I Want to be a Disciple Maker, Not a Trainer.

When it comes to disciple making, I really don’t like the word “training.”  There appears to be some good uses of the word in the new testament, but with deeper examination the common notion of training is surprisingly evasive.

 
Here are the problems with the word “training:”



It immediately creates an ecclesial body gap between trainers and trainees.
It makes the trainee subordinate to the trainer.
It instills the message that you can’t do what I do until you’ve been trained.
It makes discipleship about completing a program rather than entering into a life long process.
It leads to skewed notions like “train the trainer” in discipleship. 
It makes discipleship more about passing on methodology and information rather than being equipped for every good work. 
It creates an assumed knowledge base that new believers can find intimidating.
It propagates the incessant consumeristic need for training and trainers.
It turns discipleship into a profession. 
It tends towards making discipleship systematic rather than organic.
It makes discipleship clinical and doesn’t prepare others for the mess of everyday life.
It turns walking the path of life with others into completing a curriculum.


I want to be clear.  I have no issues with instruction, teaching, discipline, equipping, encouraging, and the like.  I think they are all necessary components of effective disciple making.  But, if disciples are to be naturally reproductive, then they must be freed from any notion of having to complete training.  Some of the most highly trained men in the New Testament era observed “the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus.”  Acts 4:13




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