Discipleship Essentials*
Sunday, October 17, 2004
My Prayer Today
Heavenly Father, As we consider this week what it means to make disciples, I pray that You will fill me with Your Holy Spirit and give me both the ability to understand what it means to make disciples, and the passion for making them! I pray that as read Your word about Jesus’ calling of the first twelve disciples that You will make my own calling ever more real in my daily life. I pray that You will guide me and use me to glorify Yourself as I share the Good News of Jesus with everyone around me through my words and actions. This I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
God’s Word Today
Luke 6:12-16; 9:1-6, 10
12One day soon afterward Jesus went to a mountain to pray, and he prayed to God all night. 13At daybreak he called together all of his disciples and chose twelve of them to be apostles. Here are their names:
14Simon (he also called him Peter), Andrew (Peter’s brother), James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, 15Matthew, Thomas, James (son of Alphaeus), Simon (the Zealot), 16Judas (son of James), Judas Iscariot (who later betrayed him).
1One day Jesus called together his twelve apostles and gave them power and authority to cast out demons and to heal all diseases. 2Then he sent them out to tell everyone about the coming of the Kingdom of God and to heal the sick. 3“Don’t even take along a walking stick,” he instructed them, “nor a traveler’s bag, nor food, nor money. Not even an extra coat. 4When you enter each village, be a guest in only one home. 5If the people of the village won’t receive your message when you enter it, shake off its dust from your feet as you leave. It is a sign that you have abandoned that village to its fate.” 6So they began their circuit of the villages, preaching the Good News and healing the sick….10When the apostles returned, they told Jesus everything they had done. Then he slipped quietly away with them toward the town of Bethsaida
Background on the Text – Who Wrote It? Why Was It Written? Who Was the Audience?
The Gospel of Luke was written by a physician named Luke, who was an associate and traveling companion of the Apostle Paul. Luke also wrote Acts, and the two works: Luke-Acts were intended to be read together, since Luke is a record of Jesus’ life, while Acts is a record of the life of the early church. Luke was not an eyewitness of the events that occurred in Jesus’ life, but he interviewed eyewitnesses in compiling his Gospel as we shall see in tomorrow’s background on the text. Various dates have been given for when the Gospel of Luke was written but it was most likely written either in A.D. 59-63, or in the 70’s or 80’s A.D. It was most likely written while Luke was in Rome.
Observation – What Does the Text Say?
Interpretation – What Does the Text Mean?
Application – How Can I Respond to the Text’s Insights and Teachings?
Each Week’s Check List.
After reading and studying this text, reflect on the following discipleship growth points:
Growth Point |
How |
Encouraged and strengthened me by |
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Fallen short areas |
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What will I do with these insights? |
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What did God say to me today? |
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Share insights and growth points |
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Changed/transformed how? |
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Thoughts...Making Disciples!
For those who are participating in the Discipleship Essentials process, we move this week to the first of our twenty four session together—Making Disciples. Obviously, if we are going to become a congregation that fulfills Jesus’ Great Commission to go into all the world and make disciples of all nations, we must understand what it means to make disciples. Put as simply as possible, making disciples means receiving Jesus as our Savior and Lord, growing up in our own faith walk with Him, and sharing Him and that process with others. When we have once responded to Jesus’ offer of eternal life, He calls us into a deeper relationship with Him. Having the guarantee of heaven is a wonderful blessing—the most wonderful of all blessings—but Jesus actually offers us more! He offers us the opportunity to walk with Him every day of this life—to know His desires for us, and to share His Good News with others. Being Jesus’ disciple is an opportunity to fulfill God’s promise through Abraham in the Old Testament that all the people on the earth would be blessed through Him! As we live out our faith in Jesus, trusting in Him as the first disciples did, we will see not only our lives transformed, but also the lives of everyone around us. What better use could we make of the one and only life we have to live, than to give it back to the one who created us and to let Him use us make disciples in His name!