This week I will begin the “Discipleship and Ethics” course differently than I ever have before. I did not choose the name for my course. It was already in the catalog. I actually did not like the name. One year I even asked the dean if I could change it. For many Christians “discipleship” refers to a method for training or mentoring Christians. That is the way I had used the word myself. I thought the word “discipleship” miscommunicated the content of the course. Therefore, I have always started the course by acknowledging how the word is commonly used, and then state: “But for Anabaptists ‘discipleship’ is often used in relation to ethics—following Jesus in terms of life commitments, living differently. So in this course ‘discipleship’ has that connotation.” Then, after that statement I have not used the word in class the rest of the semester. I will use it this semester! Why?
A few months ago, while preparing a bed of soil to plant lettuce and kale, I listened to “This Cultural Moment” a podcast recommended to me by Brian Ross (Pastoral Ministries professor at the seminary). In the third podcast of the first season John Mark Comer interviews Mark Sayers and they reflect together on a serious error of their early church-planting efforts. In the early 2000’s they, and many others, looked to new ways of being church. They turned down the lights, sat in a circle, talked about social justice, etc. They sought to be relevant. In the same time period what Mark Sayers calls digital capitalism came to more and more dominate life. By digital capitalism he means the blending of free market capitalism and the Internet. Digital capitalism has combined with a worldview committed to autonomous individualism. The latter told people to not give themselves to any external authority yet through the former they gave themselves to Apple and Google—autonomous yet, increasingly, enslaved.
Comer and Sayers planted churches in the context of this caustic mix of digital capitalism and hyper individualism. Sayers affirms relevance, it is just not enough. They were sending Christians out to be relevant and these believers were getting sucked into and enslaved by the world they sought to be relevant to. In the podcast Comer and Sayers made bold statements like: “The I-phone is a greater threat to the gospel than secularism ever has been.” Earlier you could assume Christians read their Bible, prayed regularly, now spiritual disciplines are disappearing, “if not erased by secularism then by Wi-Fi access.” What really caught my attention, however, was what they said is needed—discipleship!
Sayers said, “We must return to formation and discipleship. We can’t send people out into the world unformed because the world has so much sway, pull, allure to it. First we must help people be with Jesus and be formed by Jesus.”
They were using the word “discipleship” the same way I did when I worked as a campus minister with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship—of mentoring people in how to read the Bible, pray, evangelize, and lead Bible studies. But, they included more. They said “basic human wisdom is lacking. We must go way back in discipling and teach people how to live in community, how to not be flaky, how to show up, how to deal with conflict.” They seek to shape Christians who will read a Psalm before touching their phone in the morning and who will share a meal with other Christians a couple times a week. They do not assume that is happening. They now work at those things through discipleship.
I put down my garden trowel, leaned back and thought, “Perhaps I need to start talking about discipleship in my class. If Sayers and Comer are correct, without discipleship people will not be able to live out the ethics I teach in the course. The caustic floodwaters of digital capitalism and hyper-individualism are too strong.
Since that moment I have remained committed. Discipleship will be a theme in the course this semester. I did, however, wonder about the framing of it—my talk about the word the first week of the course. I will now embrace the common definition rather than saying that is not what the course is about. I will say discipleship is walking toward Jesus with new Christians, intentionally sharing life with them, guiding them, mentoring them in practices, values, character—training them so they can train others. I wondered, however, will I say what Sayers and Comer say. Is it particularly needed now?
I sought to disciple students when I worked with InterVarsity, even then, back in the mid 1980’s it did not feel like what I did was enough. I was with students a few hours a week, at best, and they were being shaped by other people and influences many more hours. In response, my wife and I decided to rent a house and invite three of the students to live with us for a year. Is the need actually greater now, or are Sayers and Comer just coming to the same conclusion I did decades ago? I asked Brian Ross what he thought. He said, yes the pressure and influence is greater now. It used to be that people had times away from cultural and societal influences—in their home or room for instance. Now, through phones, the world is in our room and everywhere else. Think, for instance, just of the difference in the distraction factor between now and 1985.
I think Noemi Vega, former student and current InterVarsity South Texas area director, would agree with Brian and with Sayers and Comer. In a recent newsletter she wrote:
College student ministry is shifting. Our freshman class is like none other I have encountered. They are our iGen students, the ones that are über connected online, but are hesitant to form face-to-face bonds and friendships. In response to our changing culture, after praying and seeking the Lord, my staff and I decided to focus on "deeper discipleship."
For Trinity University it meant calling our bible studies "Family Groups" and treating them as family. It meant having a lot of conflict resolution conversations on the leadership team. The staff and large group leaders changed the structure to make it more community-oriented and make space for more authentic conversations. Every student leader was matched with a staff to disciple them. And God moved. Trinity now has 21 student leaders, all committed to discipleship: both receiving and giving! They have the most bible studies in the last three years: 10 on campus. God is on the move transforming our student's lives.
So yes, when I talk about discipleship in the first class I will frame it the way Sayers and Comer do—of particular importance at this time. What will I do differently in the rest of the course? Go back to notes on discipleship from a college course? I had not thought of that until right now, perhaps a good idea. But no, not just that. We need more.
I will point students to ideas like ones I found in Mark Scandrette’s book, Practicing the Way of Jesus. He writes, “Too often our methods of spiritual formation are individualistic, information driven or disconnected from the details of everyday life. . . Perhaps what we need is a path for discipleship that is more like a karate studio than a lecture hall. . . action focused, communal, experiential” (14-15). Much of the book is Scandrette describing discipleship experiments that he invited others into. They are for a particular time period—a day, a week, a month or longer. They all are inspired by the life and teachings of Jesus and relate to real needs. A group of people commit time and energy to specific practices and reflect together on the experience and how they can shape ongoing rhythms of life (16). Examples include:
- Seeing as God sees, for a week look into the eyes of each person you met, pausing to see them as loved by God (51).
- With a friend, for a week eat with the lonely--at a local soup kitchen, hospital, or nursing home (137).
- A forty-day vow: no meat, no media, no solo sex, a limited wardrobe, and memorize the Sermon on the Mount (55).
- Keep a gratitude log for one week. Another week, keep a detailed journal of where you spend your time and money (148).
- As a group pool a certain percentage of your incomes and decide together how you will spend it to bless others (149).
- Expect opportunity – each morning for a week, ask God for the opportunity to be an agent of healing (137).
The actions are important, just as valuable is what happens as they group processes their experiences.
I invite you now, as I will invite students throughout this semester, to recognize the truth in Sayers and Comer’s observation, follow Noemi’s lead, borrow Scandrette’s examples, and do against the current discipleship with others.