• “Go … and make disciples of all nations.”
• “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel.”
• “Repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed … to all nations.”
• “As the Father has sent me … I am sending you.”
• “You will be My witnesses … to the end of the earth.”

Where Do You Want to Go?

by Dale Losch, President of Crossworld

One day Alice in Wonderland came to a fork in the road and saw the Cheshire cat in a tree.  “Which road do I take?” she asked. 

The cat responded with a question: “Where do you want to go?”

“I don't know,” Alice answered.

“Then,” said the cat, “it doesn't matter.”

The point is simple: If you want to achieve a certain result, you need to have a clear goal. So what is the goal of disciple-making? As we have already said in previous articles on the subject, the immediate goal is spiritually reproductive followers of Jesus who are characterized by love, obedience and self-sacrifice. But what is the ultimate goal? Is it to simply populate the world with disciple-makers?

Consider what happens in human cell multiplication. One cell becomes two. Two become four. Four become eight, until before long there are millions of healthy reproducing cells. But to what end? The development of a new living being. Cells do not multiply to exist independent of each other, but to form a new body. 

So it is with disciple-making. The ultimate goal is the development and growth of a healthy body — what the Bible refers to as a “church.” Disciple-making is to church planting what cell multiplication is to the development of a new living being. Disciple-making and church planting are meant to be part of a seamless process that results in the birth of a living being (the church) made up of living cells (disciples). Disciple-making that does not result in the development and growth of healthy churches is not biblical disciple-making. Disciples are created to live and thrive in community.

If our goal is healthy churches, then it is critically important that we choose the right road. To apply the wisdom of the Cheshire cat, if you know your destination, it does matter what road you take. Reproductive disciple-making (or spiritual multiplication) is the key to establishing healthy churches. The body is only as good as its cells and the church is only as good as its disciples.

In Jesus Christ: Disciple-Maker, Bill Hull writes, “I have not mellowed in my belief that making disciples is indeed the primary and exclusive work of the church. The fact that the church is weaker than ever and shrinking is the evidence that we still haven’t got it.”

In a similar vein, in the article “We Aren’t About Weekends,” Pastor Bob Roberts observes, “If you focus on mission, churches will follow, but if you focus on churches, mission often gets lost.”

At Crossworld, we have chosen to focus on the mandate Jesus gave us: to make disciples who make disciples. We have chosen to do so out of love for Christ and His church, believing that if we focus on this mission, communities of disciples will begin to develop and healthy “bodies” and churches will be born.