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How churches can make more effective disciples

effective-buildingMost churches use the pastoral model, the attractional model, or the influential model of ministry, all of which are good but are missing a key ingredient, according to Randy Pope in his book INsourcing: Bringing Discipleship Back to the Local Church. Somehow we need to take the broad message of the gospel and the wide mission of the church, and deliver it person-by-person until our people are filled with it. Thus the author advocates a model of ministry he calls Life On Life Missional Discipleship (LOLMD).

There are five key emphases in the small groups which form the key part of the discipleship process, spelling the acronym TEAMS:

  • Truth: Participants learning how to study the Bible on their own, and bring back questions or insights to the group
  • Equipping: Giving participants a specific plan to follow, modelling how to do it, giving them assignments to apply what they have learned, and following up to see that it has been understood and become usable
  • Accountability: Asking hard questions, challenging bad behaviour, and finding the sin beneath the sin, but all in an atmosphere of grace
  • Mission: Taking up the mission of Jesus where participants live, work and play, and to the ends of the earth; mission being the disciples’ exercise and the Word their food
  • Supplication: Praying for each other and with each other

Interspersed between chapters explaining the theory of LOLMD, the author provides descriptions of group meetings to illustrate how a discipleship group might work. Interestingly, he advocates men-only and women-only groups, and he also recommends that a church begin in a small way with just one or two groups, rather than suddenly replacing an existing small group structure with new missional discipleship groups.

Many church leaders have come to realise that their churches need to be far more effective at building disciples, and this book is one of a number of good resources that have become available in the past year. The book is interesting, well-written, and filled with insights that will help churches become more effective.