In the 4 Gospels we see three different invitations that Christ and his disciples extended to people depending upon their level of commitment.
The First Invitation: COME & SEE: This was an invitation for people to come see and experience the power, presence and message of Christ. Sometime these turned out to be a large gathering of people but only lasted a day or two. As ordinary people came they got to meet Jesus, hear his teaching on the Kingdom of God, experience his power when he performed miracles and healings and they would receive an invitation to join him in a deeper committed which was the second Invitation. The goal of this event was to discover the Person of Peace who would open their home that would form the beach head for the new movement and to find those who were prepared to follow Jesus and become His disciples.
The Second Invitation: COME & FOLLOW: These were people who were willing to leave everything to come and follow Christ. They considered the cost of discipleship and made a decision to be Christ's disciples. As they did Jesus taught them how to become spiritually mature through laying a strong foundation of himself/Christ and his teaching, about living in the Spirit, how to relate to one another, spiritual warfare and pursuing His mission. As he watched and prayed he then would extend a third invitation to some of those the Father identified. The goal of this following was to establish his follower to be strong in their faith and to identify those who would form the apostolic leadership from which the movement would gain momentum.
The Third Invitation: COME & BE WITH ME. The few that Jesus identified through prayer He made them to be His apostles. He would teach them to do what he did and implement the same pattern (come and see, come and follow and come and be with me). They would watch Jesus do it, they would practice it under His supervision and he would them unleash them to go do it themselves in teams. As they did the work they then would gather those who were identified from the Come and Be With Me to be the second generation of apostolic leadership and then repeat the process. This time not with just twelve but with seventy-two. It is here with this third group THE COME & BE WITH ME that we see the rapidly reproduction begin to happen. They were the apostolic leadership that would leave to go to other unreached groups to share the gospel.
As the process was repeated over and over again more disciples increased and more apostolic leadership were developed thereby increasing the momentum of the movement. It is important to note that this strategy was used to raise up, train up and unleash ordinary christians, people, to create this church planting movement. The church planting was done by ordinary christians who had no special training. These regular guys were used by God to do some pretty extraordinary and amazing things. These ordinary christians or regular guys were the one's that God used to be His missionaries!
So here are some question for us to consider:
- What if we were to follow the same pattern?
- What would it look like in N. America?
- What would COME & SEE EVENT look like?
- What would a COME & FOLLOW GROUP look like? And what would a COME & BE WITH ME TRAINING look like?
Share your thoughts in the comments space Let's brainstorm and begin to experiment and see what God does.
A New Testament pattern ... let's construct some containers and see how we can sort the verses of the gospels into places where things happen.
ReplyDeleteCome and See: this could correspond to Jesus teaching in the temple, typically at Solomon's Porch. Plus more intimate conversations, including events where Jesus encounters people as he travels from place to place. In these, he comes to you.
Come and Follow: Jesus heads out into the wilderness, and it costs something to be a part of this event. People go without food for several days, so Jesus even feeds the 5000. This sort of event self selects for those who are seriously committee - like a 5 am or all night prayer meeting (common in Korea) or a Saturday morning bible study.
Come (away) and Be with Me: Time with Jesus on a consistent basis. The twelve. Mary, Martha, Lazarus. Community ... sometimes in a house (Mary & Martha), the Upper Room of John 13-17, or on a Mountain of transfiguration. There is intimacy and little structure. Mark 6:31 And he said to them, "Come away by yourselves to a lonely place, and rest a while."
Come, take up your cross and go missional: One level that is missing is Matthew 10/Luke 10, where the disciples are sent in pairs to preach. Jesus does NOT go with them, but these alternate with "come away" times.
When we've sorted out the verses into these containers, what's left that Jesus did in the making of disciples?
There could be a few combinations ... when Jesus goes to Jairus, to them it's a Come and See, but for the disciples it's a time of learning and teaching. Modeling.
There are some modern examples of similar places. Yoido cell church has the ministry visitation of the cell leader (along the way) and the cell meeting (come and see), plus the 5 am and all night prayer meetings (come and follow), a retreat center called Prayer Mountain (come away with me), plus the supervision and training of the cell leaders/deacons (go missional). Saddleback has their five purposes: Fellowship & Worship(come and see), Learning (Come and Follow), Missional gift oriented serving, and Evangelism (mentoring disciple makers).
David you allude to a very important point in this process and that is all of these invitations are going on at the same time but to different groups. While some are receiving the invitation to COME & SEE you can also have some who are at the COME & FOLLOW and help to reach the come and see group and others can be at the COME & BE WITH ME. I's a very fluid strategy and possible can become messy at points. Thanks for your great insights.
DeleteAbsolutely...I feel that God speaks to us in profound ways using the scriptures. Wow...great job Jay...way to see the scriptures as a current day evangelistic tool to the current day church. I have forwarded this to all. Keep up with the mind of Christ...I love it 1) COME AND SEE 2) COME AND FOLLOW 3) COME AND BE WITH ME ....PEACE JEN
DeleteThanks, Jay ... part of the foundation of my DMin project in evangelism was to attempt to discern what Jesus specifically did to make disciples, and look for examples where people are doing exactly that process and what results they are getting. The results were interesting ... but giant third world cell churches and CPM house churches, plus folks like Neil Cole, seemed to come very close to the model I saw in the NT.
DeleteDavid, I would love to read your DMin Project and the results from it. Do you have it in print somewhere or able to email a copy of it?
DeleteJesus, as His Father throughout Scripture invites people to come to Him. However, His command to us is not "Come" bunt "Go".
ReplyDeleteMany of us grew up with the idea of evangelistic outreach as having the goal of getting the prospect to church. Coming together for discipling is important, but no substitute for going to those who are far from God.
I agree with you Hal that Christ's command and commission to His followers is to "GO" but what I find interesting in these 3 invitations the first two are not to those who have become His followers but to those who are investigating Christ and deciding what they will do with him. So Christ's invitation to them would quite naturally be to come to Him. But the second and third invitation of "COME AND FOLLOW" & "COME AND BE WITH ME" is to those who are his disciples and to some who would become his apostles. Christ's invitation to them was to be with him and join him on his mission. To join Christ was go where he goes which is to the lost.
DeleteI like our discussion!
As you say, Christ invited people to join him as he went through all 3 aspects of disciple making. I honestly believe that the vast majority of western Christianity is barren of new disciples becasue it has been literally captured by the 1st phase, the "come and see" aspect. The "come and follow" step does not happen because most western "church leaders" have ascended to their positions without engaging in personal disciple-making. (In spite of it's own trials and difficulties, aspiring to become a church leader in a western context, requires much less personal sacrifice than becoming a successful new disciple-maker. So the "come and follow/learn from me how to make new disciples" phase is simply replaced by piously echoing Christ's command: "Go" But, as Jesus demonstrated, this is where the tough, costly, sacrificial aspect of the Christian life becomes more than an academic lesson, it becomes real, effective, and reproductive with regards to expanding the Kingdom. Unfortunately local church leaders have learned to survive (and even thrive through transfer growth) on the contributions of those that become mutually satisfied and safe within the "come and see" aspect. I truly believe most church leaders want their congregations to be disciple-makers, but congregations must be taken to the harvest fields and taught how to do this by someone who is sacrifically passionate about the lost. If this second phase doesn't happen correctly, ironically it doesn't stop the third phase "come and be with me" aspect from happening, but the results which are modeled are eternally deadly just the same. Large numbers of people wanting to "come be with" their leaders, just reproduces more leaders and churches like we already have....Churches full of people who endlessly aspire and labor to obtain higher and higher ministry roles, while their neglected communities continue to go to hell.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Randy. Most western church planters and pastors of existing churches think they are successful if they can build a CROWD of people to attend their religious services week after week. But Christ did not command us to build a CROWD but to make DISCIPLES. Gathering a crowd (for people to COME & SEE Christ) for short periods of time was part of Jesus' strategy for making disciples but was never the final goal. He gathered a crowd together to sift through them to find those whom the Father was working with ready to surrender their lives over to Jesus and to find the Person of Peace who would be willing to open their home and influence others to come and be part of the COME & FOLLOW GROUP. This come and follow group would hold each other accountable, learn the life of Christ that is to be lived and learn to be obedient to all that Christ commanded. From the COME & FOLLOW GROUP Jesus (& His disciples) sifted through them and through prayer & observation of faithfulness to Christ & His lifestyle) would gather a few would be the ones to train up and unleash to do what Christ had done and what the Apostles did so that the movement would multiply. So the 3 groups (COME & SEE; COME & FOLLOW & COME & BE W/ME) were Jesus' strategy to sift through the masses of people to make disciples and identify apostolic (missionary) leadership.
DeleteJay, I can see what you're saying about the sifting process that Jesus did. He came for the sick, for the thirsty. I was just talking today with a friend about a successful drum center here in town, and I see a parallel, and it makes sense because this is how God made people. The center attracts people by letting them come in and see people playing expertly, they can "hear the music", they can see what is possible (COME AND SEE). There is a weeding out process in that the people who really like what they see stay and find out about how to sign up for lessons, and pay for lessons; otherwise they just listen and then walk away again (the weeding out). So the people who sign up for lessons, that is the COME & FOLLOW. They have to actually go through, starting from the very beginning, learning the basic elements of drum playing. Those who don't want to do the work don't keep staying. Then finally, after a lot of practicing (not just learning ABOUT drums, but actually DRUMMING, but also, not just trying to make music without training, but TRAINING) there are the few (more weeding out) who actually become great drummers, those drummers who, when people hear them play, they know, even though they don't know how they know, that this person really is a great drummer and they want to become one too. The neat thing is that Jesus does that with us, training each person to become the person He made them to be.
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