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The church gets its disciples from the societies that surround it. In order to get these followers, the church has to convince them of gospel kingdom and make them tailor their ways of life just as it is taught in the bible. Hitherto developed disciples were once naïve and young Christians in the kingdom. Just as the military gets its personnel from a community at large, the church too does. This calling of new Christians into a church and teaching them on how to be true disciples can be seen as a recruitment process. This paper aims at exploring the discipleship recruitment and cultivation process as used by Jesus in making his first disciples and exploring how the processes can be employed in churches of the modern world .
Vindicating the Cultivation Process
Biblical Exegesis is the application of critical thinking skills in decoding information from a biblical text. Research is shaped by many things factors. It is only through integration of all these factors in the research process of our topic that the true and precise meaning of a biblical text will be achieved. Biblical knowledge greatly shapes our faith knowing more about God reveals to us what he expects from us and the onus that we have in his kingdom in order to reap in his blessings. Our faith thus shapes our understanding of what is going on in the world.
The Union of Cultivation and Recruiting
Cultivation cannot be accomplished without recruiting. The person to be cultivated must first be recruited into the kingdom of Christ. According to Benner (2004), the process of recruiting without cultivating is not only wrong but also it’s also unethical. This can be argued from a variety of perspectives. First, this is picking somebody from the societal fabric with the hope of changing their life and then dropping them back to the same society unchanged.
Basically, these models work hand in hand in the path to true discipleship. Cultivating must always follow recruitment in order to impact the necessary skills and knowledge of service in the ministry of Christ Jesus (Beagles, 2012). Jesus applied both recruitment and cultivation in his mission on earth. A good example is when he was calling Peter and Andrew to quit fishing and be his disciples. Jesus told them to quit fishing and follow him for he would make them fishers of men. This can be seen in three steps. The call to follow him is the recruitment into discipleship. The part on Jesus “making them” is the cultivation process since it shows that knowledge and skills would be coming from Jesus. The “Fishers of men” part is the mission. After recruitment and cultivation, Peter and Andrew would be disciples and call others into the ministry.
Prospering through Change
In Christianity, hope and desire for change are the drivers behind commitment in the mission. A person joins discipleship with the aim of transforming their lives and being useful to other people who may have not realized the fruits of living life the Christian way. Promising change on one end and delivering absolutely nothing on the other end is unethical. The recruitment and cultivation process is also subject to abuse by some of the ministry leaders who preach the gospel of fear and despondency. The disciples in turn recruited are not on free will but rather coercement and fear of hell. Discipleship should be a transformation process in the life of an individual causing them to follow God more readily and practice his mission to save the world (Peterson, 2012).
The Ethical Practices of Recruitment
It is unethical to recruit disciples in a bid to use them in activities that are not developing their knowledge of God at first hand. It is unethical to use fear in influencing someone to make a decision for Christ, even if the motives are right. The role of a Christian leader in cultivation of disciples is permanent (Beagles, 2012). Not everyone in the congregation of a church can become a true disciple.
Ethical issues in cultivation can appear where there in misinterpretation of the biblical text. A Christian leader ought to be fully versed with a biblical text before they embark in preaching. Failure to decode the text correctly may cause misguided interpretation to the disciples affecting their activities and general perception of God. According to Scazzero and Bird (2010), Christian leaders should thus be people of integrity and will to serve the kingdom of God.
The Role of a Christian Leader
Using the reading where Jesus was calling Peter and Andrew to be his disciples as a paradigm, the role of a Christian leader is revealed and recruiting disciples, cultivating the disciples into maturity and then sending them back to the community to recruit others (Beagles, 2012). Jesus, the father of discipleship laid the blueprints that ought to be followed by Christian leaders in discipling their congregations. This role is not focused on filling the church fast but rather on the long term effects of making the gospel known to a person. Christian leaders should not just call people to attending the church but rather they should impact knowledge and effect transformation that would cause the person to attend the church out of will.
Summary
The effectiveness of the ministry of Christ depends on the success of the cultivation, not just the recruitment. The great commission charges all Christians to go and make disciples for the kingdom of God. There is nowhere in the bible that Christians are charged to get more followers. According to Beagles (2012), true discipleship involves calling, growing the disciples and later sending them to service. Research has shown that the small group strategy in discipleship where Christians assist each other to study the bible is much more efficient than a mass approach (Walton, 2011).
A Christian leader must understand that his/her disciples have different capabilities. The leader has the onus of identifying these capabilities and developing them to maturity. Just like a good coach does in selecting his first team from the rest of the team. Depending on the size of the church, Christian leaders are involved differently. A large church calls for much involvement since the leaders have a large number of people to monitor and identify potential volunteers and disciples to the church. There is less involvement in the smaller church (Hull, 2014).
As the recruited disciples develop in the kingdom and service, the role of the Christian leader becomes easier since the disciples are developing and know what is expected to them. This is because gaining knowledge about God and Jesus provides blueprints which ought to be followed in living a righteous life just as Jesus did while on earth. Aspects such as preaching will become easily understandable to Christians who have prior knowledge about God (Beagles, 2012).
Conclusion
True discipleship is a transformational process. In order for this process to achieve its aims, there must be that desire to serve in the disciples there ought to exit a personal relationship between a disciple and the Christian leader for effective sharing of knowledge and skills to take place. Just like Jesus followed this three stage model, Christians should incorporate discipleship into their lives and proceed with the process spreading the gospel and enlarging the kingdom at large.
References
Beagles, K. (2012). Growing disciples in community. Christian Education Journal, 9(1), 148-164.
Benner, D. (2004). The gift of being yourself: The sacred call to self-discovery, Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Hull, B. (2014). The complete book of discipleship: On being and making followers of Christ. Tyndale House.
Peterson, E. H. (2012). A long obedience in the same direction: Discipleship in an instant society. InterVarsity Press.
Scazzero, P., & Bird, W. (2010). The emotionally healthy church: A strategy for discipleship that actually changes lives. Zondervan.
Walton, R. (2011, December ). Disciples together: the small group as a vehicle for discipleship formation. Journal of Adult Theological Education, 8(2), 99-114. Accessed on 12 January 2017 from http://dx.doi.org/10.1558/JATE.v8i2.99.
