Disciple-making: What is it all about?

Abstract

Many theologians, pastors included, are deeply aware that the church is challenged in many ways. It often looks like we have lost the script for being church. And sociologically it may very well be a dead-end road. Theologically, many agree that before that dead-end, there is a fork in the road. A choice to continue as is or go back to the original plan: ‘Go, make disciples of all the nations …’ (Mt 28:20). This article explores some of the reasons why, should we not see the choice of this fork, we may end up at the dead-end. And should we see the fork in good time and make the right choices, what would that imply? Or differently said: how did we lose the plan and what was the plan all about? The article refers to literature whose authors attempted to show the original plan and suggested transformational processes to get back what we have lost. A central departure point is a remark by Bonhoeffer that ‘Christianity without the living Christ is inevitably Christianity without discipleship, and Christianity without discipleship is always Christianity without Christ’ (see p 2 below). The article also focuses on what is meant by disciple-making¹– accepting that churches in the reformational tradition would certainly, at the fork, choose the road leading to ‘Go, make disciples …’.
Contribution: In this article, the departure point is a practical theological one. The Biblical Sciences are presumed and so is Mission Studies. The importance of the Biblical Sciences, Systematic Theology and Congregational Studies is easy to recognise.