#4: Become Like Me: Make Disciples Who Make Disciples (Luke 9-10) Series

Discipled, Week 4: Become Like Me

Luke 9-10

2 Timothy 2:2

Good morning! Go ahead and take your Bibles and open them to Luke 9. This is page 814 if you are using one of the pew Bibles.

Today we wrap up our series called Discipled. Next week, we are going to begin a series that will take us up to Easter called “What’s in a Name?” [talk briefly about the I Am statements]

So it is going to be a great series. But this morning, I want to finish up talking about how Jesus led His disciples to be disciple makers. We’ve been talking this month about how Jesus made disciples. First, there was the invitation: Follow me. We talked about how those first disciples—four fishermen and a tax collector, left everything and followed Jesus.

Then, for the next three years there was a period of education: Learn From me. Jesus taught his disciples, using both words and actions. They listened to Him teach. They watched Him perform miracles. It was basically a time of internship and training.

But now think about what happens next. All of us have experienced the training period for a job, right? It might be a day or two, or a week or two, depending on the job. But when training is over, what happens next? That’s right. There is an expectation that they do the job they were hired for.

So how long does it take before we are ready to do the job Jesus expects us to do? And what is that job?

And what is the job?

The job is to make disciples. It is the Great Commission—go and make disciples. If you want to make it rhyme like these other points, the process is to move from invitation to education to expectation, to duplication—being disciples who make disciples.

So how long before you are ready to do that?

Many years ago, I was leading a Bible study about spiritual maturity. I asked the people in the class (and these were mostly senior adults), what are the marks of spiritual maturity? The answers to the first question were along the lines of developing the Fruit of the Spirit, developing hunger for God’s word, practicing spiritual disciplines of prayer and Bible study and so forth.

Then I asked them whether they considered themselves spiritually mature. Very few adults were willing to say, “Yes, I am spiritually mature." It was more like “Well, its an ongoing process. One said, "Christians are always arriving, never arrived."

These answers were not wrong. Paul consistently writes about God perfecting the work he began in us (Philippians 1:6); not having already been made perfect (Philippians 3:12-13); and attaining the whole measure of the fullness of Christ (Eph. 4:13-14).

All of these are true statements. None of us have arrived. We are always pressing on toward the upward call.

But what if instead of a group of Christians, I was teaching a group of zoologists? And instead of asking how long it took to be spiritually mature, I asked them when an animal was biologically mature? What would be on the list?”

This time, the list was pretty short:

1. Able to feed itself

2. Capable of reproducing

As far as biology is concerned, if you are doing those things, you are mature. If not, you aren’t.

Just for grins and giggles, I Googled the phrase “fastest animal to maturity,” I learned about the African Annual Fish. These little guys spend their entire lives in rain puddles left behind after the rainy season in East Africa. They hatch from eggs that have been dormant in the mud since last season. Within seventeen days, they are capable of laying and fertilizing eggs of their own. And when the puddle dries up, they are gone.

On the other end of the spectrum is the Olm salamander, which is found in the secure, isolated caves of Eastern Europe. And by the way, if there was an award for cutest salamander, I would have to give it to the Olm salamander. Just look at how happy he looks. I never thought I would want to cuddle a salamander,

The Olm salamander can live for as long as 100 years. But get this: they don’t begin reproducing until around 16 years of age.

The lesson? When time is short, we get busy. But when we are in a secure environment, we lose a sense of urgency.

The Bible is clear on two things: First, God intends for us to reproduce spiritually. He told us in the Great Commission that we are to make disciples.

Second, there is only a finite amount of time we have to do that. We may act like we are in a safe secure environment, just like out happy salamander here.