But more often than not, I get the validation I need. Today is a validating kind of day.

Children are like sponges: they soak up whatever is around them, whether that’s scripture or Daniel Tiger sing-alongs. They imitate the adults in their lives, aspire to become like them, ask questions needing answers. Discipleship of children seems naturally then to occur in the place where kids are for most of the day, namely, the home.

Discipleship meaning:

1. Engaging in apprenticeship to Christ through

2. an embodiment of His mission and

3. an understanding of His teachings

In simpler terms: becoming like Christ.

Parents are almost certainly the best equipped to do this kind of work. The structure of a nuclear family is a perfect place for teaching and forming the character of children. Exploration of faith is not easy or simple. But it seems to me that the eighteen or so years that a child in your care is the best opportunity to assist in faith exploration. Not to mention, you have all of this time after your children leave you to continue the process of discipleship.

But then … life. Dishes. Homework. The part where you are supposed to mold your kid’s eternal character while also remembering to pack a lunch.

Barna, the Christian polling people, released a study today: 51% of U.S. adults think church is the primary place for discipleship. (Which makes sense, insofar as “church” is already the place where you go for coffee in the lobby and to get asked awkward questions about your prayer life.)

Parents, however, are divided. Half (51%) expect the church to take the lead, while nearly as many parents (49%) believe it’s their responsibility. Many parents also admit they feel under-equipped—86 percent say their children learn spiritual lessons at church that they themselves cannot teach.

The results of Barna’s study are eye popping. If it is the case that the process of forming your child into a person of faith is entirely in the hands of your church, we might suggest spending more than 1.5 hours a week there.

Do the math: your child spends about 0.89% of their week at church. Which means 99.11% of the time they are…well, not there. This is not great if church is the only place doing the shaping of our faiths. It’s a bit like expecting someone to get fit by jogging to the fridge once a week. If we are talking about whole-person transformation into people of faith, that is… surprising?

Yet 51% of adults are okay with the primary source of the most important part of life being elsewhere. We apparently believe can effectively outsource our greatest responsibility and supplement it.

Now, if this were about education, then I might say it makes sense. If your kids are in public school, then yes, outsource away! But at 7 hours a day for five days, that’s 35 hours of learning. Put another way, it’s 21% of your kids time. If your kids are like mine, they spend 40-50% of their week sleeping. If 21% goes to school, that leaves me, the parent, with 29% of their waking hours. And realistically half of that is spent looking for missing socks, so for me, it’s more like 14%.

So let’s say that indeed I’m too busy or ill-equipped to disciple my children. Does it make sense to rely predominantly on the church?

Maybe the answer is yes because you are satisfied with 1% of the week being about character formation in Christ. Or maybe the answer is—every moment your kids are with you should be a form of discipling.

I don’t think we should let ourselves get away by saying we are ill-equipped to disciple. If that is the case, we ourselves should consider whether our faith is actually something we understand.

If you have faith, show it. Turn the 1% into the 29%. Because kids are sponges. And the question is not whether they’ll soak something up, it’s whether you’re going to pour whole milk or dirty dishwater. I promise your church is just going to give them Mountain Dew.

So what do we do to increase engagement?

One seductive answer is that we create small groups that cater to the preferences of the population. We happen to have a good idea of what people are looking for.

In general, people want to join small groups for spiritual reasons ahead of social reasons. While creating a dichotomy between spiritual and social reasons feels false to me, the conclusion it reveals is important: when drawing people into small groups, focusing on spiritual benefits over social benefits may resonate more deeply with a congregation.

This conclusion makes sense. Many people feel that they are over-scheduled and are not excited to add something that feels like an extra social engagement to their calendar. Hence, relational reasons for small groups will fall flat. The conclusion also makes sense in Evangelical circles where there is little catechetical formation for both children and adults. Thus, Evangelicals are always looking for intellectual nourishment. People in my church crave organized, systematized, and concise information about the Bible and Christian theology.

According to a recent study, the top three reasons that drive a person to join a small group are:

• I want to learn more about Christ

• I want to learn more about scripture

• I want to develop deeper expression of my faith

Now, those impulses are terrific for the average Christian. But what I’ve found is that those are almost always gateway drugs into the highly relational life God calls each of us to.

Strangely, these spiritual reasons aren’t necessarily the long-term drivers of spiritual growth. They are the intellectual entrance into the Kingdom which eventually becomes about outward care, love and relationship.

Why is that? Our pursuit of knowledge of Christ ebbs and flows and is also almost always unsatisfying in Christianity. Because attempting to know Christ will always bring individuals to a point where the intellectual answers do not bridge the gap between belief and practice. In simpler terms, faith will always be expressed most fully in action, in doing.

So if a church offers small groups on the basis of the top three spiritual reasons in the study above, is that a healthy approach? Well, yes, in a way. But a spiritual seeker might then have their expectations inverted as they realize that most of spiritual growth stems from the social reasons for joining a small group—learning and formation happen most in community. The community actually drives the spiritual growth and creates sustainable paths of formation. Then, the social drivers and spiritual drivers help to push each other.

What I find interesting is that the top reasons for joining a small group (i.e., the spiritual reasons), are so intuitively good. There’s no doubt that we all agree they are important, possibly, the most important impulses we have in life. Yet, when we enter a small group community, we begin a journey that opens our eyes to the relational portion of Christianity which is like revealing the rest of the spiritual formation iceberg.

For churches, the question to ask is: how am I presenting the power of small group ministry to my flock? An equally important question is then: how am I pushing small group leaders to create spaces of strong, resilient and intentional community, rather than classrooms about the Bible? If a church treats small groups like Sunday school, there will almost certainly be no real transformation in it if people then do not find themselves in a more relational ministry. The reasons that people are least likely to join small groups need to become the reasons they are most likely to stay.

But it turns out that keeping the Sabbath can be both relaxing and stressful depending on your gender. A study in the Journal of Psychology and Theology1 notes that men in Seventh-day Adventist communities experience significantly reduced cortisol levels—hormones associated with stress—when keeping the Sabbath. However, women experience higher levels of cortisol.

The study notes: “Overall, cortisol was lower post-Sabbath than pre-Sabbath. In addition, females had significantly higher cortisol than males […]. Most importantly, the interaction between cortisol collection day and gender was significant. Men had lower levels of urinary free cortisol post-Sabbath. Conversely, women experienced no differences in urinary free cortisol from pre- to post-Sabbath.” This suggests that women are not always experiencing the positives of keeping the Sabbath in Seventh-day Adventist communities.

Why?

Seventh-day Adventists tend to avoid work from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. But what does avoiding work actually mean? If there is some kind of work being shifted to women, then the possitive effects of Sabbath on women is lessened.

Another interesting conclusion from the study is that intrinsic religiosity affects the cortisol changes—that is, if you are more integrated with your faith in your daily life, you have higher cortisol levels pre-Sabbath and lower levels post-Sabbath.

“Pre-Sabbath cortisol levels increased as intrinsic religiosity increased. Post-Sabbath cortisol levels decreased as intrinsic religiosity increased. We believe this lends credibility to the explanation that the changes we see in pre- and post-Sabbath cortisol are potentially explained by religious beliefs, values, and behaviors.” This helps to explain that the cortisol changes are indeed related to religious belief.

Previous studies have noted that death rates in Israel went down on Sabbath days in Jewish communities and that the pattern was stronger in men. One study postulated that there are “ritualistic demands” on women that cause them to not experience the same effect.2 Similarly, the authors of the Seventh-day Adventist study state, “[…] SDA men may have fewer and women greater physical demands on Sabbath relating to meal and home preparations before sundown on Sabbath. SDA women and men may both have greater psychosocial interactions, support, and/or demands on Sabbath during worship activities.” One possible explanation in the study is that the men in the study may work at higher rates during the week and thus experience Sabbath as a respite from that work.

Our conclusion is that it’s important to think about how the Sabbath is affecting your entire family. Are you and your spouse both experiencing the ameliorating affects of Sabbath?

This certainly explains why I am more open to spending time with my kids, engaging in social activities and relaxing on a Sunday. Whereas, my wife tends to be less excited to leave our home. One thing, in particular, that comes to mind is how much I look forward to my Sunday night small group. But if small group on Sunday is actually causing my spouse to have increased anxiety, are we really sabbathing as a family?

A note on AI: Seeking Christ is a sacred act, one that we are not willing to cede to artificial intelligence. We uncompromisingly do not use artificial intelligence to write our posts. We hope that the genuineness of our writing bleeds through every paragraph.

Let me outline some of the important points that Andy makes (summarizing for both future me and present you). Note that this is largely a summary of Andy’s comments and I’ve inserted some of my own thoughts here and there:

• Roughly 100 years ago, humans develop machines (devices) that operate independently or with little human involvement. Tools then get to the point where human skill is not as necessary and tools can create new efficiencies. (4:00)

• Humans then develop the ability to operate in a digital world, interfacing with that world using screens. (5:27)

• Humans then develop artificial intelligence. Computers improve but it in cyclical spurts (i.e., we have “AI winters” followed by AI growth). However, in the last 5 years, we invent a form of vector mathematics and allow computer systems to train themselves on data sets. These systems have three new qualities: (i) cultural and lingual fluency, (ii) emotional / relational fluency, and (iii) simulation fluency. These qualities do not mean that computers can actually understand these things as humans do.

• The fourth thing that may arrive: machines are able to move through space and time (i.e., robotics). Robotics will be like a new category of creatures in our world. (11:20)

• Jesus lives in a world where he has access to the technology of writing and money. Writing allows ideas to spread. Money allows value to spread (independent of land or human capital). Jesus uses neither. Yet, Jesus embodies the fullness of what it means to be human so our apprenticeship (i.e., formation) in Him requires us to learn to be human independent of technology, even the technologies of writings and money. Even as the apostles carry on Jesus’ message using technology like Roman roads, money, etc., there is no New Testament marveling of the embedded technology that the apostles use to spread the Gospel. In the New Testament, there is a constant “re-centering” of attention away from the technological medium and back to relational connection with others. (14:00) [Chris Unseth: It surprised me that I have never considered this. Of course, we have all thought about how Jesus wrote none of the words of the New Testament. But the fact that he shirked many major technological mediums of his day entirely has profound implications to me. Jesus was not concerned about mass dissemination of His teachings outside of word-of-mouth evangelism by his disciples. He was wholly invested in human-to-human interaction.]

• The project of the Kingdom is about restoring humans to the ability to love one another. This restoration begins with the life of Jesus which is lived entirely without scale and amplification techniques, yet His life resonates widely in the world. Technology is not relevant to the project of becoming like Jesus. (20:40)

• Technology deforms us if we are use it to break free of the burden of being human (e.g., work, suffering, toiling for others). (21:50).

• Artificial intelligence is useful for understanding information and developing techniques. But the deep work of therapy is the interior healing of our souls, emotions and mind. This healing is not about information and techniques. We need a human person to be with us in our (i) fear, (ii) guilt and (iii) shame. Cultures are built around these concepts. In fear, we need a person to trust. In guilt, we need someone to tell us our sin is covered and we are free. In shame, we need unconditional love. These require personal encounters that artificial intelligence can only simulate. Only a live person can feel fear, guilt, and / or shame, then respond with trust, forgiveness, and / or love. God has entrusted us with the authority to form these responses and we should not abdicate that to a chat bot even though people may prefer artificial intelligence because it feels safer. With artificial intelligence, we miss out on formation into persons who can be agents of God’s reconciliation in our world. (23:36)

• Artificial intelligence is the ultimate mirror. It will never be what you need—that is, another embodied person. If someone or something is just a mirror, you are simply reflecting your own weaknesses and vulnerabilities in it. Jesus intervenes so that history and culture are not just a mirror of humanity. (31:50) [Chris Unseth: Probably Crouch’s most compelling point and one that I have wondered about with respect to AI. Humans crave encounters with truth. They want to understand things fully and to have their assumptions challenged. The fact that we must prompt AI to provide push back erodes its ability to truly challenge us and feel human. Ultimately, the sheen of AI always wears off when I realize you can never shake off its very particular flavor of writing or creating images.]

• LLMs are following a path of probability when crafting responses. Artificial intelligence thus provides the most average / probable answer possible. Jesus, however, almost never provides the probable answer. Even in the Shema, Jesus adds a fourth element not present in prior Jewish formulations. Why? Jesus is the Son of the living God who is always opening up new possibilities, thus Jesus is the most creative conversation partner you can have. (36:14)

• Jesus relates to us in ways different from a chat bot. Chat bots return answers immediately. In prayer, God almost never immediately provides us with a fully developed answer. When He does, the answer is often challenging and unexpected. Usually, we hear silence. Part of relating to God is realizing that the path to Him is not done on our own terms—it’s not a fluent conversation or exchange of answers. This is also true of our interaction with Scripture. (40:06)

• Artificial intelligence can affect our spiritual practices. In the practice of solitude, artificial intelligence hinders by wanting to be your companion. So you forfeit the ability to be truly alone. In the practice of silence, we relinquish the need for communication. But artificial intelligence does not and cannot be silent; it is by its very nature responsive. Carrying it with us means that we do not learn how to speak to God and how to not require God to speak to back. In fasting, artificial intelligence cannot help you because it does not require food. (44:14) [Chris Unseth: I don’t know if I buy these points. I can see AI facilitating all kinds of positive developments in spiritual practices. However, the larger point is true. AI smooths over the friction that causes us to grow as human beings and ultimately, spiritual practices are meant to replace the missing friction. In that sense, AI’s purposes do run orthogonal to the purpose of spiritual disciplines.]

• Technology will not help you become the kind of person who has something worth offering. An entity that is predictable will respond with attunement to what we want and will not train us for human relationships. Pain and friction is required to sustain humans—a lesson that human beings need to learn. (47:20). [Chris Unseth: Probably my favorite statement in this conversation. Our individuality or uniqueness is what makes us into people who have something to offer others and even God, Himself. AI flattens our individuality out.]

• Artificial intelligence does not need you. It does not grow sick, require compassion, grow old, require care. But we build community by being present to the needs around us. Fellow human being grow weaker over time, unlike artificial intelligence. Humans need a community around them that know how to care for someone who does not know how to be economically productive or cognitively relevant. Artificial intelligence will not train you for the moments of greatest human possibility (moments of greatest human need). (50:45)

• This is a perfect time in which Christians need to teach what it means to be human. (55:01) [Chris Unseth: Yes! This should be our response as a church. AI has a flavor in its responses that ultimately regresses to bland or can sometimes engender disgust. What people will start to crave are genuine human experiences. What Christianity offers is the ultimate course on being human and experiencing your humanity.]

• Pastors should not be using artificial intelligence when doing what is the most sacred part of their jobs. Most people do not go into ministry thinking it’s purely a technical thing. (59:00)

• Artificial intelligence can make us feel as though we have superpowers. With minimal energy or output, we have outsized effect on the world. Technology helps us to go through the world without effort or skill—we can make a difference without having ourselves become different. The technologies train us to not want the pain / difficulty of being formed into a different person. This like the dream of magic; power is wielded without moral character, dependence on God, or dependence on other people. (1:03:00)

• The philosopher Hilary Putnam observes that relationships are digital alloys of face-to-face relationships. We build relationships in person. Digital relationships are like carbon (not that useful, in this case, digital interaction) but if we build primarily on iron (in this case, the in-person portion of a relationship), you can end up with a stronger alloy (steel) of a relationship. Care and compassion (both requiring strong in-person presence) are the most important things we can do as human beings. (1:11:04) [Chris Unseth: This is a strong case for church growth going forward. Few modern institutions cultivate (nay, demand!) weekly in-person experiences. As the pastiche of AI’s relational ability wears off, I suspect people will crave genuine, human experiences that push them to grow as spiritual and embodied beings.]

• Humans are meant to be heart, soul, mind, and complexes designed for love. Whatever we bring into our lives should advance those things and engage our “allness” of heart, soul and mind for the purpose of loving God and our neighbor. This is how we flourish. (1:15:40)

A note on AI: Seeking Christ is a sacred act, one that we are not willing to cede to artificial intelligence. We uncompromisingly do not use artificial intelligence to write our posts. We hope that the genuineness of our writing bleeds through every paragraph.

However, the data often indicates only a tepid transformation between practicing Christians and non-Christians. For example, the question of pornography use has vexed me for years. You would think that practicing Christians would be wildly different from the society around them. And perhaps you can make that argument based on the Barna study below1: it appears that there are 17% more Practicing Christians who “never” use pornography, versus the general population.

However, I don’t find 17% to be very meaningful and it’s possible that Christians are virtue signaling in these studies, which would mean the 17% portion is smaller. On top of that, Practicing Christians and Non-Christians look virtually the same in daily, weekly, and “less often” than a month use of pornography categories versus non-Christians.

In the press release of the study, Barna says, “Just 10 percent of U.S. Christians and churched adults say their church offers programming to help those struggling with pornography. Meanwhile, over half (58%) say it’s important to them that their church is addressing topics like pornography.”2

I’m not sure “programming” is the answer here. That appears to be the simple solution for many churches that are facing a pervasive problem.

What we argue on this substack is that programming typically solves for symptoms rather than the underlying disease. The disease of modern pornography was possibly not contemplated in Paul’s writings but we do know that sexual immorality was a particular focus for him. I don’t want to put sexual sin on a pedestal, yet there is clear language that sexual immorality is an especially insidious form of immorality that is worthy of our special attention. It also turns out that its use is a lot easier to study than “honoring your mother and father,” and it’s far more indicative of an underlying disease than sins like, murder, theft, etc. Sexual immorality goes to the character of individuals, a malformation in our hearts because it is often so hidden. That makes it a useful indicator of our soul’s hidden conditions. And if that’s the case, church “programming” needs to do a lot more than simply address the sin, it would need to address the very formation of a person’s character into something Christ-like. In other words, we’re talking about deep discipleship as a real solution to sexual sin and addiction.

Recall how we define discipleship here3:

1. Engaging in apprenticeship to Christ through

2. an embodiment of His mission and

3. an understanding of His teachings

Even now, I’m thinking of how we could refine that definition to include this preface: “Transformation of our souls by”—at the very least, this is the hopeful result of discipleship. “Transformation.”

The data on pornography use tells us that practicioners are not experiencing the kind of transformation we hope to see. We admit that Christianity is not an easy practice. It’s one that takes time and devotion. The results are often intangible—it’s more like building muscle than cooking a meal; we don’t see the end results until we have been practicing it for a long time.

Discipleship programs need to be equipped to do more than provide information; they must demand vulnerability from us. What the data tells me is that most Christians are not in need of more “programs” and “knowledge” about how to overcome sexual sin (or other sin). They need more spaces where they can share in what I call, radical vulnerability.

What is radical vulnerability? It is a space where an individual can share anything without shallow judgment from fellow Christians. Most often, that kind of space needs to be constructed. It might mean that a man needs a space with all men (and likewise for a woman who wishes to be vulnerable). It requires a space where gossip and social “triangulation” (simply, sharing information about others outside of their presence) is strictly prohibited. And then it requires a deep level of trust and honesty. The best spaces for this kind of sharing in a church is typically a small group setting or a retreat setting—again, we should resist the belief that a “class” will fix the problem of pornography without greater transformation of the soul.

Of course, yes, classes on pornographic addiction are awesome additions to a church. But if you think about what is successful vs. unsuccessful in those programs, the key is typically that men are asked to share in an “AA”-style setting their struggles and addictions. That is not meant to simply eliminate the sin. The group is oriented toward character transformation through an unprecedented amount of inter-group honesty that then extends to the individual’s family and friends. That is a form of “radical vulnerability” and is often the beginning of true transformation in a disciple.

So if we look at the Barna data, what we might conclude is churches are not good at deep character transformation. But the more nuanced view is that Sunday church (i.e., sitting in a pew) is simply not good at deep character transformation. And so the answer continues to be to drive people into smaller settings where they can share mistakes, foibles and deeper flaws in their character with a view toward inviting the Holy Spirit into those dark spaces, engaging in actual transformation.

I am indeed excited for the 17% of Christians who actually find themselves no longer struggling with pervasive societal sins like pornography (even if that number might be lower than what is true). Oddly enough, that is about the percentage of people I would estimate are involved in church relationships that consist of mentorship and small groups. My hunch is that the roughly 20% of church attendees who deeply participate in community are succeeding in the battle against pornography because they are succeeding in the larger battle of counterformation. Counterformation is the process of pushing against the world’s formation of our souls and, as Flannery O’Connor once said, “push back against the age as hard as it pushes against you.”

A note on AI: Seeking Christ is a sacred act, one that we are not willing to cede to artificial intelligence. We uncompromisingly do not use artificial intelligence to write our posts. We hope that the genuineness of our writing bleeds through every paragraph.

3

What is Discipleship

What is Discipleship?

Welcome and Introduction…

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9 months ago · Chris Unseth

My experience, as a dad of three (soon to be four), is that parenthood is a marathon of selfless obedience. I’m not the first to say it. Parenthood demands a rhythm of giving that often receives no thanks, mirroring the gospel’s call to love without condition. Modern parenting is especially difficult. Modern parents are overwhelmed by expert advice and digital ideals, creating a climate of anxiety rather than wisdom.3 Social media has also implanted an image of the platonic-ideal of family life. It’s painted in beiges and maroons, kids who wear whites that never get dirty, endless blue sky picnics, and square meals artfully plated on rustic dish ware.

Being a sibling is also an exercise in bearing with one another, as time shifts us through the good, the ugly, and the beautiful. I have four siblings. There have been times where those relationships thrive and times where they languish. The ebb and flow of sibling relationships, especially in adulthood, tests our endurance and reveals the limits of sentimental family ideals. We are geographically spread out, in different stages of life, and have the added pressure of two parents experiencing early dementia. It’s not an ideal situation and there have been seasons where it may be easier to simply walk away from those relationships.

Then there are parental relationships.4 Parenting parents has been the hardest part of growing up and consequently, the most challenging piece of my faith. Both my parents showed signs of dementia in their 50s. Now, they are under my care. It’s a responsibility I didn’t want or take lightly. But it felt like the right thing to do. The rewards for this kind of caretaking are minimal. The costs far outweigh the benefits. There are days where I receive hateful and angry texts from my parents (a symptom of dementia). There are other days where my family questions my motives in bringing my parents to the town where I live, so that I could better care for them. There are days where no immediate family member (except my wife) believes I am doing the right thing for my parents. I have cried countless times as I pass the apartments where my parents now live. There will come a time when I am spoon feeding my parents as they stare back blankly at me. I have become my parents’ parent at a very young age and the loneliness of being a dad is the same, whether it’s for your kids or for your parents.

As I navigate the painful role reversal of becoming the parent to my parents, I’m reminded of Christ’s own teaching: Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. (Luke 9:23, NKJV). Daily cross-bearing doesn’t often happen in glamorous mission fields or public ministry. It happens in spoon-feeding your father. In returning hate with grace. In enduring suspicion for doing what is right. This is the theology of suffering—not as a mere obstacle to overcome, but as a daily vocation through which we are conformed to the image of Christ (Romans 8:29).

All of these family experiences have been incredible areas of spiritual growth. The family remains the most consistent crucible for forming a Christlike servant’s heart. Why is that?

1. Families are places where we can take on the role of a “servant”. There is no greater place in life than family if you are attempting to cultivate the heart of a servant. As a child, we took for granted our parent’s roles in keeping the home together. As adults, we inherit an incredible model of parenthood that teaches us to feed and clothe our children, to provide for their needs, and to create an emotional support system.

   By embracing the role of parent, you also embrace the unending lack of gratitude from your children. Your time is a complete gift. Likewise, we sometimes have siblings who do not recognize the lengths we go to to draw close to them or serve them. Our acts of grace are treasures stored in Heaven.

2. Families require consistency. The physical rigor of fatherhood takes its toll. Wake up early. Make breakfast. Finish the dishes. Wash clothes. Fix the door jamb. Build a bookshelf. These activities are all learning experiences for me and demand my physical and intellectual strength.

   But we are what we do consistently. When we commit to something and that thing becomes dependent on us, we have no choice but to remain faithful to that commitment. That is why I love fatherhood.

   I read to my kids every night because it’s what their developing brains need. I feed my kids healthy snacks because that’s what their bodies need. I discuss the Bible with them because that’s what their spirits need.

   In all of those activities, I am becoming a person who has a servant’s heart. And when I can incorporate spiritual disciplines like reading Scripture and prayer, those things become part of our family and consequently a consistent part of who I am.

3. Families require emotional maturity. There is no other sphere of life where I am more tested emotionally than with my kids, my siblings or my parents. Those closest to us have the power to say the most damaging words.

   In many cases, a close sibling may be dealing with emotional baggage or trauma alongside of us—thus, we have two sets of similar baggage butting up against one another which can cause immense emotional friction.

   My favorite Bible verse to meditate on during these times of friction is: For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. (2 Timothy 1:7, NKJV). Some translations use ‘self-control’ instead of ‘sound mind’. That God’s Spirit can indwell and provide us with emotional self-control is an empowering thought. When we are dealing with emotionally difficult situations, it’s powerful to remember that the Spirit of God does not lose control and that the Spirit lives within us.

So what happens as families shrink? We lose the daily friction that once functioned as a school of sanctification. Without the sibling to forgive, the aging parent to honor, or the child to discipline and nurture, we lose built-in pathways to maturity. Scripture assumes we will learn how to bear with one another in close, unavoidable proximity. Paul’s household codes in Ephesians and Colossians, or Peter’s exhortations to husbands and wives, all presuppose the sanctifying role of family. When these structures weaken, we must ask: where will this formation now occur? We lose some of the friction in our relationships that was once a locus of spiritual growth and development. It’s a lamentable state of affairs. Yet, we also have communities around us that we can cultivate.

The answer, in part, must be found in the Body of Christ. The New Testament never makes blood relations the ultimate bond; in fact, Jesus redefines family altogether: For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. (Matthew 12:50, NKJV). But building spiritual family takes intention and grit. Communities that feel like family require not just potlucks and Bible studies, but the kind of long-haul fidelity that doesn't fracture at the first offense. That is where the church has its great opportunity—and also its great vulnerability in an age allergic to commitment.

The closer we can grow to the community of Christ-followers, the closer we get to being able to see who we are and who we are becoming. Community is one of the richest grounds for self-discovery. It’s one of the richest grounds for identifying areas of emotional and spiritual growth within us.

In place of all of those shrinking immediate family relationship that shape us, we cultivate a community that feels like family. The hallmarks of a family-style community are closeness (physical and emotional), consistent interaction, and conflict. Yes, conflict is a hallmark of family! And in a community unrelated by blood, it’s hard to replicate family because the ties are more tenuous. In the midst of conflict, these communities can fracture. At these times, it’s important to remember that the community of God is thicker than blood.

A note on AI: Seeking Christ is a sacred act, one that we are not willing to cede to artificial intelligence. We uncompromisingly do not use artificial intelligence to write our posts. We hope that the genuineness of our writing bleeds through every paragraph.

Welcome to my Substack. I’m glad you’re here. This space exists to thoughtfully explore what ‘discipleship’ really means—a word so often used in Christian circles that its meaning has become diluted, even obscured.

I’m so glad you’re here; finding this corner of the internet hopefully kicks off a world of incredible exploration in your life (as it did in mine).

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard someone in church say, ‘We need more discipleship!’ And while it’s hard to argue against such a seemingly noble impulse, it raises a deeper question—have we actually considered what discipleship entails?

The word, “disciple” is so deeply embedded in our Christian vocabulary that its meaning often escapes us.. So much so that we forget how to actually practice it as a concept. What are we practicing? It’s a catch-all term that is used for anything and everything that has to do with spiritual formation. And I mean everything.

• Our church doesn’t have enough prayer? More discipleship.

• Our church doesn’t have enough volunteers? More discipleship.

• People in our community do not understand our core doctrines and beliefs? More discipleship.

Further complicating matters, we hear church leaders speak of ‘discipleship pathways.’ This phrase sounds strategic but finds no real analog in Scripture. The resonance of that phrase reveals our addiction to pseudo-corporate language—our struggle as Evangelical Christians to find places of clarity and authority in church practice. “Pathways” sounds good because it suggests a system of thought, a patterned way to walk through what is otherwise, a very amorphous process of spiritual growth. So it sounds good in principle… in practice, the words are hardly descriptive .

Discipleship has three main components that we’ll explore:

1. Engaging in apprenticeship to Christ through

2. an embodiment of His mission and

3. an understanding of His teachings

Let’s see if we can recover the depth of what discipleship truly is, so that the word becomes not a vague aspiration but a lived reality.

Webster has a starting point. The origin of the word disciple is: “Middle English, "follower of Jesus, one of the apostles, pupil," in part going back to Old English discipul, in part borrowed from Anglo-French disciple, both borrowed from Late Latin discipulus "follower of Christ, apostle" (translation of Greek mathētḗs), going back to Latin, "pupil, learner," of uncertain origin.

So let’s start with the Greek, mathētḗs.

“Disciple” comes from “Mathētḗs”, meaning Student or Follower

Bill Mounce says mathētḗs means “disciple, student, follower; a committed learner and follower, in the NT usually of Jesus Christ.”

That’s where I want to key in—discipleship or disciple has these valences of meaning that reference “student” or “follower.” And I love Mounce’s next definition, “a committed learner.”

John Marc Comer, author of Practicing the Way, spends a good portion of his book arguing that, in fact, the word ‘discipleship’ (unlike ‘disciple’) is never used in the New Testament (i.e., there’s no verb like ‘discipling.’ He’s right, though it’s not an infallible reason to get rid of the meaning of ‘to disciple.’ But discipleship does miss out on conveying the full weight of the meaning behind what Jesus does with his disciples in the Gospels.

Comer argues that a better is, “apprenticeship.” Perhaps to be a “mathētḗs” is more fully conveyed in the word ‘to apprentice.’

I’ll admit that I’m a bit biased. I went to law school and engaged in what still feels very much a system of apprenticeship—possibly less romantic than what you’re imagining though (partners at large law firms aren’t exactly working shoulder-to-shoulder with young associates). The idea, however, is that law school (being a “student”) teaches you very little—it is not until you enter the actual practice that you start to develop a sense of autonomy, a viewpoint about what you’re doing.

Teaching the disciples in strange parables, having them literally walk and sleep near you, instructing them while “on the road,” does have the feeling of being an actual apprentice. And when you think about Jesus’ upbringing either as a carpenter or stone mason, the use of ‘apprentice’ starts to make even more sense.

What gets me is that a “disciple” of someone is simply a believer in that person’s teachings. But a true apprentice must actually “do” things. That is a massive distinction. It’s the difference between going to church on Sunday and visiting a sick person in your church. It’s the difference between intellectually grasping love and tangibly expressing it. The woman who was healed by touching Jesus’ garment had faith but what actually led to healing? Her expression of that faith.

There is a reminder in James that faith must involve some form of action for it to be alive. “But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” (James 2:18, NKJV).

So the distinction being made between the word “disciple” and “apprentice” is certainly worthy to consider.

What do you think? Is there a difference in your mind between being a “disciple” of Christ and being an “apprentice” of Christ. I think it’s good to examine.

A Disciple is Always an Apprentice

If we are okay with thinking about the semantics, I argue that a true disciple of Christ is ALWAYS going to be an apprentice of Christ. A true disciple, in the fullest Biblical sense, must also be an apprentice—one who not only follows Jesus in belief but imitates Him in practice. I mean that in the most trade / craft / professional sense of the word. To engage in discipleship is to engage in apprenticeship—or to be someone who not only follows Jesus in their heart, but physically follows Christ. We are to walk in his footsteps.

Not the literal footsteps he walks in the Bible. In the Biblical sense of the word: “He leads me beside still waters.” (Psalm 23:2). He “makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him;” (Psalm 37:23). As embodied people, this means not only a mental or heart assent, it is necessarily a physical assent to Christ.

We are to embody Him on this earth. That is the reason He has made us to be a disciple.

I think that this is often missed or underplayed amongst Christians.

There is a physicality to being a Christian. Christian faith is not merely intellectual or emotional—it is incarnational. It requires our bodies, our presence, our actions. There is a way in which we cannot be Christians if we are not literally moving in the ways in which Christ directs us to physically be.

And I don’t mean that doing sedentary things is somehow not a part of being a Christian. But I’ve never met a Christian who is able-bodied that should not be more physically present in the relationships around them. Never.

It’s like parenting, and parenting is physically hard.

But also don’t miss the psychological reality that how we order our minds and thoughts connects to our physical being. In fact, apprenticeship is meant to push you to think about being a disciple as something that uses your whole self!

Now, let’s tie this back to my original question.

When people say, ‘we need more discipleship,’ they often mean more teaching, more doctrine. Rarely do they mean more foot-washing, more visiting the sick, more meals with the marginalized.

Therein lies the problem. Discipleship is most commonly pictured as a strictly cerebral activity. Indeed, it is the opposite. If discipleship in your church is reduced to classrooms and curriculum, it has veered far from the heartbeat of Christ’s call. Discipleship is not academic—it’s incarnational.

Robert Mulholland famously defined spiritual formation as “the process of being conformed to the image of Christ for the sake of others.” That definition bears repeating—especially the final clause. Christ did not conform us to Himself for personal enlightenment or isolated growth, but for the good of others. And when we look at the Gospels, the image of Christ we’re being conformed to is not of a scholar in a lecture hall, but a healer on dusty roads, a shepherd among the broken, a servant who kneels to wash feet.

While monastic withdrawal may nurture certain dimensions of spiritual growth, it risks neglecting the outward, incarnational aspect of discipleship modeled by Christ. Our faith can grow in meditative solitude but there must be a balance of outward, others-oriented service and love—in other words, a sense of community wherein we do the things Jesus did for those He loved.

Does this mean that the solitary monk is excluded from discipleship? Not entirely—but it means that discipleship, if it ends in solitude, is incomplete. Christ withdrew to pray, but He always returned to love, to serve, to heal. So too must we. The rhythms of inward formation must give rise to outward embodiment.

Discipleship is engaging in apprenticeship to Christ through (a) an embodiment of His mission and (b) an understanding of His teachings.

Hopefully that definition is far enough removed from Mulholland’s to highlight the emphasis on faith that is active, and not simply faith that languishes on the sidelines.

To be a disciple is to become an apprentice in the school of Christ—not only learning His words, but practicing His ways. And that requires more than a workbook or a podcast. It requires our hands, our feet, our calendars, our dinner tables. It requires our lives.

A note on AI: Seeking Christ is a sacred act, one that we are not willing to cede to artificial intelligence. We uncompromisingly do not use artificial intelligence to write our posts. We hope that the genuineness of our writing bleeds through every paragraph.