What do you Impart?

Have you noticed that the most significant things the Holy Spirit recorded through the writers of the Gospels were not what Jesus taught?  Far more attention was devoted to the things He imparted than to His teachings.  We are told of His frequent impartation of healing.  He imparted to His disciples an anointing by the Holy Spirit.  He imparted peace not as the world gives peace but His personal peace that is never dependant on circumstances and no one has a right to take away.  He imparted revelation to His disciples.  Truly He is a teacher.  But even more He imparted things to His disciples that they could receive in no other way.

In other writings the Holy Spirit shows us the practice within the early Church of things being imparted from one believer to another.  We see examples of the laying on of hands not as a ritual or ceremony.  Rather this was a time when the life of the recipient was empowered with an imparted anointing of one sort or another.  This was viewed as an important component of Church life.  Paul writes to his disciple Timothy about the things imparted to Timothy that have equipped him to serve and do battle.

And yet, in modern institutional churchianity we observe that such impartations are extremely rare.  We see great emphasis on preaching and teaching.  This emphasis seems far greater than what appears in the operations of the early Church.  Today we see more use of spiritual gifts as tools to bring in people and contributions than as impartations of long term benefit to the children of God.

Why do we observe such change in the dynamics of ministry within the Church?

It appears to me that these changes may be directly related to a much more obvious and fundamental change that has taken place.  In modern churchianity there is great emphasis placed on getting more members for the congregation.  Ironically, this is so important that we are even justified to entice members of another congregation to leave that one and come to our congregation.  We try to build seeker friendly congregations that will entice even the most casual visitor to want to come back and join our congregation.  We give wide spread praise to the leaders who have built the largest congregations.  We push aside or ignore to death the persons who make waves that might make people in the congregation less comfortable in our group.  We work diligently to build our group even at the cost of other groups and non-conforming individuals.

In the larger view, we idolize making converts all around the world.  We stir up the enthusiasm of our group by soliciting money from the members to support missionaries around the world who send us back statistics about the amazing numbers of people who “come forward to receive the Lord” at their meetings.  We measure the success of groups in terms of the numbers of its members and converts.

Jesus, however, intentionally spoke to the world in parables so that they would not understand what He was saying.  He asked recipients of His impartations to not tell anybody.  He seemed to desire operating in ways that would avoid more attention and larger groups.  He intentionally said things that offended large numbers of people.  He was not recruiting the rich or famous to give Him support or publicity.  When given the opportunity to perform a stunt that would give him the whole world as His audience, He said “NO.”

Instead, Jesus became the leader of a ragtag group who were described as a group of ignorant uneducated fishermen.  He undertook not the building of a big organization but the building up of about a dozen disciples.  He did not seek to become noticed by everyone.  Rather, He undertook to become a very close friend to only a small group of men who came to see the anointing of God in Him.  When He got to the end of His ministry He made two particularly noteworthy statements which summarized His own view of what He had accomplished.

The first of these two was made to the Father in His prayer.  He reported to the Father that He had kept the ones whom the Father had entrusted to Him.  It was very clear that His focus was on the few names on Father’s list.  He had no apparent interest in expanding Father’s list of about a dozen.  Rather, He was committed to impart to this small group the things He received from Father.

The second statement was made to His disciples.  This was the small group of men who had seen Him intimately for years.  They saw it all.  They saw Him with the crowds.  They saw Him when He went off to squat by the side  of the path when hiking through the countryside.  They saw him match wits with the religious leaders.  They watch while He poured out love on prostitutes and commuted the correct sentence of an adulteress.  Having watched how He treated His family, His finances, His taxes, His relationship with the Father, these men knew Jesus intimately.  It was these men Jesus looked in the eye and told, “If you have seen me you have seen the Father.”

But, churchianity is lead by men who are continually seeking public acclaim and at the same time trying to avoid intense personal scrutiny.  These organization men are absolutely brilliant and extremely effective at building larger and larger organizations with more and more money and influence.  They are continually answering questions that no one is asking.  At the same time they perpetually refer to someone else people who have real questions about the difficulties they encounter in life.  They are good at organizing the delivery of Christmas turkeys.  But utterly inadequate to deliver us from our own evil that lies within us.

Why this disparity between conduct our greatest leaders and conduct of Jesus?

Much of the change lies in our change of the tasks we have accepted and undertaken.  Jesus, after giving us an example so that we would understand what He meant, commissioned us to “make disciples.”  It was these disciples that He asked us to teach and baptize.  Modern churchianity, however, has commissioned itself to make members.  It has undertaken to teach whoever it can get to listen.  Jesus, on the other hand, specifically did not ask us to build His Church.  Indeed, He gave to Himself the task of building His Church.  He chose to give the Church His personal touch by placing each member in the Church in just the spot that pleases Him.  Moreover, He gave rather stern warnings to men who would lead the Children of God astray, to move them out of the place in which He put them.

Why then in the system do we see a virtual complete absence of true personal disciples?  It is because members of a large club I lead require almost no personal sacrifice compared to what is required to disciple just one man.  The organization takes on a life of its own.  Disciples require me to continually die to myself and my own desires.  The leaders of the club system suffer burn out because they operate in their own strength.  Disciple makers are sustained by the Spirit of the Lord who is continually flow both through them to their disciples and through their disciples to the servant disciple maker.

So, what is required to be a disciple maker?  First and foremost it is important to realize, while one can teach what he has not experienced, he can never impart what he does not have.  The man who has not been a disciple can never effectively be a disciple maker.

So, if I want to be a disciple, how do I find a disciple maker?  Initially I must acknowledge that discipleship is a relationship.  So the search can only be among the people with whom I have some relationship.  Among such people, look for five specific things:

1.     Look for someone in whom you see the character and person of Jesus.

2.     Look among that group for someone you trust enough to reveal your inmost personal secrets and failures.

3.     Look among that smaller group for someone who has vision for what you personally may become in God’s plan for you.

4.     Of those, find the ones who are disciples and in effective relationships.

5.     Finally, choose one of these and ask if he/she will watch over and disciple you.

Let us return to the way of Jesus.  Let us go and make disciples and impart to them the Spirit and life of the Lord.