LOOKING BACK

“But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children,” (Tit 2:1–4 ESV)

As I become older and mature, I begin to look back on the influences and influencers in my life. Of course, my parents were the first. My mother and my grandmother were two of my biggest influencers. We lived with grandma, my father’s mother, with mom and dad, myself, my 3 sisters and 3 other cousins. My grandma was the caretaker for us while mom and dad worked. She would always tell us how to act, when we could be heard or when to shut up and even when to sit down. Sometimes it went in one ear and out the other. I was 10 years of age when my dad built us a house in 1962 on the G.I. Bill.

I look back now, and it is virtually prophetic as I believe God brings back reminiscence of the sayings and the words spoken during our formative years. I remember my grandma as a praying woman, and she was always on her knees in the back bedroom. What I know now as the presence of the Holy Spirit was what I felt at times as I lay in my bed at night and when I would lay awake in the mornings. I have come to believe and to know this was the results of grandma’s prayers and was a prophetic cry that grandma made because God revealed it to her, or she prayed for it. She would call me a preacher when I was young, and as a strong Presbyterian woman she would say to me on those Sundays when nobody would go to church, that I needed to go with her and she would not ask but told me I had to go. We would go with and a friend who would pick her up and she would call out to me.

"Come on Jimmy; we are going to church, because someday you're going to be a preacher."

I didn't particularly accept grandma's words about being a preacher. That was the only word that she knew relative to the other spiritual ministry functions mentioned in Eph. 4:11. I however, enjoyed church for it being engaging because I saw the culture of the southern black church pastors (preachers) as big, fat and sweaty but had an amazing message and delivery. When I was 30 years old, I recall the words my mother prayed from 1Cor 5:5 relative to my sinful drifting days. I cannot forget hearing Grandma’s words either. The Apostle Paul reminds Timothy that his faith did not start entirely free of the past family faith and prayers that where the cause of his present calling and existence as a minister of the gospel.

“I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well. For this reason, I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands,” (2 Timothy 1:5–6 ESV)

We are always guided by an authoritative faith coming from the prayers of our pastors and past family figures who have held on to the truths of scripture and prayer. Those mores are still coming down to us and we will pray them on to the next generation as well. In this new era the biblical truths still influence the new cultural ways of life. As Jesus told us “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” (Mat 24:35 ESV). It is how we see the Word, never changing, never passing away, and as a result we keep it relevant for the current and coming generations which is just as important today as it was when grandma prayed them.

I look back on my education and teaching career at Oral Roberts University and my ministry development. The school had been conducting continuing education for pastors for about a year with the ‘The Ministerial Alliance.’ I had completed my D.Min. Thesis on the subject of Discipleship. I was being asked to take my teaching, “Discipling Men in Small Groups in the Local Church” (1997) to the level of continued education for pastors and their congregations. This was a very profound move for me. It catapulted my thinking into two areas, one being the need for a form of discipleship that would touch the next generation in other areas and relations in the Church, and the idea of different cultures relative to discipleship being affected by the changes that has transpired in our whole country, our churches, and our lives and the world.

One of my professors Dr. Charles Snow became a dear friend and colleague when I began to teach at ORU. I discussed with him how I never forgot his teaching of what discipleship was in one D.Min. class that he taught.

Discipleship is that factor presented in the Bible that calls for an individual to become a loyal, learning, follower of Jesus Christ. In turn, we should be willing to disciple others to become followers as well. The word “disciple” means “learner.” Disciples of Christ follow Him with loyalty and humility and as a result, grow into His likeness. As the learner matures in the character of Jesus, they become involved in ministry of Jesus Christ. This process toward involvement is what I call discipleship and requires learners to become leaders in some capacity. Leaders become mentors and teachers, modeling the life of a loyal, learning follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.[1]

In Matthew 28, the Lord’s Great Commission spells out this strategy and confirms this process. Jesus commissioned the Church to make disciples of all nations. The Greek word for “nation” is ethnos, which means “all races, all human beings, all of humankind.” The mandate Christ gave the church has never changed:

“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt 28:18-20).

This passage provides the framework for this process. As a methodology, this framework will be one we can implement by a term I will call “groupings” described as:

God's Army of believers who have agreed to submit themselves to Jesus Christ for discipleship, assembling in groupings in order to affect themselves and their generation through a process of prayer and intercession, study of the Word of God, caring ministry to one another, and an outreach to a world in need of Christ.

I look back as a minister for over forty years now, there is evidence that we who are believers that became ministers all have had occurrences that can only be described as a 180-degree experiences. Our salvation can only be described as one of those experiences. This turning around, is a departing for a new direction, even a new destination. The essence of this atoning action takes one forward past all that one has lived. It provides the directive for the grouping individuals regardless of where it takes place. The principle of discipleship applies in the church, in a community home, in the workplace, even on the internet in a distant land.

“Ye shall be witnesses to me both in Jerusalem, and in Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth.” (Acts 1:8).

Jesus’ injunction is that every born-again person be discipled in a mentoring relationship. Will you, your pastor, or group accept the call to be loyal, learning, followers of Jesus Christ?

Study: Questions to ponder, alone or in a group.

1.  If you are (30+ Years) in your life or Christian walk, does that make you a teacher in some respects? Why or why not?

3.  Looking back on the older men and women who have been an influence in your life, what principles did they teach you? What did you learn that you still remember?

3.  Have you been involved in some of the other forms of mentoring, coaching, groupings, or someone has been teaching you. Have you come to the place of seeing this is really discipleship? How?

[1] (DMIN 718 "Strategies for Effective Discipleship”) Doctor of Ministry Lecture. Oral Roberts University, May 31, 1994.