I hope by this point I have impressed upon you the importance of discipleship in your own life. Now you want to be a disciple, and that’s great. The only issue is how do we actually become a disciple? We can know all about discipleship, but it doesn’t mean anything if we don’t have a way to actually do it. It’s like how we all know that we should be healthy, but how do we actually become healthy. Knowing what good physical health is and knowing how to exercise and eat well are two very different things. The same is true about discipleship. We know what a spiritually healthy person looks like, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we understand how we can become spiritually healthy.
It all starts with your attitude. For many, becoming like Christ is not something that they are intentionally doing. When I say intentional, what I mean is that it’s something that they are following to make it a goal. People are busy and there are many things fighting to take up our limited bandwidth. That’s why for most people, something as abstract as discipleship is often left to chance. The common belief is that if I am around enough disciples, go to church regularly, and do some spiritual practices, like praying and reading my Bible, then I’ll become a disciple. The issue is that there’s nothing happening here that is intentional about growing as a disciple. Imagine if a football team trained for their games by just hanging around other football players and going to football games. They would never really develop into real football players. Putman puts it this way when he says, “Great coaches do not leave the process to chance—they are intentional.” [1]
If you want to grow as a disciple, then you must be intentional about growing. It needs to be the focus of your time. The other thing one must do is shift their understanding of what discipleship is. For many, when they think of discipleship they think of growing in knowledge and understanding. Many churches and people conflate gaining biblical knowledge and literacy with discipleship growth. That’s not actually the case. “Arguably, intellectually focused activities regarding knowing and understanding the Scriptures (Jn 5:39-40) are not the prime biblically recommended way toward knowing God and being His disciple.” [2] While gaining knowledge is part of becoming a disciple, the main vehicle of discipleship formation provided by scripture is relationship. To see this, look no further than the entire Bible itself. “God’s whole book is about restored relationship with Himself and with others.” [3] Discipleship is best done in the form of relationships, with God and with His people. It is in these relationships that people become disciples as they grow closer to God and His people.
As we talk about a personal plan for discipleship, we must also keep in mind that discipleship is a holistic process. It involves developing in all areas of your life. In her article “Whole-Person Formation: An Integrative Approach to Christian Education,” Diane Chandler identifies seven primary dimensions of formation that must be taken into account for healthy spiritual growth. The first dimension she mentions is the foundation to the other six, and that is the human spirit. For any lasting change to occur, our actual spirit must also change. This means turning our thoughts, attitudes, and emotions towards Jesus. Fortunately, this is one of the easier things to develop since there are clear spiritual practices that we can perform to develop in this area. “Spiritual practices (i.e., prayer, Bible intake, worship, meditation, fasting, and intentional community) provide conduits for worshiping God, fostering communion, and developing godly virtues.” [4] These practices can help us to develop spiritual virtues within ourselves. To develop spiritually, our plan must include regularly performing these practices.
The other six areas of formation that Chandler lists are emotions, relationships, intellect, vocation, physical health, and resource stewardship. When forming a plan for personal discipleship development, one must account for how to intentionally grow in each of these areas. This means finding ways to build up the relationships in your life, perhaps through service to others. Developing physical health may mean learning to exercise and eat well so that our bodies can accomplish the task of loving others. Developing concrete ways to grow in each one of these areas can lead us to deeper discipleship development. There is one catch to all of this. It is easy to get carried away with developing in these areas for self-improvement’s sake. We must always remember the ultimate goal of our self-improvement is to better learn to love God and others as we develop as a disciple. “The ultimate goal of ethical living, however, is not self-improvement but rather to love and serve God and others so that Christ might be exalted.” [5]
In summary, growing as a disciple starts with actually being intentional with your growth and development. It’s easy to become complacent and just go through the motions of going to church and attending a small group, but real discipleship needs to have an intentional plan that is constantly evaluated along with the spiritual growth of the disciple. This plan must accommodate seven primary dimensions of a person since discipleship is a holistic process. There is no one-size-fits-all plan for discipleship that works for everyone. Each person is at a different place developmentally with each of the seven dimensions. Only you know what your next step in each area is. For instance, maybe for you your next step for spiritual development is to commit to a regular time to study scripture. Emotionally, it could be to go to therapy to recover from past emotional trauma. Relationally you could develop a new friendship with a coworker. Intellectually your next step might be to read a book about theology or listen to a lecture series. Your vocational development may look like finding a place to serve in your church with your gifts. Physical development could look like making a commitment to eating healthier. Resource stewardship development may look like making a commitment to tithe regularly. All the while we must remain aware that these things are not done in order to simply develop ourselves but to develop a deeper relationship with God. Doing these things will set you well on the path to becoming a disciple.
[1] Putman, Real-Life Discipleship: Building Churches That Make Disciples, 36.
[2] Cox and Peck, “Christian Education as Discipleship Formation,” 246.
[3] Putman, Real-Life Discipleship: Building Churches That Make Disciples, 50.
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