebody discipling us. Well I think this goes back to your very exact definition of what disciple making is. And if there's one gift that I've gotten from you over the years it's that you've really leaned into what that is in terms of what we call disciple making and what we don't call disciple making. And so there are lots of people who I've discipled over the years who are still in my spiritual family and I will never get rid of them but they are no longer actively discipling them. Now they're actively discipling other people hopefully.
But on occasion there comes a point in our relationship where I just check in on them. Like I would kind of like an elder parent for example. My dad is still really active in my life and so we check in although he's not really actively parenting me anymore. And I think that that's probably the model that is beneficial for when we think about how to transition someone from being that active discipler to being more of that spiritual parent to an adult child. Does that make sense?
Yeah I think that does. Yeah. And I'm really comfortable with that. Right. Because like you do and like we try to do on this podcast right.
Is we try to think about well what is Jesus example in this? But also what does scripture have to say right? So I think of the Bereans or the Thessalonians and acts and the the Bereans have more noble character because they examine the scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true. And we want to do that too. Right.
So I try to think about well you know what was the example that we have in scripture around this idea that everybody if you're following Jesus well someone should be discipling you as a consistent ongoing sort of thing not just a thing that helps you during a season. And it's probably a long longish season right? Maybe three years maybe five years something like that. But in the grand scope of your entire life that's not really going to be a lot of time. Let's hope right?
Let's hope that you're around for decades. And so when I think through scripture I don't see any indicator that that should be a consistent thing that it should be a long long term thing in a believer's life. Tony do you have any verses that come to mind that that would indicate one way or the other to you? That. No I was trying to think about some of the texts that we see in the New Testament.
Specifically John gives us a really interesting viewpoint. If you read the gospel of John and then you go to John's letters you see John's maturity in the text and clearly in the gospel he's underneath Jesus's teaching. But then when we get the first second and so forth when it comes to the book of John right like and even revelation what you begin to see is he becomes the elder statesman. So I would say that there comes a point in John's ministry where he's more just working side by side with the Holy Spirit and less with somebody who's actively discipling them. And I think that that's probably I think that's probably a good model for most of us.
That's that's ten to where I lean at this point. You know you and I still meet regularly to talk about life. I wouldn't say that you're actively discipling me anymore. Right. Although you were you were for a season.
Like we were in it. Like we were going through the tools. We're doing all those things. But now you you sit on something that I've created internally called the the counsel of the godly. Right.
And I think you've heard me talk about this before Justin. I don't know if our listeners have but I imagine in my head that there is this justice hall type of table like from the Justice League. Just so we're all clear about that. It's a long superman right? Absolutely.
And wonder Woman and Aquaman the DC universe. Right. And it's only because they have a league. And in my head it's the hall of justice. Right.
But I call this the hall of the godly and this is the counsel of the godly. And so around this table are godly men and women in my life who I go to for certain parts of my walk. Right. And so instead of like instead of saying there's one person who's pouring into me instead I have like like a plethora of people that are pouring into me whose counsel I value because of where they are in their walk with the Lord. And so to be clear you don't get to go to come to the table unless you're walking with the Lord.
And I'm not going to come to you about something specific unless you're walking with the Lord. And every person on the council has kind of a different role. Like one of the things that I just deeply appreciate about our relationship is that you always challenge my intentionality and my thoughtfulness through a process. Right. So if I'm thinking through something that I know is going to be multiple steps when I think about who I want to talk to on the council on my counsel of the godly I want to talk to you.
I want to talk to you about that. And this is kind of how I get my spiritual mentorship needs met or my kind of disciple making needs kind of focused. So that's kind of the way I think about it. Justin how does that idea of a counsel or having multiple godly people in your life resonate with you? Yeah I think that's that's absolutely scriptural.
Right. So proverbs 1522 plans fail for lack of counsel but with many advisors they succeed. I know you weren't just talking about planning there but you know I do a similar thing. I don't have as cool of a imagery around it but the idea of having people that I go to for specific things to help me in my faith and help me in my walk and you're the guy I go to for relational questions. Hey got this thing.
Not sure about it. Here's what I want to do but is that going to be weird or is that going to be whatever? I think that's definitely scriptural. I think it's fits with what we see in the people's lives in the scriptures right? So we see Paul like I see Paul early on in his ministry.
Like he goes to Jerusalem and meets with James and Peter and the other elders and he doesn't say he's going for their stamp of approval but there's certainly a deference to them. And later on he makes it really clear that hey I'm not deferring to them. I want to be real clear like I'm not. I'm not answering to them right. That there's a co equalness that he seems to prese in that text of like hey you know I stand with them I don't stand below them.
And we're partners in ministry here. And oftentimes he refers to others as co laborers in ministry. And so I think at some point when we reach a place of maturity or yeah I mean maturity is the best way to say because even as adults like we can say we're mature but we all has. Have areas of immaturity still. That's right.
We all have areas that are like hey we really should grow there or it's a weakness or however we want to say it. And I think the same is true as disciples. Now even with my areas of immaturity I don't need to move back into my parents house and have them watch over me you know as intensely as they once did. And my dad is still really involved in my life like yours. And you know I value that really highly but it's more of a friendship a co equal sort of thing.
But I'm still giving that respect to him and honor because he is my dad and that will always be the case. Now here's where I want to lean in on something that I think is important to note is that even though you may have kind of achieved a certain level of maturity where you don't need an active discipler. And I think that you and I are kind of in the same place on that. What I would say is this is that if you aren't actively introducing new practices to follow Jesus into your life then you're probably not mature. And so if you aren't growing if you aren't moving like it can't always be the same way that we follow Jesus.
Jesus following Jesus. When Jesus calls us to follow him he's calling us to a life of perpetual movement. And that's both physical movement in terms of like actually doing practices spiritual movement our depth and our intimacy like the work of the relationship. Even in a mature relationship it's still movement. My wife and I have been married for 21 years.
If we stop dating it's still going to have a detrimental effect on our marriage if you stop leaning into your disciplines with Jesus. So you may need to put some people in your life who challenge that. Who challenge that. Or you may need to read something or listen to podcasts. There are so many tools that we can use to kind of continually refine our maturity.
And I've been in the local church for a long time and one of the things that I've heard for years is that old people don't like change. You've probably heard that too. I've heard that old people don't like change. I actually don't think that's true. Instead what I like to say is we often get out of practice.
Of change. And so the practice is what makes us. Nobody likes change. Nobody likes change. But when you're young and you've got kids who are growing and changing all the time then guess what?
You've got to change. But when you become more mature and no one's forcing you to change you get out of practice. Yeah I think that's a good point. And I think you really. In this episode so far we're talking about a few different things that all connect to each other right?
So we have this idea of hey we need to continue to grow and to move. We need to have that movement towards maturity. And if we ever stop moving towards maturity or hungering towards that something's a little bit off in us right? Or something's off with what we're doing or thinking. We have this idea that connected to that is those around us like you mentioned your counsel.
So who's around us that can help us grow in a particular area? And are we committed to really loving others and being loved by them in such a way that they're close enough to see where we need growth and also we're close enough to see where we can help somebody else grow. Right? This is what I would call fellowship or community. Like this is part of being part of the body in the kingdom is we need to do that.
And if we're not we're not being like Jesus right. But also it connect. That connects back to this idea. If we have a lack of clarity around what disciple making is then we start labeling disciple making lots of things that aren't. And we start to get confused about what it is disciple making is to be about and what it's for.
And that's the that's really the beginning point of the episode for me is like hey I don't think we should be out there saying hey you should always have someone discipling you and you should always have someone that you're discipling. Now I think the last part of that I wouldn't even say always on that we should always be ready to disciple. But there might be a season where we're in between. And even if that's the case we're looking and we're praying and we're actively moving towards that. But it's on the other side right.
I don't think we should always have someone discipling us. We should always be close enough to people that they see us and are investing in our growth as another brother another sister in Christ. And we should be doing that with others. And so for me this is like it's important but it's not. It's one of those things that's like important to me because words really matter right?
And we talk about that a lot. And if somebody doesn't have a depth of understanding around what disciple making is and we're talking about hey you should always have someone discipling you that can put a belief really down deep into them that changes a whole lot about their own spiritual development more than anything. Friends our hope is that you continue to refine what it means to be a disciple maker in the context of Jesus style disciple making. And this is what this podcast is all about. This is what Justin and I kind of lean into when we talk about this.
And so many of us get distracted not intentionally there's no malice intent or anything like that but we just get distracted because we let our definitions get way too broad. And in that broadness we lose the depth of effectiveness. And I think that that's really important. And so Justin any closing thoughts before I give us the takeaway and action step. No.
Although I think our experiment worked okay here so we'll. This was a good conversation. We didn't. Yeah I thought so too. Yeah.
Minus the dog incident which has never happened but it's fine. Bruce Wayne is the dog's name so maybe it was fitting he knew we were talking about the Justice League. Anyway there you go. The takeaway and action step which by the way I wrote in the middle of the episode while Justin was talking the takeaway. You may not always need an active discipler but you do need people in your life to speak God's wisdom.
Right? You may not always need an active discipler but you do need people in your life to speak God's wisdom. Action step. Evaluate your counsel and evaluate your definition of disciple making. Evaluate your counsel in other words who you're gaining wisdom from and evaluate your definition of disciple making.
Friends as always it's such a privilege and an honor to be with you on this journey. If you have any questions at all how to get in contact with us is in the show notes. We're embarrassingly easy to find and we look forward to connecting with you guys real soon.