Top Highlights

• Main Ideas 1. The local church has a discipleship disease. Without the proper diagnosis and treatment plan, we will do more harm than good. 2. The church seems to think our disease is that we’ve gotten too deep. In order to treat this disease, we have sought to develop ministry strategies that require less of people, not more. We have lowered the b...
• The source of true discipleship is not better programs, better preaching, or better community. All of those, and more, are hugely important tools, but the source of discipleship is God himself. Thus, at the heart of everything we do is the desire to grow in our love and knowledge of God. We are called to love God with all of our heart, soul, and mi...
• It is important to point out at the beginning of a book about discipleship that will hopefully be read by ministry leaders and growing disciples that it does not matter how good our ministry plans are if they are not reorienting people to set their eyes on the God of the Bible. Deep discipleship is not simply a result of following a specific philos...
• True discipleship can only be measured by a disciple’s ability to connect all of reality to the Triune God. When we think about discipleship, we are thinking about our ability to be reoriented to God, and we begin to see that God initiates discipleship, that God is the source of discipleship, and that God is the goal of discipleship.
• In Matthew 16, Jesus confronts this view of discipleship as self-improvement. At the core of the chapter is the incredible scene at Caesarea Philippi when Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” (v. 13). In verse 14, Jesus’ disciples respond by saying, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah ...