Effective Women Disciple Makers

We’ve all sat in zealous mission sermons that spur us to “Go and make disciples,” but if you’re like me disciple-making was a pretty vague term that somehow haphazardly happened if we followed Jesus close enough and taught bible lessons with an organised curriculum. I’m married to a very diligent evangelist who loves to tear into complicated passages of scripture and explain them beautifully to a table full of listeners. Me on the other hand? I’ll serve the tea.

It’s only been in recent years that I learned more fully what a disciple or student of Jesus really is and what the normal Christian life should look like as we follow and learn from Jesus. Luke 6:40 says “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher.” When we are fully trained disciples we are like Jesus. We cannot make healthy disciples until we are mature and trained students that look like Jesus holistically from Monday-Sunday.

The reality is every one of us is training disciples. What we choose to focus on and what we do with our time affects everyone around us. The ones who respect us watch us and copy us. Our children are mini disciples that follow what they see. So the question is not if we’re making disciples, but are we making healthy and God honouring ones?

For some years I’ve lived in environments of crisis to some degree. So many needs clamoured for attention. The loudest cry always got my attention first. I see the same thing in many churches today. Pastors live day to day trying to calm the loudest needs. If their churches are large life becomes an exhausting cycle of trying to keep the most miserable people happy. The truth is none of us have the capacity to quell the needs around us. Pastors do not have the longterm resilience needed to see to the needs of 100 people clamouring for the best sermon, kindest care, and most palatable wisdom on demand.

Jesus had twelve disciples but we often think we can have fifty or more. Even then He chose three very close disciples, Peter, James, and John and spent most of His time with them. They chose to follow Him and wanted to learn from Him. They were highly imperfect committed disciples. Jesus modelled perfection to them for years as He ate, walked, discussed, and taught them daily before He told them to “Go and make disciples.”

Somehow we’ve translated that to mean we can lead someone to Christ with a quick prayer and invite them to church on Sunday where the Pastor will hopefully preach a message that is applicable. Our Sunday morning Christianity has made our discipleship muscles weak. We desperately guzzle the worship and hope to be inspired by the message because the cares of this life are literally choking out the word of God. The cry of our Monday-Saturday stressors choke out the biblical mandate to make students of Jesus in everything we do.

Here are five ways you can start becoming a fruitful woman disciple-maker in your community.

1. Be discipled yourself. Find an older, wiser mentor who you want to be like and ask her if you can follow her as she follows Christ. Spend time in her home, take notes on phone calls, and dig deep into complicated questions you have. A disciple is a student and a learner always becoming more like her teacher. Find someone you want to be like and follow her! This is not idolising one person and trying to replicate everything they do, but being aware of the strengths older wiser individuals have and learning from them as they have learned from Christ.
2. Know your mandate. Ananias in Acts 9 was only a disciple and he learned how to hear the voice of God, obey the call of God, and surrender to the plan of God. The fruit of his obedience was physical healing, salvation, and water and spirit baptism. Every one of us can be a part of a Saul’s transformation to a Paul. This is not only work for the zealous evangelist or gifted speaker, but for you and I. We are mandated to lay hands on the sick, bring others to Jesus, and to teach the things that Jesus taught us.
3. Learn Jesus’ strategy. Busy is not always fruitful. More is not always best. We’ve been indoctrinated to think larger churches=successful churches and bigger bible studies=successful bible studies. The more participants we have in our programs the better our updates sound. We need to redefine our view of success with the lens of Jesus. Pick 3-5 individuals who would like to learn from you and model Jesus to them Monday-Sunday. Teach them how to make 3-5 disciples themselves and you’ll start seeing multiplication beautifully.
4. Do what is reproducible. I am always asking myself if the ones following me can replicate what I am showing them. If we think we need a big house to host people for example, we are not being reproducible. Most of the world lives in small spaces, but most of them have kitchen tables so use your kitchen table! Use tight spaces. Show the ones following you that we can follow Jesus every day of the week by using what He gives us to spread His love.
5. Make your “ministry” your “Christianity.” When we have defined times of “ministry” on a Tuesday evening, it can make us feel really good about ourselves. When we make a prayer card and move overseas we earn “full time ministry” status. I’ve discarded those terms entirely and made it my aim to be a full-time disciple of Jesus. I am a learner of Him. I am being discipled by some and discipling others. This is Monday-Sunday wherever I am with a day of rest in between to tune my heart to worship.

Depending on the church environment we were raised in we may have some things to unlearn about disciple-making. One of those things is that we cannot expect to be fruitful in the kingdom just because we are busy with ministry. We cannot allocate specific slots of “ministry” and expect hurting people to be accidentally transformed into the image of Christ. Healthy disciple making is intentional care for the body, soul, and spirit of those who follow us. It is tuned into the negative emotions of pain, the wrestling questions of faith, and presenting physical challenges our followers are facing. It is holistic, time-consuming, and beautiful.

“Go and make disciples” is a mandate for women too. We are homemakers and disciple-makers in everything we do and we can learn to be strategic and fruitful in every way. We can see healing, salvation, and redemption in the hearts of those who follow us as we follow Christ. Our sweeping and wiping and nurturing can all be delightfully woven into a tapestry of kingdom expansion. Are you confused about your calling or role or ministry today? Tune out of the pressures our expectations have caused and tune into the simple mandate that holds powerful transformative reality.

Jesus didn’t leave us alone when He left. The Holy Spirit brought the comfort and power we need to be effective and fruitful. Effective disciple making is not trying harder and having more people in our home and feeling good about ourselves. It is aligning our hearts with what the Holy Spirit is doing around us and following His promptings. It is being led by the Spirit as we’re praying and cooking, teaching and cleaning.

“Go therefore and make disciples of every nation, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20

Photo by Conscious Design on Unsplash