Thank you for tuning in to the Forgotten Pew Podcast. We want to help those who sit in the pew each week and are forgotten. We want to help you in your Christian walk as a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. So grab your Bible and a cup of coffee and listen to Bob and Caleb chat about discipleship. Well, good morning, dear listener. Well, at least for us, it's morning. You might be listening in the evening, and that's okay. But just forgive us if we say morning. We're here at a frigid morning in Astoria, Oregon. The heater might come on and off, and we're here with cups of coffee. Now, Bob, you're doing something unique that I don't think I've ever seen you do before. You're drinking flavored coffee. I am drinking cinnamon bun coffee. Yeah, I'm normally a black, the way that God made it. That's right. In my estimation, but it's not bad. Not bad. A good way to start the day with, you know, if I can't have a cinnamon roll, I'll do a cinnamon bun coffee. There you go. Yeah, so I was talking to Bob this morning about just different people's coffee habits, and it's kind of funny. So I'm a guy that is pretty adventurous. I like all sorts of different blends. Not a huge flavor coffee guy myself. But at our church, we have a Keurig, and we have a men's study every Saturday, and there were some guys that didn't like when I would buy the coffee, because I would buy those sampler packs. And they never knew what kind of coffee they were getting. And the one guy says, I don't want to come to church and have more decisions. I just want things simple. I want certain things simple, and I like my coffee simple. And so he bought a whole bunch of Dunkin' Donut coffee. Now, some people don't like it, right, Bob? Some people don't like it. Some people love it. Yep, yep. I'm okay with it. Well, a guy who roasts his own coffee, that's about as flavorful as I get is whatever, either Costa Rican, Brazil, Mexican, that's flavor enough. Yeah, and that's how God made it. That's right, yeah. But I will say this, the Dunkin' Coffee, it's okay. Yeah, good, good. It's a good everyday sipper. You know, it's not too exotic, but it's got a lot of flavor to it, especially through Keurig. And that's what I'm drinking this morning. I'm drinking a Dunkin' Donut. Good way to start the day. That's right. And yet, I think discipleship, at least for me, a lot of discipleship has come through open Bibles, donuts, and coffee. There you go. Yeah. It seems like for us Christians, coffee just happens. Yeah, and so because coffee happens all the time, discipleship and coffee to me are just two things that are always... Synonymous. Yeah, synonymous. Yeah, yeah. You wanna meet for coffee and we'll talk? Yeah, sure. Yeah, we go to a coffee shop and buy coffee. So yeah, it's good to have a... Good to share a cup of coffee with you this morning, Bob. Yeah, good. So in this episode, we wanna discuss some of the misunderstandings in discipleship. So the previous episodes, we kind of just wanted to give a broad brush overview and some of the foundations of discipleship. And that's really the whole purpose of this season one, is just to not really get too deep, but kind of just outline what discipleship is. But we think it's important for us to outline some of the misunderstandings. So Bob, I'm gonna play a game with you this morning. We got a cup of coffee, so you should be awake. So we'll play a game. So I'm going to throw out a couple situations. The game is called discipleship or not. Is this discipleship or is this not? So I'm going to throw out a couple scenarios and you tell me if you think this is discipleship or it's not. So here's the first scenario. Somebody comes up to you and says, I'm a disciple because my church did a 13 week class on discipleship. Yes and no. Okay, what do you mean? I would start with the latter. That's probably not discipleship, just doing a teaching of some kind. Certainly there's a lot of different things you can do, but if that's what you're counting on alone to be your method of discipleship and spiritual growth, you're going to be lacking. But yes, it may be a help in moving you forward into your development. along with a host of other things. As we said in the last session, discipleship takes place in a variety of different ways. So yeah, don't limit yourself to just some guy standing up teaching a few weeks because that's not a good spiritual diet. Our growth is daily in a variety of different ways. yeah all right I think that makes sense but yeah I think that answer is a hundred points that's the most points you can get so right now you have a hundred points that's good here we go okay so here's here's the next one A person comes up to you and says, I'm a disciple because my church asked me to be, to head up printing the bulletins. And so each week I print the bulletins and I do all this and I do it with great vigor. And sometimes there's misspellings and I catch those. And I'm a disciple of Jesus Christ because I do the bulletin at the church. Not necessarily true discipleship. It's probably admirable that you have a joy and an ability to be able to do something. It could be an outworking of your gifts and abilities, which may be part of your spiritual growth. but an activity that really doesn't push forward spiritual growth in the lives of others, it might help you a little bit, but I don't think that's what we would classify as true discipleship and carrying on my following of Christ and my spiritual development, as good as that is and as needful as it is. Yeah, yeah, it's one of those things that it by itself is not discipleship, but it might be how you serve others. That's right, that's right. Which is part of what discipleship's all about, is being an encouragement and doing things for others, but yeah. Yeah, so I I'm gonna break from the game a little bit and just tell a story about this guy So I went on a missions trip to the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming and we stayed at a church and One of the guys that worked at the church was a recovering drug dealer and He was you know, he finally got clean he came to know Jesus in prison and he was working with the pastor and we were there at the church, we were sleeping at the church, so we were there really early Sunday morning, and we hear somebody going, somebody rustling in the kitchen, and so I wake up to go see, and here's this guy named Max, and Max is putting together the coffee carts, and this guy has a ruler, and he's measuring, making sure everything's just right, and I said, what are you doing? And he goes, this is how I'm gonna serve Jesus. And he did that, and it was kind of like, oh, that's kind of interesting. And then we saw Max again later on that week, and he was, he just showed up to church on the kids' night, and he was there to make sure the kids were safe. got to the class, talked to the parents in the parking lot, just kind of played with the kids. Every night he was there. He was just doing stuff. He wasn't teaching. And man, it just really encouraged me. So when I was thinking about the bulletin, I was thinking of that. Max's ministry was the coffee cart. He didn't let anybody else know that's what he's doing, but just imagine you get this coffee cart, and it's immaculate, and it's perfect, and everything's measured out, and that's what he wanted to do to encourage, and that's what he could do, so. Yeah, sure, sure. Okay, 200 points. Right now, that's what you have. You have 200 points. First question, 100. All right, so here's the last one. Our culture is breaking down, okay, some people say. I think they're probably right. There's some stuff going on. Jesus wants us to fight for what is right. So, you know, there's a thing that happens in... in government, and I'm going to go stand up for what is right. I'm going to go stand up and protest. I'm going to stand up and do what we may call this cultural Christian activism. I'm going to picket. I'm going to hold up signs. I'm going to make sure people vote for the right person, whatever person that may be, whether it's an R or a D. We'll let the listener decide which one's right. Is that discipleship? Well, first of all, I'm not somebody else's conscience, so I think we have to realize that everybody has to be led by the way that they think is the right way. I would say no, that's not really true discipleship, and I base that basically on when I look at the New Testament, and especially when I look at Christ, and the apostles, I don't see that kind of activism. I don't see the standing up and protesting. I see discipleship and disciplers as those who are imparting truth. one by one, and I think that's what Jesus did, or small group. He took 12 small guys, and if there was anybody that could protest society and some of the ills of the day, it would have been Jesus. And what I think is interesting, Caleb, is any attack that Jesus gave, it went against the religious leaders who were not living the way they were supposed to. they were really true disciples. But when it came to society itself, Jesus imparted life changes in individuals' life. And I think there is a sense in which we have to stand for the truth. And I can't tell one person or another person that that's right or wrong for you. I just have to go back to the scripture and say, really, how did truth get emulated into the lives of people? And it was usually individually. And I have found, if I could give a personal note, and I don't want to step on toes, for sure, but I have found more individual, small group type of discipleship and bearing the truth and helping people understand the truth to bear more evidence of what and change, I guess you might say, than I ever have from activism that I see today. As a matter of fact, sometimes activism can have the opposite direction. It just turns people a different direction. So again, I can't tell people what to do, but just my observation of what discipleship is in the New Testament seemed to bear out that it's more gonna be individualistic and small group rather than standing on a roof with signs and saying, this is wrong. Yeah, and each of these examples I gave were of particular things that people do. And discipleship isn't that. Discipleship isn't, I can look at a practice that you do, and because you do that particular practice, that means you're a disciple. We're going to talk about some of the disciplines that a disciple does, but I would even argue there's people that probably do those disciplines and they might not even be disciples. So just doing the mere activity of a disciple doesn't make you a disciple. It's that commitment to Jesus Christ and that commitment to his teaching. And like you said with the Christian activism, I agree with you. Yeah, so I give you 100 points. Yeah, but that leads you to bearing the truth in some way. Yeah. I think that's fine. Absolutely. But I think we have to be cautious as to what that looks like. And there's no doubt we're called to bear the truth and even more in our society that's just going south day by day. So, Yeah. And being a disciple, though, would mean I'm more concerned about being known for my following of Jesus than I am my political stance or this particular stance. And that would be my contention with a lot of Christian activism, if we could call it that, is I'm known more for what I'm against than who I'm for. So it would be one thing if people said, well, they're just really dedicated to Jesus, and they're also, because of that, and because they see people made in the image of God, they don't like abortions. Opposed to just, well, they're just anti-abortion. No, no, no. There's a reason, there's a theological reason, and it's attached to, because I'm with Jesus, right? And that's really what a disciple is, right? Is that follower of Jesus. And that's really the idea, this lifelong commitment of being known as a follower of Jesus. That's right, yeah. And yet, you wanna be part of Christian activism, however that looks. Yeah, that's an individual conscience. There's several ways to be part of that. So for example, our church and myself, very involved in the, the pregnancy center here in town of helping mothers who are in a situation where they might have an abortion and giving them resources and helping them make the right kind of decision. So in my sense, in my thought, that's an activism. I'm not holding up a sign, but I'm trying to help in a situation in the culture. But the focus is that they hear about Jesus and they become a follower of Jesus, which in my mind will clear up a lot of those other things. Yeah, and I think if we can be more active in personal lives of those people that we may be standing against that aren't bearing the truth, yeah, there's no doubt it's evil. There's a lot of evil around us, and we certainly need to talk about that. But at the same time, are you investing in the lives of individuals, those people that really aren't standing for biblical truth? and developing relationships and showing compassion in the individuals that really are blinded by the truth by Satan. So what are some other ways that we can also invest in individuals and in families today that are out there? Amen. So what are some other misconceptions? We'll end my game and What are some other misconceptions that people have about discipleship? Yeah, there's some definite misconceptions, misunderstandings, what discipleship is not. I think in some way it's not following Christ on our terms. And I think often we get trapped into wanting to kind of put it in the way I want to do it. And understand that discipleship is not about me. It's about Christ. And therefore, I want to follow Christ on his terms and how he lays out what that's all about. So that can definitely be a misconception. Certainly, Christ had thoughts on what is acceptable, what's not acceptable. We talked a little bit about that earlier. with his disciples, he showed them what was right, what was wrong, how to process the truth in that way. So I think those are a couple. Probably along with that is the misunderstanding that it has to be convenient for me. There are some times where, let's just face it, if we look at the life of Jesus or Paul or some of the others, wasn't always according to their own schedule. Discipleship has to be something, if it's a true commitment, then it means I'm in it. for the long haul. And it may be, I've got to give up some things. I've got to sacrifice some things. We'll talk more about that when we get a little bit further into what does that commitment and sacrifice really look like in that sense. I think it's also, discipleship's not a solution to, as a quick fix to my problems. I may still have some problems and some things I gotta deal with as a disciple of Christ and finding dependency upon Him and the Holy Spirit to help me overcome those difficulties and persevere through them and endure. And again, we talked about this earlier, but I don't think it's just showing up for a program, a 13-week discussion. That may be part of a bigger picture, but it's certainly not, I think we misunderstand sometimes in that respect that it's just this little thing over here, rather than a lifestyle, a part of who I am and who I need to be. Yeah, I totally agree with those. Yeah, even in my own life, I've even had some of those misconceptions. You know, one of the other things too that I think kind of adds to this confusion of discipleship is you have people inside of the church, leadership inside of the church, who are supposed to be the example of what does it look like to live like Jesus. And even the best of us, there are times that we don't act like Jesus. And so there's a bad example. And there are some times where we can even even as those who are really trying our best and walking by the Spirit, we can have seasons where we're probably a little bit more fleshy than we are Spirit-driven, and we can influence people in a negative way. And so that adds to the confusion. And then you then have other churches where the pastor or the leadership has no desire whatsoever in discipleship. They're more concerned about other things. There's another thing. And so that then just adds to this whole confusion of what does it look like to be a disciple because people are looking to the leadership as this is the representative of Christ. This is what we're supposed to look like. And they see a really bad, product or or they see a really bad example or they themselves have a really bad understanding of sin and the sanctification process, and then you add in then weird Christianese, this strange language that we have inside of churches, and that word just gets thrown around. Well, that's discipleship, that's discipleship, that's discipleship, that's part of the process, that's it. And so it kinda just becomes such a, it's a catch-all word. It can mean anything. and therefore it means nothing. It has to mean something in specific. So that kind of adds to this whole confusion and some of the misconceptions. Right, yeah. One of the other things too that I think also leads to some of these misconceptions is culture. Culture, that's one of those, that's really hard to define, by the way, what is culture? It's kind of like asking a fish, what's water? You know it when you're out of it, but when you're in the midst of it. And there's been some recent discussion, and you and I have had this discussion of an Eastern mindset and a Western mindset and these different cultures. Kind of explain what that is and how that relates to discipleship and can add to some of this confusion. Yeah, well, often people will have this concept. Here in the Western, we are more program, analytical, schedule-oriented. So my discipleship might be, meet me next week at 2 o'clock for breakfast. Right. In the Eastern mindset, it tended to be more of a relationship in the sense of, come with me. And I think that there's a cross on that from both sides of it, but often if you look at the Bible and you talk to people who have an understanding of the Eastern culture, even today, the Eastern culture, it's not quite like we are in America in some respects in what we do here. And so I think there's not a right or a wrong, but I think, I think Burcroft talks about it in his book where he says, in the Greek culture, a disciple was a committed follower of a great master or philosopher or religious figure, and there was a development of a sustained relationship between the follower and a relationship that, followed somebody you could imitate. And so with the rabbis and their pupils, it was 24-7. You attached yourself to that rabbi and you didn't leave him because the goal was eventually you would be like your rabbi, your teacher, your master. And today we kind of segregated out to various different points of life. And probably some of that is problematic for us to say, stick with me 24-7. That's just not reality in some respects. So those are some of the differences and commonalities. I think there's a, like I said, a crossbreeding of both. Yeah. Yeah. And it's interesting, Bob, you and I have both traveled and we've traveled to places where they have more of an Eastern mindset. And there are some distinct things in culture that when you go to a different culture, you notice immediately. So for example, how they treat leaders. So normally in the West, Leaders try to look like the people they're serving, like they want to relate to the people. So there's like this leadership barrier is very, that threshold is very thin, right? My goal is to relate to my people. When I went to India, no, there was a huge power difference, right? What was interesting is, in the United States, there's not a lot of people that, because we're so relatable, Yeah. There's kind of this, well, why do I have to be around you if you're just like me? Whereas in India, there was a lot of people that would follow these pastors around. I mean, they were just attached, and there was just people around, and they wanted to be around me, and I would walk to a place, and they wanted to watch how I ate, right? And so that was really weird. Though I took that challenge on wholeheartedly. Sure. Yeah, I ate and they watched me eat. And so I, you know, I wanted to be a good example in that. But one of the things that I did notice was when I started to ask them how they lived, how they walked for Jesus, because they were so attached to their leaders and because there was such this huge power dynamic, they actually had very difficult time applying scripture for themselves. So what would happen is they would ask the pastor what you and I would think is just, that's a personal preference question. So they would go, what color should I paint my house? And so the pastor made every decision for them. Well, that's not discipleship. That's a bad thing. So they have that good part of being around and wanting to learn and wanting to glean. That's great. Whereas in the United States, they don't wanna be around the pastor, right? But they can make decisions for themselves. And there seems to be that. So it seems like the deficiencies in one are the strengths of another. And so, like you said, balance, right? We wanna be around people and we wanna, yeah, we have to be willing to give up some of our own personal time and space. And I think with cell phones, that makes things, and social media, that makes things easier to contact, that you don't have to be in somebody's house to be around somebody for a long time. No, we have so many more advantages to, quote, be with somebody 24-7 than we used to, you know, 20, 30 years ago, when you physically had to actually travel somewhere and spend time and money to get to that place, where we can do that now. But I think at the end of the day, regardless of where we come from, we come back to something we talked about before, and that's that intimate relationship, to me, is the important part. And you can't have an intimate relationship if you don't have any kind of contact. Exactly. So I think that's what's important is touching base with other people, whatever that might look like. Yeah. And when we mean that, we mean not just social media contact. That's right. Because social media does hurt in this. It can. Because social media, you can curate your life to an unrealistic life and Yeah, there's gotta be that talking and there's gotta be that relating to somebody. Yeah, I find a lot with social media, there's misunderstanding, misconceptions of what you see, what you read, because you don't have a face-to-face type of conversation where you can see a person and how they're feeling and really what the mood was. gestures and all those things. So I don't think social media can be an end-all for discipleship. That's right, that's right. So there's another debate within the Christian world, and it's this debate over what we may call programs, program discipleship, and relational discipleship. And so, Bob, when we think of programs inside of the church, we're thinking of a set series of events and teachings and processes that have to happen, that's scheduled beforehand, and it's meant to educate people, right? So you have a children's program, and so it's very thought out, very methodical. And then there's what's known as the relationship model, where it's, no, get rid of the programs, you can't have a program, it's always gotta be one-on-one, face-to-face, in a coffee shop, as it were. kind of walk us through some of that. How do we think through that in the modern church as people wanting to disciple people? How do we wade through this debate? Yeah, you know, I think people use different languages. Some people like the term program, some people like the term ministry. I think if If we're using the term program, we mean ministry and helping people to grow and to take those steps further in their growing process with Christ. And I don't think it makes any difference. But if we're using program by way of just an isolated event, And then I wonder, if it's ministry-driven, great, but some churches tend to use programs as just an end-all, and I don't think it really has the moving forward. So, you know, I think if the end is ministry-oriented, moving people to be servants of Jesus Christ and involved in one another's lives and helping them to grow in their relationship in the areas that we've talked about of prayer, Bible reading, those kind of things, memorizing scripture, great. I don't think it makes any difference what we call it, as long as we're accomplishing the end goal of what the product needs to be. Yeah, we do that sometimes as Christians. We get stuck on terms, and we think because somebody who did something right or did something wrong, they use that term. We then automatically then say everybody who uses this term is in that camp or they're in that other camp. And so obviously you gotta have things planned out. You can't just go into things darkly. we looked at Paul, where Paul says, I am proclaiming Him with all wisdom. Well, wisdom is planning, but it also has that discernment of going, okay, I have a plan, this is what I think God wants, but there's times where we've got to deviate from that plan, and there's got to be some relationships, and yeah, I might have a 13-week class on discipleship, full well knowing that that might start a one-on-one coffee where we're going to dig into some of these things deeper. Well, let me give you an example. I mentioned earlier, one of the tools we use, resources we used early on in my ministry was the Navigator's Design for Discipleship. That's six booklets. But we try to remind people that when we're done with this, this doesn't mean we've ended our discipleship. Like you say, that's probably the impetus to say, now we take this even further. It's only a resource, a tool to get us to where we need to be in investing in other people's lives. But if we stop with that and say, yep, I'm a disciple now because I did this six booklets, I got them filled out. That's right. No, no, no, that's not it. That's not it. And it's something that you said earlier, we're inherently selfish. I think we're inherently lazy, especially when it comes to the right things that we're supposed to do. So it's easy for me to say I'm a disciple because I went through a class. And it's easy, because culturally, somebody's a doctor because they went through medical school, right? Now, we know that there's a lot of other stuff that makes somebody a doctor, but in everybody's mind, oh, you went to school, that's what you are, because you've been trained that way. And so we kind of have that cultural idea of, I went to a school, I went to a class, I took a series of classes, I went to Bible college, now I'm a disciple. And yeah, that's some of the misconceptions that we have, and they're not helpful. Yeah, I think if we can come back to that discipleship is anything we do that helps me to walk by the Spirit, to walk in love, to understand what it means to grow in Christ, then, man, the door's wide open at that point. But I think we have to realize that's what we're trying to shoot for is the end goal. That's right. So there's another debate that we're going to weigh in on here. We're weighing in on all sorts of stuff tonight, Bob. This episode is going to be the controversial one. So specifically in our circle, there is a debate between verbiage on discipleship and mentoring, right? Yeah. Those terms like program, relational, east, west, you have people who are very, very strict in those definitions to the point where some people go, you can't even use the word mentor because it's not found in the Bible. And then you have other people who go, mentor, discipleship, it's the same thing. As we're thinking through this, how do you think about those two phrases, discipleship, mentoring? Are they the same thing? Are they different? What's some of the overlap? Well, there's no doubt that you find both camps, and there are those who love the aspect of discipleship. It is a biblical term. It's a term that's used by Christ and, you know, even though the Apostle Paul may not have technically used the word disciple, it definitely was an aspect of his life and investing in other people. And so I think, you know, discipleship tends to be a little bit more of a day-by-day growing in the Lord and looking at how I can grow and and my godliness. As Paul said, discipline yourself for godliness. I think that's all part of the discipleship role. Mentoring can tend to lead more to more maybe a specific or a particular area. When we talk about mentorship, we may be talking about almost like an apprenticeship. You know, in our circles where we're doing internships, we call that mentorship. We don't necessarily call it discipleship, although there's discipleship that takes place. Because you're looking at various aspects all around. Mentorship, I think, is broader in that sense, where discipleship is you're specifically helping people to grow in Christ and their relationships. So I think they can be used hand in hand. Some people don't like mentorship because it's a secular word. And like you said, the scripture doesn't use it, but at the same point, there's a lot of things we have terms of that aren't in scripture that we would die for. So yeah, I don't get hung up on the terminology in that respect. Yeah, I think that's a Obviously, I don't want to discourage anybody, especially if somebody is really staunchly in a camp, but I've always felt – I'm more concerned about the end product and the meaning of a thing opposed to the actual title we give. I understand that sometimes when you use the word mentor, it may give an air of one person has arrived. I'm helping the other person arrive. And so, yeah, if that's the spirit in which somebody talks about mentorship, well, obviously, as a Christian, I'm against that. I definitely think it's important to, as a pastor, as a younger pastor, to look to you who's been an older pastor and other older pastors and go, what do you think of this? And you guys give me examples and encouragement and books to read. And, you know, there's times where I've taught through things and older pastors have pulled me aside and said, you don't necessarily have to say that in your sermon. You don't necessarily have to say it like that. You can say it like this or say it like that. And I see that as, discipleship, mentoring, you know, it's not, see that as that apprenticeship thing, right? It's that adding of polish to the product. It's not telling me how to read my Bible. There was never an issue of the interpretation per se, but maybe the application of how you do that in this particular role. So yeah, I've had no issue with the word mentor, but want to make it clear that what we're talking about in this podcast is following Jesus. So if you call that discipleship, which is what we're calling it, or you call that mentoring, or if your church has another really interesting phrase, but at the end of the day, it's about following Jesus. That's all I care about. I'm going to use an example here. So my family were really into turkey hunting. And there was once this really famous turkey hunter who went to a turkey calling contest. And he did a call that some of the judges had never heard before. And they said, we've never heard that call, so you don't win the calling contest. And the guy said, well, I don't care whether you heard that call or not. The only contest I'm concerned about is a contest in the woods. And there's a sense where, yeah, you could call it whatever you want, but as long as people are following Jesus, that's really the only concern I have. Right. Yeah. Yeah, me too. Well, this has been good again, Caleb. Wow, we've covered a lot of ground and more ground to cover, but we're going to call it good for this session and sign off. And once again, just appreciate anybody that's joined us and we'll look forward to our next time together. Thank you for listening to this episode. Our episodes are available on Sermon Audio or the podcatcher of your choice. Like us on Facebook, and if you're interested in contacting Bob, please visit www.nicechurchplanters.org. That's www.nice.org. ChurchPlanters.org. Or, if you'd like to talk to Caleb, please see www.LewisAndClarkBibleChurch.com. That's LewisAndClarkBibleChurch.com.