Discipleship is an integral part of the believer’s life and a necessary component of any local church’s ministry. However, discipleship can be easily misunderstood and become a sort of grey, ambiguous term, something that we all know we should be a part of but we aren’t sure how. We know that Jesus invites us to be disciples and commands us to make disciples, but we don’t really know what that looks like. So what does it look like? Relationships. Relationships with the purpose of growing in Christ.

Let me start by defining terms. Discipleship is the process of following Jesus. Disciple-making is the process of helping people follow Jesus. This is primarily done through relationships. Disciples are not made via online sermons, curriculum, or printed books. They are made through participation in the body of Christ, especially through participation in relationships.

When a local church considers their disciple-making ministry, they often focus the conversation on the question of which curriculum to use. This is an important question, but it is not the most important. The most important question is, “How can we foster environments where people help each other follow Jesus?” These environments can only be created if we get people invested in relationships.

Consider Jesus’ method of making disciples. We don’t see him emphasizing a curriculum, a meeting time, or a specific set of content that must be covered. We do see Him investing first and foremost in relationships. He spent time with His disciples. Yes, He taught His disciples, but He did so as they spent time together in the context of relationships (traveling, eating, attending weddings, serving, healing, teaching, etc.). Often His teaching was occasioned by His disciples’ questions, questions that came as they observed His life (consider Jesus’ teaching on prayer, for example: Luke 11:1-13).

So while we make decisions on curriculum and meeting times, we need to remember that our goal is Christ-centered relationships. This is the primary emphasis of the discipleship program at our church. Yes, we help form groups (some happen organically and some are assigned). Yes, we use a curriculum. But we encourage our leaders to first and foremost focus on building relationships, because those relationships will be wheredisciple-making happens. In my next post, I’ll discuss how to do that: how to invest in relationships with the goal of reproducing disciples of Jesus.