Part 1 -- The Discipleship Arm Dance: Overview

5 Pentecost 2013

Father Adam Trambley

June 23, 2013, St. John’s Sharon

The Discipleship Arm Dance – Part 1: Overview

Jesus was baptized by John.

He came up out of the water.

He received the Holy Spirit.

He heard the voice of God, “You are my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

He went into the wilderness.

He defeated the devil.

He came out of the wilderness.

He announced his purpose.

He chose four others.

He taught them everything they needed to know.

He sent them out.

When I was in Mexico last month, I met a man named Mark Geppert.  Mark has prayed through many

Pastor Mark Geppert

place of the world that have not received the gospel or where Christians are persecuted.  He has been in jail in seven different countries.  He started an organization called South East Asian Prayer Center, and is helping spread the gospel and do gospel work like feeding people, starting orphanages, providing medical care, and doing microeconomic lending throughout Southeast Asia, while also supporting those efforts with partners in other parts of the world.  Today he is leading prayer teams in places like Northern India and the Himalayas where there are people groups who have never heard of Jesus and do not yet have the Bible translated into their language.  And, by the way, he grew up and lives in Pittsburgh.  So you can live in Western Pennsylvania and make a difference throughout the world.

Mark showed me this set of motions to describe the beginning of Jesus’ ministry as a process for discipleship of non-Christians.  We are called to follow Jesus, and his life and work provide a template for our own work of evangelism and discipleship.  We can do what Jesus did, and then invite others to do what Jesus did, and to help them become followers of Jesus, too. 

Pastor Bob Logan

Mark didn't have a name for this Macarena for Jesus, but I've been calling it the discipleship arm dance. Part of why I like it is because we need something like this to help us.  Almost nobody in the Episcopal church really knows how to disciple non-Christians.  If we did, we would be doing it.  But we aren’t, and, neither, for that matter, are almost any of the other mainline Protestant churches, or Roman Catholic Churches, or evangelical churches, or black churches, or charismatic churches.  We, and some other healthy congregations, are pretty good at incorporating people who grew up in a church and realize that they want to come home.  We aren’t good at finding a way to take people who have no religious background but who are desperately seeking something in their lives, and helping them become followers of Jesus.  But there are a few churches that do know how to do this important work--not many, but some.  Pastor Mark’s churches in Southeast Asia are figuring this out.  A pastor in California named Bob Logan who I work with also knows how to do this, and our staff is listening to some of his resources, as well.  But I truly believe that unless we learn how to reach non-Christians and do what we need to do to disciple them, we are looking at a pretty dim future for the church within the next twenty years.  When we do figure it out, however, and I believe that we at St. John’s will because we already have people praying about it and we have people struggling with it, and we have people that really want to bring salvation and healing and the good news to those who don’t have it, when we do figure it out, we are going to begin the next sixty year period of dynamic, life-giving mission and ministry.  After that sixty years, folks will need to figure out the next thing.  I’ll be a hundred years old and my kids’ grandkids will have to take care of things.  But by learning the simple pieces of reaching and discipling non-Christians, we can send this church on a glorious trajectory forward.  And that process is not easy, but it is simple.  

Jesus was baptized by John.

He came up out of the water.

He received the Holy Spirit.

He heard the voice of God, “You are my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

He went into the wilderness.

He defeated the devil.

He came out of the wilderness.

He announced his purpose.

He chose four others.

He taught them everything they needed to know.

He sent them out.

I am going to spend a good bit of the summer going through this process for discipleship.  We’re going to look each step from three angles.  The first concerns Jesus’ life and what each piece meant for him.  Why did he do it?  What was so important that gospel writers wrote it down and made sure we paid attention?

Second, we are going to see how we have experienced each of these steps ourselves.  Before we can bring others through something, we have to know the path.  Part of our problem with discipling new Christians is that we haven’t necessarily lived through each step ourselves.  We might be able to get through life without them all, although something will probably be lacking.  We might be able to do church without focusing on every step, but we won’t bear all the fruit God planted us for.  We might even be able to bring some other church people into our congregation, but they will have the same difficulties discipling folks that we have.  We won’t be successful with non-Christians until we’ve experienced all these steps.

Think about how many good Christians you know who have never really heard the voice of God say to them in a way that they fully believe that “You are my beloved child.”  How many folks have never had to go out into the wilderness of their lives and received the support necessary to defeat the devil there?   Instead of being free, they are walking around bound by all sorts of things interfering with their happiness and peace.  Way too many of us hanging around in church have no idea what our purpose in life is, and we need to know because when we walk down the street we see way too many rudderless people who need help finding direction.  We need to announce our purpose before we can help others find theirs.  And of course we know most of us aren’t choosing four others and teaching them everything they need to know about faith and life, because if we were, the church would be quadrupling every four or five years. 

Now somebody will probably think – well, lots of people probably will think, but one or two people might ask– is this really Episcopalian?  We didn’t learn it quite like this.   Sounds a bit evangelical or Holy Roller.  And maybe it does sound that way, but everything we’ll look at is very Biblical and at the core of what we believe and how we believe we need to live out our faith.  The Episcopal Church has just been blessed for a while to be in a place where we could let some things slide and still have a thriving, loving church.  But, for good or for ill, times have changed.  We need to be more intentional about our own discipleship to help the growing population of non-Christians outside our doors come to Christ and a church home.  The fact that St. John’s has done such a good job of being a loving and prayerful church family when things were easier means we are at a place to take on these challenges now that the landscape has become more difficult.  Not every congregation is ready.  And I wish I didn’t have to be the one to come in and tell you that we need to be so much more intentional about difficult discipleship practices to survive, but I have to tell you what I’m seeing, and I assure you that I’m struggling along right beside you.

Then, third, when we think about what these steps all mean for Jesus and for ourselves, we’ll look at what they might mean for unchurched people among our family and friends who are searching for something important in their lives.  Once we’ve lived into the steps of Jesus early ministry ourselves, we’ll each be able to reach at least one other person and help them live into following Jesus, as well.

OK, before we close today, let’s all learn this discipleship arm dance.  I’ll say a line and make the motion, then you repeat it.  If we get good participation, then we’ll move on to the creed.  If not, we can keep going.  I’m not proud and nothing else is scheduled here until three o’clock.    

Jesus was baptized by John.

He came up out of the water.

He received the Holy Spirit.

He heard the voice of God, “You are my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

He went into the wilderness.

He defeated the devil.

He came out of the wilderness.

He announced his purpose.

He chose four others.

He taught them everything they needed to know.

He sent them out.