Yeah, I know; I’m cloning a clever title that others have used. But please bear with me as I attempt to explain what I fear is so often missed when Christians claim to be putting the Great Commission into practice. Here are the last three verses of Matthew’s gospel, which are customarily referred to as the Great Commission.

And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and make disciples of / teach / all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

The translators of the Authorized/King James Bible offered us three translations of the Greek word matheteuo: teach/make disciples of/make Christians of. The translators considered all three translations to be equally valid and included the latter two as notes in the margin. North American editions of the King James Bible omit these notes made by the translators, considering them to be unimportant. That was not the view of the translators themselves.

Now, a disciple is someone who is taught. But hearing the plan of salvation, accepting it as a life changing truth and being baptized is not always enough to make one a disciple of Jesus. A disciple is one who allows the teachings of Jesus to transform all aspects of his life, who knows he needs to strength of fellow disciples so that collectively they can be effective ambassadors of Jesus Christ in order to make more disciples.

It is this aspect of the teachings of Jesus that is too often omitted in evangelism and missions. If the goal of a mission is just to make converts, that mission is apt to end up with a group of people who never learn to work well together without constant oversight by a missionary. The goal of a missionary must be to gather people who can function as a church without his help.
A true disciple never stops learning; he is ready to learn from fellow believers, those from his own congregation and those from other congregations of the same faith.

The calling of the missionary is to teach, and to do it in such a way that the teaching takes root in those who are taught so that the missionary is no longer needed. As soon as a few people are baptized in a new location, they must become part of the decision-making process for the group. No one member should be dominant, including the missionary. The missionary should be a teacher and a mentor, but never a master. Members should be taught to share of their material blessings to help one another, to cover needed expenses of the group and to share in the wider work of the church. The missionary should not be the one to administer such funds.

The Apostle Paul collected funds from churches in other places to help the needy brethren in Jerusalem. This is an example for Christians today, we have an obligation to help one another. But let us beware lest our benevolence become a snare to others. Each congregation must function with the means at their disposal and in a way that is appropriate in their community. Emergency help is one thing, but to provide ongoing help for a mission congregation can be pretty much a guarantee that they will always be needing help.

The New Testament epistles speak much about moral purity, avoiding any and all forms of idolatry, compassion, helping those in need, brotherly love and unity that transcends ethnic and economic differences, submission to God and to one another, and trusting God in all circumstances. This is discipleship.

There is no mention of building places of worship. Neither are there exhortations to bring in large numbers of new converts. Yet as long as the church prospered spiritually there were large numbers of new converts. What might be the results in our day of a renewed emphasis on the foundational truths of discipleship?