Logan Leadership

This blog entry is part of a series of three that focuses on the three environments for making disciples: peer-to-peer discipleship, guided discipleship, and focused discipleship. Each of these represents a relational, intentional way to make disciples within our churches.

The focused discipleship approach is especially useful for either brand new believers who need more focused attention or for fruitful disciples who are emerging as leaders. Focused discipleship relies on coaching as its means. People grow through a coaching relationship tailored to help them discern how they’re going to grow and serve and what steps are next for them– in both personal development and ministry development.

This blog entry is part of a series of three that focuses on the three environments for making disciples: peer-to-peer discipleship, guided discipleship, and focused discipleship. Each of these represents a relational, intentional way to make disciples within our churches.

The second discipleship approach, guided discipleship, turns up the degree of intentionality. This is a facilitated missional community environment, usually a group of 3 to 12 people (sometimes breaking out into smaller groups for processing). It reflects how Jesus worked with his disciples: living and serving together as they learned from each other and challenged each other. This facilitated environment focuses attention on people’s development by working off some type of map or template of what a disciple should look like– the specific outcomes the discipleship process is aiming to produce.

This blog entry is part of a series of three that focuses on the three environments for making disciples: peer-to-peer discipleship, guided discipleship, and focused discipleship. Each of these represents a relational, intentional way to make disciples within our churches.

Peer-to-peer discipleship is a reproducible process that anyone can engage in. Generally, this discipleship environment makes use of a simple template that helps people engage in God’s Word, reflect on their lives, confess sin, take steps to grow in holiness, and reach outside of themselves. This environment is engaged by small groups of people– usually 2 to 4 individuals– and are leaderless and non-facilitated.

As we encourage our people to engage culture, they will form missional communities. Out of those missional communities, we will develop leaders. With those leaders, we will multiply movements. These four areas together make up what I call “the missional journey.”

• engaging culture
• forming communities/churches
• developing leadership
• multiplying movements

Here’s an exercise to flesh out these four areas in your own ministry. Identify the 5 to 7 core outcomes for each of these areas (e.g. If we are engaging culture in our region, then we will see… )  Get as specific and behavioral as you can. Outlining the outcomes of these four stages clarifies the “what” that we’re moving toward. It also gives us the relevant categories for measuring our effectiveness.

A while back I was talking with a woman who is a world class intercessor about the development of a prayer ministry. My leadership gifts were kicking into gear, and I was thinking, “Okay, we need prayer. So how do we go about creating a system for making that happen? How can we mobilize enough intercessors?”

Meanwhile, her intercessory gifts were kicking into gear and she responded, “You know, your prayer strategy needs to be birthed in prayer.”

Oh duh. I was trying to plan a prayer ministry without having prayed about it. How about I slow down and ask God what he wants to see happen?

Here’s a strategy you can use regardless of the kind of issues you are facing. Read the description below and think through how you could use this kind of strategy in your own ministry.

One church has been in the process of transition. The church is two years old and is losing the lease on the building they are currently meeting in. Many people have been very invested in making services run there and are wondering what this will mean for the future of the church. The leadership council wisely hosted a series of “congregational conversations” after the services. At these conversations, the 100 or so people who were present were seated at tables of eight, each with an assigned “table leader.” Some basic content was given by a leadership council member (lease status, other meeting place options, a reiteration of the definition of “church,” and some general reassurance). Then the tables were given 3 questions to process: