Rev. Kathryn Klassen
If you were to ask any evangelical church in the western world if they are committed to discipleship, they would say yes. However, recent findings from the March 2020 ‘National Study on Disciple Making in USA Churches’ tell a different story. One thousand interviews with senior/lead pastors of Protestant churches were conducted in September 2019, in a variety of denominations, church sizes, and geographical locations.1
One sobering finding from this report was that while many Protestant pastors were making substantial claims about their church’s disciple-making activities and priorities, they did not have the numerical evidence to back it up.2 The study did not infer that church leaders were deliberately hiding the truth, but instead suggested that perhaps these leaders perceived what they wanted to see instead of what was actually happening. The study suggested that part of this disparity might be due to differing definitions of disciple making and it concluded that by inadvertently over-estimating disciple making efforts, churches risk perpetuating an illusion of progress inconsistent with statistics.3
A similar Canadian study was conducted by Alpha Canada and Flourishing Congregations in 2021, and repeated in 2024. The focus was not on disciple-making per se, but on how church leaders perceived and practiced evangelism. The purpose of the study was to look intently at the evolving Canadian landscape of evangelism, shaped by cultural shifts, changing perceptions and societal dynamics. Their present-day findings—based on Canadian government statistics—identified approximately 12.6 million Canadians (over 30% of the population) who reported no religious affiliation, double the number from 20 years ago. Despite these odds, 70% of leaders across Canada saw an increase in spiritual curiosity in their communities from 2021 to, including an unexplainable increase in spiritual hunger, a greater intentionality on the part of the church, and a renewed focus on the role of prayer.
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I suspect increased prayer, along with COVID-19, contributed to the increased spiritual hunger.
Over the Spring I took a sabbatical to do some research into ‘The Role of Spiritual Nurture in Disciple Making.’ My research convinced me that we need a perspective shift around disciple making, in addition to the above call to renew our focus on prayer and intentionality.
Disciple making in a western context often conjures an image of two people sitting in a coffee shop with a Bible—often termed, one-on-one discipleship. While that might be part of it, as we look at Jesus’ disciple making, we see much more. Jesus doesn’t disciple the twelve on His own. He brings them into His relationship with the Holy Spirit and with His Father, who incidentally is the one that directed him to these twelve in the first place. In John 17, we see Jesus giving His Father a performance appraisal on His 3-year ministry. There are no numbers in His review. He doesn’t talk of the crowds, or the healings, or the sermons; He refers only to the ‘ones you gave me’ (John 17:2). ‘This is what I passed on to them and this is what they are doing with it.’
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How might our disciple making change if every church leader and lay person had to give an account for those God has given them to disciple?
Jesus also gathered them as a group. Yes, they got front row seats at all his meetings, enjoying his teaching and witnessing major healings. They also got many invitations to dinners and received unscheduled personal tutoring as questions arose. Hanging out 24/7 allowed for these spontaneous moments.
Part of my research included interviewing young moms on their role as nurturers. One mother commented that, as a youth pastor, she prioritized ‘Kairos God conversations’ with her youth as the real work. After raising her own children she realized the real work was in the day-to-day ‘with-ness.’ Being with them all the time allowed the Kairos moments to come without striving or pressure.
Jesus also discipled not only in community but through community. He didn’t protect his twelve from the raw iron-sharpening-iron moments between them. Instead, he used those as teaching moments. He also didn’t wait to recruit them into mission. They became his prayer team, even though they were novices. Jesus did not minister to them through a program, but a life-on-life, highly relational commission.
As part of my research, I interviewed 15 different people across different generations, genders and ethnicities, inquiring about their spiritual nurture. Those that came to Christ in other countries talked of being discipled in community. When they immigrated to Canada however, they had trouble finding community in the church. Instead, for many, their spiritual formation was reduced to programs and events. Relationships were transactional, not covenantal. Their comments were quite sobering!
“In my home country we would go every day and had a lot more connecting. Here in Canada, we meet less, and our visits are less intense.”
-South American
“In Canada no one does anything extra. People don’t bring you into their circle of friendships. It is just programmatic. It is all up to you.”
-Southeast Asian
“I brought a lot of fire with me, but I found Canada as a huge vacuum spiritually. I missed the communal context that kept me in the group.”
- African
The comparison between the western world and the eastern world only holds water when you consider that in the eastern world, disciple making movements abound.
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What do they have that we don’t? One of the predominant forces that stunts our disciple making is our individualism. According to German Theologian Johannes Hartl, modernity has not so much abolished God as it has deified self.
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While it is easy to point the finger outside, we must also admit that western individualism has crept into the church. We are guilty of this idolatry, and it is most visible in our disciple making. Our individualism can subtly put our lifestyle and career ambitions ahead of our gospel commission. Our individualistic pursuits become the ‘thorny soil’ that choke the seed, keeping it from maturing (Luke 8:15).
What the global south has that the western world doesn’t is the ‘we factor.’ The ‘we-factor’ often includes multi-generational relating, meaning multiple layers of maturity, including peers, plus those a few years older, and some a few years younger.
8 In short, family! In the GTA our parks are packed with immigrant families having picnics. The whole family is included. Despite many living in high-rises and longing to be outside, there is an innate compulsion to gather. It saddens me to think that coming to Canada, families may be at risk of losing that.
In the Trinity we also find the ‘we-factor,’ one God communing as three. We even see a multi-generational father-son relationship. Jesus will always be His Father’s son, and the Father will always be Jesus’ father. As Imago Dei, should we not mirror God’s oneness, His three-ness, and his multigenerational-ness? It seems western individualism has squelched these aspects of the Imago Dei, and by so doing adversely affected our disciple making.
So where do we go from here? As has been recorded, prayer is a great starting place. It is hard to confess what we can’t see, as David says in Psalm 19:22, ‘Who can discern their own errors? Forgive my hidden faults.’ We need to invite God to show us where we are deifying self in our lives and ministries, and convict us of our need to change. Then, in humility, let us invite the Spirit to re-parent us from our ‘I’ orientation into a ‘We’ orientation—something a lot more like family.
Throughout the New Testament we see family imagery present in the kingdom. When Jesus taught his disciples to minister to the poor and imprisoned, he called the ‘least of these’ his siblings, ‘brothers and sisters of mine’ (Matthew 25:40b). The Apostle Paul, though single, not only identifies as a spiritual father but also as a mother.
‘Just as a nursing mother cares for her children, so we cared for you. Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well… For you know that we dealt with each of you as a father deals with his own children…’’ (1 Thess. 2:7b-8,11)
All of us, whether we have kids or not, are called to be spiritual mothers and fathers. The interviews I conducted asked questions first about familial nurture, and then spiritual nurture. Of the fifteen people I interviewed, all fifteen have landed on their feet and are following hard after Jesus. The sampling included individuals ranging across three generations. Some came from Christian homes; others did not. My interview participants represented seven different countries of origin. Out of those fifteen, only one referenced both parents as loving and present. The rest either came from broken homes or experienced one parent alienating them in some way, either through absence, illness, or anger, etc. or they were parented in a community that included grandparents and servants. When it came to spiritual nurture, only 1.3% talked of curriculum or programs that assisted in their spiritual formation. All of them spoke of the ‘we-factor:’ their mentors, peers, youth groups, cultural family, and community. Many achieved spiritual formation after being drawn to those who offered the nurture they missed out on in their upbringing.
Imagine the wounds in the many who haven’t landed on their feet. Despite their age, they long for a father and/or mother figure to nurture them. There is much fathering and mothering and sistering and brothering to do. The church is supposed to be the family of God, making up for the deficits in our families of origin. Is this not the gospel? Could this be the ‘we-factor’ of disciple making? The beauty of this parenting image for disciple making is that you don’t parent the masses; you just pour into those the Father has given you, usually one at a time.
I am grateful to be part of a denomination that is committed to multiplying disciples everywhere. I am excited about the nations coming to Canada, many of whom are coming to reach us. Let us be open to learning from them. With a little bit of spiritual tweaking, this might be more doable than we think!
Rev. Kathryn Klassen is the Eastern Canadian District Director of Renewal and Leader Formation. Her passion is to contagiously chase after God with every ounce of her being such that others are drawn into the abundant life Jesus promised them. She brings a global awareness, having grown up in East Africa and lived out much of her ministry experience in the multicultural city of Toronto. Her 35 years in disciple making have included ministering to university students, businesspeople, seniors, and everyone in between. She is a catalyst for the deeper life helping others journey from disillusionment, disengagement and distraction into becoming their very best selves.
Footnotes:
1 National Study on Disciple Making in USA Churches, by Grey Matter Research & Consulting in partnership with 24 other organizations. https://exponential.org/product/national-study-ondisciple-making-in-usa-churches/ pg.4 It is important to note that this research was collected during COVID where churches were not meeting in person. However, I suspect their statistics would most likely reflect their pre-COVID reality.
2 Ibid, pg. 8
3 Ibid, pg. 11
4 Reigniting Hope – Conducted by Alpha Canada and Flourishing Congregations, https://alphacanada.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/REIGNITING-HOPE-REPORT-KEY-FINDINGS-Final.pdf pg. 13.
5 An exegetical study into John 17 will reveal the word give/gave/given showing up 16 times – and correlates with the above suggested summary of Jesus dialogue with his Father around his discipling the twelve.
6 National Discipleship Study, pg. 13.
7 Leadership Conference 2024 – London, England; Dr. Johannes
Hartl – May 6, 2024
8 Life Model Works, online course, Lesson 4, Michael Hendricks