When you look around at the state of the Church, what impression do you get? How is the Body of Christ developing? These are difficult questions, so a bit more detail might help clarify. Add maturity as one of the search filters and remove size. Now contemplate your answers again. The Church has certainly become larger and with the advent of the seeker-friendly mega-church, the numbers are impressive. What is the state of the mega-church brand of Christianity, if we are not counting numbers? Don’t count attendance; don’t count weekly services; don’t count tithes; don’t count conversions; and don’t count staff members, etc. Do, instead, identify disciples.
An invitation into the family of God is waiting for everyone; all it takes is a heart touched by God’s grace and then a gentle explanation of how to become a Christian. The entrance cost is free; Jesus Christ paid it all. Yet, if you add maturity as a filter and becoming a disciple as the goal, you won’t find too many takers. Maybe even worse, you won’t find too many offers. That is because becoming a disciple is anything but free; it could cost you everything—even your life! Plus, it takes church leadership less concerned about size and more concerned about depth.
The modern congregation is a mile wide and an inch deep. The raw numbers are impressive, and yet the percentage of biblically literate disciples is anemic. That is because discipleship takes a training regimen that cannot be approached casually. What we discover in Peter’s letter is a step-by-step program for growth—from salvation to the ultimate maturity. Peter organizes his plan just as you’d expect from a man who fished for a living. It’s simple, systematic, predictable, measurable, effective, consistent, and duplicatable. It won’t take a genius to learn, nor teach. The Apostle Paul, a true scholar, must have learned a lesson or two about simplicity from this blue-collar worker before he wrote, “Commit the things you’ve heard from me, from many witnesses, to faithful men who are able to teach others also.” He must have heard what Peter thought of his usual approach, “In all of his letters Paul speaks of the same things of which I write. But, his way of communication makes it more difficult to understand. Ignorant and unstable men then twist and distort his words, as they do the Scriptures. That is always very damaging to themselves and to those who trust them.”
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