Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Practitioners podcast. 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.
Guys I'm so excited for today's episode because Justin is going to do most of the talking. Yay.
No guys today normally you like to be the talker so I'm surprised you're. Well I'm trying to lean into the opposite side of where I am. There you go. On Life Today episode part two episode 17 of the season. But part two of the bicycle illustration.
You might remember last episode we started with the front and the back wheel. We talked about how the power of your life as a disciple comes from your relationship with God. And the action step was to look at the air in your tires and download the PDF. Hopefully you've done both of those things before coming to this episode. If you haven't listened to part one yet the bicycle is really built from the wheels up but I'm bp so go back and take a look before we dive into this episode which is all about the frame who to invite how to invite what to do.
Justin take us into the frame. Yeah. So like you said yes the bicycle is built from the ground up the wheels but it's held together by this metal thing in the middle right this frame. And the frame is super important to a bicycle and it's super important to disciple making because how we frame disciple making is going to determine how it moves. Right.
What happens after and what happens if things go off course if it goes a little bit different than what you were hoping the frame is what's going to hold it together for you and it's going to provide stability for your disciple making relationship. Now the frame of most bicycles now there's different types of bicycles but most bicycles are held together by what you could look at as two triangles that kind of share one side together. And so we're going to be looking at these two triangles. One triangle is the small triangle the other triangle is the larger triangle. And we're going to start with this small triangle.
But let me set this up a little bit because these triangles really communicate into some of the most common questions that Tony and I get around disciple making. And some of those most common questions are you know what Tony mentioned at first like well who do I invite? How do I do that? Inviting what should I do? What does that conversation look like?
And underneath those questions is this you know it's really a discomfort or a fear of like this is going to be really weird. I don't know how to have this conversation to where either I don't feel weird or where the person that I'm speaking with doesn't feel like I'm saying that I know more than they do and so they should let me help them. And so we we want to work through that because there is a way to have these conversations that is natural and that is helpful to those that you're just you're about to disciple. Yeah I think one of the things that I often hear I was talking to a pastor in Georgia today about this idea and he was just like he's so nervous about how to get started with someone new. And I think a lot of us have a fear that we're going to mess this up when really it's it goes you know so much deeper than messing it up.
And God's redemption is like right on the other side of whatever we're going to do anyway. And so I really appreciate this framework because it gives us the ability to lean into it. Yeah nice nice work. Use of the word framework there too. I like that.
Well I was I was trying to I was trying to put in as many and then lean because we're going to talk about talents too. So it was like we're getting all of it. We're going to get all the puns today. That's right. All right.
So the first triangle answers the question who to invite? How do you know who to invite into a disciple making relationship? One of the most frequent mistakes that rookie disciple makers make is they invite people they should not be inviting. Right. They invite people who they're friends with.
They invite people who you know just seem to be those types of people that are going to say yes to anything they're invited to. And it doesn't mean you shouldn't invite someone like that. But there's some other considerations that we need to make before we invite someone. Right. So there's other not framework there's other filters that we need to think about before we invite.
And so this small triangle look at it as these three things that we need to be looking at. And we've talked about them before on this podcast. Right. Jesus style disciple making. The first thing you need to consider is is this person faithful?
And by that we mean are they faithful to the opportunities that are already in front of them? Are they you know showing up to the things that they say they'll show up to? Are they reading the word on their own. Are they asking questions? Are they you know going to church?
And you know if they're small group are they moving towards that sort of thing? All these things show faithfulness not only in their relationship with you. If you already have one which you may or may not but also in their relationship with God. You know one of the big verses that I think about is Luke 1610 on this says whoever's faithful with very little will also be faithful with much. And whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.
And so if you're handling those small opportunities well to grow in your spiritual life chances are you might be ready for more. But if you're not handling those small ones well giving more opportunity for growth is most of the time not going to end well. They're going to handle it the same way that they've been handling those other opportunities. Okay so that's the first side is faithful. Sorry.
The second one is a available. Do they have the time do they have the time to spend with you on a regular basis to invest in their own growth and development with the vision of helping others? If they're inconsistent with you the odds are they're not going to have the time to help somebody else because most of the time we're more interested in our own growth than we are in other people's growth. Okay so there's not much more I need to say on that. I think that's pretty clear right?
Are they available? Faithful? Available? The last side is a t teachable. Are they teachable?
Now there's some people that want to be discipled and they're faithful with their opportunities. They're showing up they're regular they're committed they're available for more but they're not teachable. And what I mean by that is these are the type of people that just love to talk and love to learn love to fill their heads but aren't open when somebody says well hey maybe you could do this instead. Or hey have you ever thought about this? Sometimes people are teachable to some people but not others.
In fact I had a friend of mine who this was about four months ago he was inviting someone to disciple him. And the guy a new believer was like yeah I might be open to that just not with you. It was like oh well that's hurtful. But he was not teachable with the guy that was inviting him. And so you know there's probably a better way for him to say that.
But those three things those three sides of the triangle. The small triangle faithful available teachable spells the acronym Fat. And so you've heard about that before on this podcast. You're looking for people who are faithful available teachable or in other words that they are fat. And we have an episode on that.
Of course if you want to dive back into it I think it's so important to start with the who. And then what I love about that is that that small triangle goes then right next into the bigger triangle which is how to invite. So the large triangle you're thinking about diving into a disciple relationship and how deep and personal it is and kind of that's kind of how that whole get started. So Justin take us into the large triangle. Yep.
So now you've identified someone who's fat. You've prayed about it. You feel like God is moving you to invite that person into a discipling relationship. So how do you have that conversation? How do you do it in a way that's not weird or that's not going to cause them to move away from you?
And that really sets up with clarity what it is you're inviting them to. And so here's the way that I do this and if you think about the big triangle right? Large triangle. There's three things and I want to open up by just sharing and being honest. Hey here's what I like.
I like to disciple people. Here's why. And most of us it's because we've been discipled or it's because someone else has been helping us learn how to do that with someone. And so I'm just going to be honest about that. But I'm going to ask some hey have you ever been discipled?
What's that like? Do you know what it means? You know et cetera et cetera. And normally they haven't and they're not sure of what it means. And so then I'll say well you know here's how I think about it.
Disciple making really involves three things. And get ready because these three things are the large triangles. The first thing is relationship building. And so just building a relationship together it's not teacher student. It's more of you know friend friend.
But you know I've I've done this before or I've you know learned a little more about it. And so there's some things that I know I'll be able to help you with but I also know that just from our friendship and our connection as people you're strong in some things that I'm not. So I'll be learning from you as well. But that first one is relationship building. The second one is life and ministry skills.
And so I distinguish these right. A life skill is anything that's going to help someone with their life and whether they follow Jesus or not. So it's things like how do I manage my money? How do I love my spouse? Well how do I parent?
What do I do with career and challenges at work? All these things are life skills that the Bible speaks to. But then ministry skills is anything that helps us follow Jesus. And so these are things that both are aimed at me so inwardly about my spiritual practices and disciplines but also things that help me follow him outwardly and communicating to others what it looks like to follow Jesus. So sharing our faith teaching others how to be in scripture those sorts of things is a ministry skill.
Okay so we have relationship building life and ministry skills. The third side of that triangle is character development. And character development is we're going to be close enough to one another to see things in each other that might be blind spots for us or that we might not even be aware of. And so we are going to love each other enough to lovingly and cautiously communicate those things to one another. Now I know in my own life that's been super important for my growth and development but I will explain those three things and then I'll ask them if they have any questions.
And then I'll say if they don't have questions I'll say well out of these three which do you think is most often left out and why? And most of the time they're going to tell me it's either character development or relationship building. And I listen to why they think that I affirm them. But I'm going to say well in my experience it's the third one. And the reason the third one is most often left out is because it's no fun on either side.
It's really hard on both sides actually. And so if I know I'm going into a meeting with someone that I care about and I'm going to share something with them that they might not be aware of and it's not positive about who they are I'm not excited about that. It's not going to be a fun meeting on the other side of that. And I've been on the other side. It's not fun because you know you're hearing something sometimes for the first time.
And even if it's not the first time it's like oh man I want to be better. I don't want to be that way. I want to be more like Jesus. And so it is most often left out. But those three things sets up the disciple making relationship.
I explain them and then again I'll ask. They have questions and then I'll say well this is the sort of thing I'm asking you to consider if you would want to be a part of doing this with me. And I don't put them on the spot. I asked them if they'd be willing to pray about it. And then I set a time you know hey next time we have regular time or in a couple weeks if I don't hear from you can.
Can we set up a time to get lunch or coffee or whatever it is? And then we come back to that conversation where they can respond. And what I'm learning about myself in this process is that I typically like there. There's one side of the triangle that you're better at than other right. So the relationship building is super easy for me and the character development is pretty easy for me because I like asking people tough questions.
But where I struggle the most is like that middle one about life skills and some of those kind of more practical and intentional parts of the triangle. What you'll learn about yourself as you dive into this larger triangle is that you have a side that's weaker for you and that weak side will be what you most often don't want to lean into in your disciple making relationships. And so you'll reflect that pretty commonly in those disciple making relationships. Yeah that's a really good word. Okay so those are the two triangles of the frame.
And if you set that up well and if you understand and apply those well it's going to set the course for your disciple making relationships such that if things get off course you can go back to those three things relationship building life and ministry skills character development. Hey I said we'd be doing this. How do you think it's going? And then you can you know assess and we have an episode. I don't.
Might have been last season I think on assessment. So look for that. But the next part of the bicycle as we move out of the frame are the brakes right? So every good bicycle has brakes. It's a little bit dangerous if you're riding around without one that has brakes.
But in disciple making brakes help us slow down or adjust the pace at which we're going. Right now. Oftentimes disciple makers want to go fast and we want to go fast and sometimes it gets too fast. And then what I mean by too fast is we're asking them to do things that they're not willing to do yet or we're giving expectations that they're not yet ready to meet. Now what it looks like practically is we show up into a meeting and are asking did you do X Y or Z?
Or we're asking them what they've been learning. They don't have anything. Or they're offering some struggle that they're having. And we're giving a cursory response to that so that we can get to our agenda. But in disciple making breaks are really important because we need to go at the pace of the spirit at the pace that the spirit is moving in that person's life because his agenda for them should be our agenda for them.
Right. And so we need to make sure that we aren't supplanting the spirit's agenda for our agenda. And so those breaks are really important. But also one other way that we can use the breaks and disciple making relationship is for us just on our end as disciple makers to reflect to sit down and stop and pray and just think about how is this relationship going? What have I seen happening over the past several months?
What are the things that this person has told me they're struggling with? Right. And doing a little bit of reflecting really so that you can have some wisdom and perspective about what pace is appropriate and how to move forward with that next step. And here's the other thing I'm going to tell you is that the brakes are super important before crashing. Right.
I know. We know that when it comes to riding a bike but when you think about balance when you think about the frames of the triangle when you think about the wheels the only way to fix when one of those things is off is to hit the brakes. So when you think about your back wheel or your front wheel or the small triangle or the big triangle if something isn't right if the triangle is cracked if the wheels are deflated all of that gets assessed and repaired in the stopped position. Right. So you're not going to be able to continue in the relationship.
And this this happens in a lot of marriages right. We try to fix things without taking the time to actually stop. But if you're discipling someone and you care about their heart stop stop and assess and look at it. And if you got to fix it fix it. The breaks are a lot more important than most people think because we're always go go go.
But sometimes the best way to go forward is to stop now. Yeah. Well said okay the next step in the next piece of the bicycle that we're going to talk about is the seat and the handlebars. These are often easy to overlook because they're so obvious of what they're used for. But in disciple making I want us to think about them about how.
How our posture is in that relationship. How are you sitting? How are you handling this handlebars which really relate to steering right? So way that we steer is by moving those handlebars. Are we gripping them with a death grip because we're trying to control it too much?
Are we open and just holding them comfortably because we are comfortable with where this is going because we trust that God is leading us. Right. And so one of the things that I think about here is am I discipling this person with God or for God? Right. I want to be doing it not not just for him of course for him is okay but principally I want to be discipling someone with God.
I remember this person is God's disciple. He's not my disciple. Right. If they're following me more than God that's a problem. They need to be eyes set on Jesus primarily.
And my posture in that is really really important. Right. So I want to be sitting up into that relationship in a way that is a presence that Jesus might have with them. I'm not trying to push them so hard that they get worn down and frustrated with who they are how God's created them. I don't want to be so hands off that I'm not steering at all.
You know imagine taking your hands off of those handlebars. I mean some of us can do that. I'm not one of them. But you can ride without hands on the handlebars. And some people even turn that way but it's not the best way to do it.
Right. So with this idea of the seat and the handlebars how is your posture in the relationship? Remember that fruitfulness follows faithfulness. And so are you faithfully stewarding what's happening in this disciple making relationship? The way that you are engaging in the way that you're showing up in that disciple making relationship?
And then the final piece is destination and vision. And so you know just like as a bicycle you are moving somewhere you're purposeful and you have your head up because you're looking at what's coming right? And so if you do this well on a bike you can see obstacles coming. You can steer around them you can slow down you can speed up when appropriate. And so that destination and vision is really important that you have it clear in your mind.
There's lots more we could say about that but we're going to leave it there. And the next time that we're together we're going to get into where all this pivots. Right? So you've heard about the bicycle and remember where we started last episode? It was why aren't more christians making disciples?
And one of the things that christians say is they don't know how. Nobody's asked them to do it. Nobody suggested it to them. At the end of this episode I would suggest that none of you can say that we have told you how we have suggested it and we're asking you to think about it. So at least at some level you should have.
All right Tony I've been talking a lot. Can you wrap us up and take us out of here? Absolutely friends. That's our podcast episode for today part two of the three part series the Bicycle. The takeaway.
Disciple making doesn't have to be weird or awkward. It's held together by proper framing. That's right. Remember we talked about the big triangle the little triangle? You need to go check out what those mean.
Your action step. Memorize the triangles and go and download the PDF. If you haven't listened to these episodes with the PDF in front of you you're really missing out on a resource that will help you make disciples. Who can make disciples? You can go to justingravitt.com to get your PDF today.
There's also a link in the show notes. Don't do it while you're driving. Wait till you're done. Make sure it's in there. Get your copy today.
And until next time continue to go and make disciples who make disciples. We'll see you real soon.