DISCIPLES THAT KNOW & REFLECT JESUS (PT 1)
It's my hope that after going through the last two posts you're getting a better idea of what the mission of the church is. We've covered that it is the unchanging mission of the church to make disciples and multiply disciples. We've also covered that disciples are someone who has committed their life to the process of observing, imitating, and obeying their teacher so that they can become like him and do the things he did.
We then went on and talked about how we summarize the great commission, the great commandments, the calling of the disciples, and the recalling of Peter into a mission statement that is simple yet biblically robust. So our mission statement at Cornerstone is:
WE EXIST TO MAKE AND MULTIPLY DISCIPLES THAT KNOW, REFLECT, SERVE, AND POINT TO JESUS.
It is our desire that you memorize this so that it becomes second nature to you. It becomes the lens you see our church through and the grid that we use for making all of our decisions. Now, it is one thing to have a clear and simple mission statement. It's another thing to begin to accomplish that mission.
How do we help people know Jesus? What does it mean to reflect Jesus? How and where do we serve Jesus? How does a disciple effectively point others to Jesus? These are the areas of our lives that need to be formed. Additionally, there is a process to growing in each of these areas as well. Let's start with the areas of a disciples life that need to be formed. Each of our four areas of formation can be subdivided into 2 subcategories.
KNOWING JESUS
THE WRITTEN WORD
IT GIVES US A PICTURE OF JESUS
Summary Statement: We love God’s word and believe it is central to knowing God, His plan and promises, and how it points to our need for Jesus.
Anyone who seeks to be a disciple needs to be someone who falls in love with the written word of God. The Bible is one of the major ways that God has chosen to reveal himself and his plan for redeeming and restoring his creation. One of the major problems of those who seek to follow Jesus have encountered with the bible is that it has a tendency to become simply a source of information. Jesus addressed this problem when he told the religious leaders of the day that "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life." (John 5:39-40) They were reading the bible and missing the point that it all led to a need to accept and follow Jesus. If we are reading the bible and falling in love with Jesus more and more then we are reading it right. The Holy Spirit loves to use what he has inspired to glorify Jesus.
Another major reason disciples need the written word of God is because the heart can't love what the head doesn't know. When we all come to Jesus, we have a false or incomplete understanding of who Jesus really is. We have a problem with creating our own picture of Jesus that looks and acts like what we want him to be like. We need a clear picture of who Jesus really is in order to truly love him well.
Key Needs In This Area of Formation:
- Make sure that disciples hear the scripture in large gatherings as well as small gatherings.
- Help disciples learn to read and understand scripture for themselves.
- Help disciples see how all scripture points to, is fulfilled by, or is in response to the life and ministry of Jesus.
- Help disciples see how the whole bible fits together as one story.
- Help disciples understand key concepts like: sin, repentance, covenant, salvation, holiness, etc.
- Help disciples spot what is not true according to Scripture.
THE LIVING WORD
A RELATIONSHIP WITH THE PERSON
SUMMARY: We believe that we too can personally have a relationship with the living and reigning Christ.
It is God's intention that we go beyond simply having knowledge about Jesus to knowing him personally. This is about having a real relationship with him. The first disciples didn't just learn about Jesus, they walked with him, talked to him, did normal things together. They knew the sound of his voice and the look he got when he was about to heal someone. God could have simply given us the scriptures, but he knew we needed more. That's why "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, flory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14-18) Christianity is not simply a belief system, it is a connection and relationship with Jesus who is alive and still desires to know and be known by us. We want to be able to people who "know his voice... I know my own, and my own know me." (John 10:4,14)
The danger of not developing a personal connection with Jesus is that we become full of information, but never experience transformation. Only encountering the living Jesus can truly change us.
Key Needs of Disciples in This Area of Formation:
- Disciples need to learn how to engage in prayer, meditation on scripture, and silence as a way of experiencing the presence of Jesus in their life.
- Disciples need help learning to listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit coming from inside them.
- Disciples also need to learn that obedience to what we hear in scripture often leads to a personal encounter with Jesus. He loves to reveal himself when his people do what they are commanded to do.
REFLECTING JESUS
Reflecting Jesus is the part of discipleship that involves our relationship with God and with ourselves. It is the place where Jesus teaches how to see our sin and deal with it as well as begin to see ourselves as he sees us and has made us and begin to love ourselves. It is the place where we talk about Jesus saying "I will make you" into something different than you are now, but more like you were always meant to be. In 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 Paul uses the image of Moses spending time in the presence of God and coming down with a face that reflected God's glory. It wasn't his own, but it radiated from him because of being in the presence of God.
Paul says " Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit." Paul is saying that the Holy Spirit dwells in us and as we submit to his work, we will be like Moses. We will be changed and show the world the glory of God. We will look more and more like Jesus. Reflecting Jesus is a process of allowing the Holy Spirit to change us from the inside out.
INNER TRANSFORMATION:
DEALING WITH THE ROOTS OF SIN
Summary Statement: We strive to surrender our hearts, minds, bodies and our lives to the transforming work of the Spirit.
Jesus told his disciples in Matthew 15:18-20 "But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person." Too often we try to fix things by simply stopping the action. Jesus showed us that the actions are simply growing out of the problems that are rooted in our hearts, thoughts, and desires. If we do not address t sin in our hearts, then we will be stuck in the cycle of what Paul calls doing what I don't want to do, and not doing what I really want to do. (Romans 7:15-20) We need to stop treating symptoms and deal with the cause, which is sin in our hearts.
Sin is the result of a heart that is seeking fulfillment in something other than God. This happens for a number of reasons. Often the things we seek are in response to experiences we've had over our lifetime. For example, if our family of origin was not safe, we can crave safety and become lovers of money. Money becomes our idol and what we think will fulfill us. If we did not feel loved, we can seek it in people. Sex, or applause can become our idol. Simply giving away all our money or stopping having sex does not deal with the sin in our hearts. We need help from both the Holy Spirit as well as mature brothers and sisters in Christ to help us uncover the roots of sin in our hearts and learn to kill our flesh.
Key Needs In This Area of Formation:
- Helping disciples name their sin with biblical names and understand why they're drawn to certain sins.
- Disciples need to learn how to confess their sins to God and to others.
- Disciples need help exploring painful experiences in their past that cause them to seek comfort and fulfillment in what their idols are.
- Disciples need to begin to see themselves in their new identity in Christ and not seek to define themselves by their failures and their sins.
OUTER TRANSFORMATION:
GROWING THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT
Summary Statement: We are God’s masterpieces and while not perfect, we are doing our best to live out the character of Jesus in the power of the Spirit.The process that the Holy Spirit uses to change our hearts and thus change our actions is often compared to the organic process of farming. If you plant one thing, you get a certain kind of thing. Paul tells the church in Galatia that " Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life." (Gal. 6:7-9) He says if you want to live like Jesus, you need to plant in your heart the right kinds of thoughts and affections. Your heart needs to love the right things and your head needs to focus on the right things. Another way of putting it is We are transformed by what we focus on.
God uses the spiritual disciplines to help us sow what we need into our lives so he can grow what only he can grow in our lives. We cannot change ourselves. But we can sow by fasting, praying, meditation, serving, and other meditations that allow Jesus to grow the fruit of the spirit in our lives. This is how we abide in Christ and how Christ produces fruit like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. We sow, the Spirit grows!
Key Needs In This Area of Formation:
- A disciple needs to learn how to set their minds on things above through disciplines.
- A disciple also need to learn how stopping certain things allows for time to focusing on Jesus through fasting.
- They need to know that what they set their attention and affections will form them. This includes TV, Social Media, etc.
- There is a need to memorize scripture that helps sow to the Spirit and produce godly thoughts and actions.
Alright! We're halfway through our areas that disciples need to be formed in. We'll cover the last four in the next post and then we'll cover the 5 stages of spiritual growth.
READ THE OTHER POSTS IN THIS SERIES: