Every minister who is seeking to advance the message of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ across the world will eventually have people under their influence. There will be people who become your students, your disciples.
There are two ways of discipling: #1, you can give them access to limited information. Thus, you never make yourself unnecessary in their lives. They will always be dependent upon you as the sole source of all information. Or, #2, you can hold their hand for a while, build them up to be independent. You can hold back nothing, invest everthing into their growth and maturation that you have got. Then the day will come in which they no longer need you. You can release their hand and allow them to grow independently of you. Thus, there is now another trained witness laboring alongside you somewhere in the world.
My approach has always been option #2.
Some are critical of it. They think that a preacher should never tell their disciples everything that they know. They say that you should never make yourself become obsolete and unnecessary in the life of your disciple. I differ with that. I WANT my trainees to become independent of me! I WANT them to go out from under my wing! The critics say that you will never develop a large following or church that way. I don’t want a large following or church.
I would not mind if a lot of folks desired to plug into the truths taught in my ministry. But I would not want it to be at the expense of their independent thinking. I would not want to hold someone back from fulfilling their own vision and calling for God. I would not want someone to stay continually dependent upon me. I would want to give them the tools to fly off on their own.
Cult leaders want to keep you dependent upon them alone as the sole source of their information. They will never teach you all that they know. They will only tell you enough to keep you hanging, so that you come back to the next meeting with great anticipation. This is similar to a cliff-hanger ending of a TV show. Some preachers in Christian churches even take this approach. Having more people at their feet is, in a weird way, like building their own personal empire. I think it is wrong.
To the preacher of my school of thinking who cares about building up his disciples and trainees as the ministers and preachers of the future, he loves them like his own family. He is happy when they achieve a great thing, and celebrates with them. He is saddened when they suffer a setback or tragedy, and mourns with them. He is alongside them giving them instructions, money, books, CD’s, DVD’s, resources, time, effort, energy – whatever it takes to develop that person’s gifts into something special which will have an impact for Christ.
In the sight of other preachers, he suffers some criticism for mistakes his young-in-the-faith learner makes along the way. But he views the youngster as his “project”, and his love for that person allows him to defend his name and his honor. He never stops believing in that person, even when others may not see the gifting and the talent that he does. He feels alone in believing in the kid, but keeps on doing it anyway, walking by faith as opposed to sight, knowing that God has annointed this young future preacher.
One thing that all preachers will suffer at some point in the discipling / training aspect of their Christian minstries is what I call an “Anakin Skywalker Experience”. It is that moment that stabs you like no other. The only worse betrayal is a cheating spouse. But that day when the student rises up against the teacher and tries to BECOME the teacher is an ugly day in a preacher’s life.
That day when your right-hand man turns his back on you. You have given him more training than the average Christian preacher has. You have exposed him to great educational resources and materials. But he is not a good steward of that education. It makes him DANGEROUS! It is a horrible day, that day you discover that you have made a mistake with a young minster that you have trained.
When the knowledge you have invested in him gives him so much self-confidence that he loses all humility and teachability. When he stops asking you questions seeking information and answers, but instead begins making declarative statements meant to instruct you. When he stops honoring and respecting the person who paved the way for him to get where he is today. When he forgets who God used in his life to rescue him from whatever belief system and lifestyle that they he was involved in prior to his conversion. When he feels like your instructions to him are a conspiracy developed by you as an attempt to hold him back and suppress him. Everything you have ever suffered through on his behalf, everything you have given him, everything you have invested in him, everything that he has ever costed you, and everything you have ever done for him suddenly becomes unimportant in his eyes. There is no gratitude. Only bitterness, jealousy, pride, and arrogance.
You want to let go of his hand and let him fly independently to function as a minister. But he is nowhere near ready. He is immature. He has a lot of growth that must take place. Yet the only one around him that cannot see it is HIM!
This day did not come early on. It hit you by surprise, after investing YEARS OF YOUR LIFE into him.
Sometimes there is a 3rd party involved, whispering in your disciple’s ear. In “ROCKY 5″, it was the boxing promoter George Washington Duke who led Tommy Gunn away from the protection and training of Rocky Balboa by convincing Tommy that he was better than he really was, and by saying that Rocky was holding him back. The young sucker bought into it, and it led to horrible results. It culminated in a fight, teacher vs. student, in which the student was publicly shown that he is not where he had been led to believe that he was at as a boxer.
This is sad. This is tragic. It leads to a bitter divorce between the preacher and the disciple. The disciple runs off prematurely. He knows little to nothing about The Bible, theology, comparative religion, philosophy, etc. So what he does is finds some unchurched folks that know EVEN LESS THAN HE DOES, and he teaches them! The blind leading the blind.
The disciple slanders his teacher. The way he decides to gain fame is to attack established preachers, specifically the one he believes held him back – the trainer out of whose shadow he is seeking to step.
The preacher is hurt. He wonders if his fallen disciple will return to right fellowship. When new potential trainees approach him wanting to be instructed, a damaged piece of him is now always wondering if this youngster will mature in a direction that produces as bad and destructive fruit. Part of him is afraid to trust new minsters who desire training, for fear of a repeat performance.
The disciple sometimes morally, theologically, or practically apostasizes down the road. Sometimes he makes decisions that bring himself or others close to him great pain. He was offered a foundation before he ascended to the position of doctrinal authority, but he refused that foundation and went straight to the position he coveted.
Not all want to hold a position in a church. Some want to be patted on the back by others and be told, “Wow! You’re deep!” or “You’ve really done your homework!” or “You’re so holy, so righteous, and such a great moral person! I wish I could be like you!”. And they can get that ego stroke on the street, in the workplace, and in the community just fine. They do not need to be in a church setting necessarily.
I feel as if I must write to two audiences: Preachers and the assistants / disciples of those preachers.
DISCIPLES: You must stay humble. Never assume that your little brief listening to Christian radio and your little internet surfing has somehow gained you the same level of knowledge that your instructor has. This is a gross mistake. He has been doing the work, laboring in the field for years before you ever even cared about this subject. He has probably read more in the last 90 days than you have in the last 2 years on this subject. He has exposed you to material that most Christians do not know or even care to know. But do not use this newly-gained information as a basis to exalt yourself to a position in the community or the church that you are not ready for yet. You WILL eventually be put in the correct office, but at the right time.
Every minister has to have a period in which they pay their dues. They earn their stripes. No one puts a gun into a cop’s hand and says, “okay, go catch bad guys”. No one puts a pilot into the cockpit and says “Okay, take off”. No one puts a knife into a surgeon’s hand and says, “Okay, operate on this guy’s brain”. There is a period of laboring and training, of being a student of the craft. On occasion you will feel like you want to skip that period. I know the excitement that one feels when they convert, and the desire to go and tell it to everyone they meet. Believe me, I do. I don’t fault you for that. But there has to be a season in which you train in order to do it.
PREACHERS: Take on as many disciples as will trust you. Do not let having been burned by one (or even more than one) Tommy Gunn or one Anakin Skywalker situation in the past cloud your vision. This is what Satan would want. Throw everything into those students. Teach them all that Christ has commanded. Train them how to define, document, and defend their beliefs.
When it becomes evident, spot a wolf when one is around, and either beat him into shape or cut them loose. I myself have had to tell a couple of guys that I would not disciple them, because their motives were made apparent early on – and I was not willing to put my name and my reputation on them. Some were lacking in humility and teachability, and I knew that they were not cut from the same fabric as myself.
To your true students, give them a good foundation. Once it seems that you have taken them to a point in which they have a solid foundaiton, once they have demonstrated that they have received your training with favor, let go of their hands. Let them go out into the world and spread their wings. Let them stand up and be counted for Jesus Christ. Let them edify all that they meet by the exercising of their God-given gifts. And watch as they take what you have taught them and now teach others!
But throughout the whole discipling process, which is just one piece of the overall pie of ministry, beware of the Anakin Skywalker moment. Many preachers out there know exactly what I am talking about. If you have not yet had this happen in your lifetime, trust me. It will one day. It is part of what we sign on for when we accept God’s irrevocable call over our lives.
But you will get through it, and after the smoke clears, your ministry will press on to victory and triumph!
Brian James Shanley
bjshanley@hotmail.com
612-867-0699
www.myspace.com/rev_shanley
www.lulu.com/brianjamesshanley
