A full schedule doesn’t always mean a fruitful life. Sometimes the noise of everyday life crowds out the very thing we need most: time to listen to Jesus.

In this excerpt from his new book, Wait/Hear, Robby Gallaty invites us to examine the soil of our hearts—and consider what might need to change so God’s Word can take deeper root.

Excerpt from Robby’s new book, Wait/Hear

You’ve heard Jesus’ parable of the sower, probably a hundred times. I’m assuming you’ve always believed—as I did and preached about it for years—that His main point in telling this story was to illustrate how evangelism works. A sower “went out to sow” (Matt. 13:3)— to spread abroad “the word about the kingdom” (v.19)— and the seed landed in different types of soil. Three times out of the four, the person given the opportunity to receive the seed, to receive God’s gift of salvation, turned it away instead. Therefore, these are the rates of return we should generally expect whenever we share the gospel with the unsaved. It’s a one-in-four proposition. Some receive Him, but most reject Him because the makeup of their “soil” is resistant to the gospel. That’s the popular interpretation of this parable. 

But after carefully considering the cultural context of the story and the audience to whom Jesus was speaking, I have changed my perspective. No longer do I think His purpose was to show His followers the difference between people who are going to heaven and people who are not. I now believe His story is a mirror for us as believers to hold up in front of our own faces, helping us diagnose the condition of our soul. Because even in being a person whom God has already saved, our lives can look like all the different kinds of soils, sometimes in the space of one weekend. Hard-hearted, shallow, overcrowded, receptive. Yet only one of those types of soil—the “good” soil (vv.8, 23)— gives the seed what’s required for bearing fruit in it. 

I want to spotlight one of the soils Jesus described: the ground that was tangled with thorns. “This is one who hears the word,” Jesus said, “but the worries of this age and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful” (v.22).  

These are the distracted hearts. And all too often these are our hearts. This is the heart of someone who’s become a cyber-zombie tethered to his or her digital devices. This is the heart that keeps us constantly swiping up and swiping down, forever responding to the texts and emails, almost from the moment our eyes crack open in the morning until our heads hit the pillow at night. 

This is the heart that scrunches down into Netflix and football and video games at the first opportunity, as soon as the workday lets up long enough to give us a minute to call our own. This is the heart that looks up from watching YouTube Shorts, one after another, and then wonders what just happened with the last two-and-a-half hours. 

This is the heart so preoccupied with the demands of growing a business or perfecting a skill that it’s lost all sensitivity for focusing on anything that doesn’t contribute to its own pursuit of what feels like success. This is the heart deceived into thinking that consuming news and political commentary is more important than any other information we could be gathering at any given moment. 

It’s a heart overrun with true crime documentaries and cultural podcasts and Amazon purchases and travel ball. A heart that’s forgotten what it’s like to have an original thought anymore. A heart who’s first impulse at the sound of a spare moment is to reach for the smartphone. 

And do you know what else it is? It’s a heart that’s too busy to hear from God. Therefore, it’s a heart that produces little, if any, fruit. Because fruit doesn’t grow amid the thorns of distraction. 

Fruit only grows in the fertile soil of hearing God’s Word, of valuing God’s presence. 

The volume of God’s voice, when He speaks to His children, is subtle. It’s a whisper. The cadence of His words, as they resonate in our spirits, is imperceptible to the untrained ear. We must discipline ourselves to pick up on His whisper by slowing down, by setting the distractions aside and by cultivating space for stillness and silence.  

Charles Spurgeon, the prince of preachers, was known to have attendees sit silently for a minute at the conclusion of his message, instead of just rushing off to the next item on the order of service. He knew how the Holy Spirit worked in people’s lives—not by keeping the schedule rolling but by allowing the seed enough time to set. He understood that his responsibility to his hearers was not merely delivering them information but creating an environment that made possible in them a divine transformation. 

The Quakers employed a similar practice, something they termed “expectant waiting.” Robert Barclay, a Scottish Quaker living in the 1600s, said, “When assembled, the great work of one and all ought to be to wait upon God, and returning out of their own thoughts and imaginations, to feel the Lord’s presence and know a ‘gathering into His Name’ indeed, where he is ‘in the midst’ according to His promise.” 

We never lose when we seek the Lord, when we choose His presence over our own problems, our own pressures, our own preoccupations. The thing that costs us is all the time we’ve given over to our demanding distractions, only to come away with nothing. When we could have had everything. When we could have had Him. 

In a world that values productivity over presence, choose presence. 

 In a culture that rewards busyness over being, choose being. 

In a time when everyone is distracted, choose to be fully present with the One who is always present with you. 

Don’t let the noise of life drown out the voice of God. Choose to sit at the feet of Jesus. Because the choice is yours.  

What might change if you made room to listen?

In Wait / Hear: Recapturing the Lost Art of Hearing God’s Voice, Robby Gallaty shares his journey through burnout and invites readers to rediscover stillness, surrender, and time with God.

This article is an excerpt from Wait / Hear, published by B&H Publishing.

Explore the Book →

Robby Gallaty (MDiv, PhD, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary) is the Senior Pastor of Long Hollow Church in Hendersonville, Tennessee, and the author of multiple books. He was radically saved from a life of drug addiction on November 12, 2002. In 2008, he formed Replicate Ministries to empower churches to activate their unique disciple-making movement. Robby and his wife Kandi have two sons, Rig and Ryder.

The post The Dangerous Soil of Distraction appeared first on Discipleship.org.

At the Spire Conference in Indianapolis, Josh Howard of Discipleship.org sat down with Bart Rendel of Intentional Churches and pastor and author Vince Antonucci to discuss that question.

Their conversation centered on a simple but important conviction: Evangelism and discipleship aren’t two separate missions. They’re part of the same calling Jesus gave His followers.

Discipleship Begins With Reaching People

In many Western churches, evangelism and discipleship have become separate ministries. One focuses on reaching people who don’t know Jesus, while the other focuses on helping Christians grow in their faith.

But Jesus never made that distinction.

Vince pointed to the Great Commission, where Jesus commanded His followers to make disciples, baptize them, and teach them to obey everything He commanded.

Making disciples involves both introducing people to Jesus and helping them grow into His likeness.

As Vince explained, discipleship starts with evangelism, and discipleship should lead to evangelism.

If we’re helping people become more like Jesus, shouldn’t they also be growing in their desire and ability to share Him with others?

Equipping Everyday Believers

One of the challenges facing the Church is that many Christians rarely share their faith.

Vince highlighted research suggesting that a significant majority of Christians never share their faith outside their immediate families. What would change if churches approached evangelism as an essential part of following Jesus rather than something reserved for pastors or particularly gifted evangelists?

Through their work together, Intentional Churches and Vince are developing resources to help churches equip their congregations for evangelism.

These include teaching resources, devotionals, practical training, and coaching designed to do more than inspire people for a few weeks.

The goal is lasting cultural change.

Rather than simply offering another sermon series, they want churches to become communities where sharing Jesus and making disciples are a natural part of everyday life.

From Reaching People to Walking With Them

But what happens after someone responds to the gospel?

Bart shared how his own experience of reaching out to friends has raised an important question: When someone comes to faith in Jesus, how do we help them grow?

New believers need more than an invitation to attend church. They need relationships, community, biblical teaching, and people willing to walk alongside them as they learn to follow Jesus.

This is where an emerging collaboration with Discipleship.org comes into the picture.

Together, the organizations are exploring how churches can develop a more complete pathway for making disciples—from sharing the gospel to helping new believers grow and make disciples themselves.

The vision isn’t simply to increase church attendance. It’s to see disciples who make disciples, multiplying the gospel’s impact throughout their communities.

What If This Actually Works?

Near the end of the conversation, Bart shared a question raised by a church leader whose congregation was implementing evangelism training:

“What if this actually works?”

What if people begin sharing their faith? What if their friends and neighbors encounter Jesus? What if hundreds or even thousands of people begin responding to the gospel?

Would our churches be prepared to disciple them?

It’s an exciting question, but also a challenging one.

Jesus has invited every believer to participate in His mission. We don’t have to choose between reaching people and helping them grow. We are called to both.

So perhaps the question we should be asking isn’t simply how to grow our churches, but how to see God’s Kingdom multiply in our neighborhoods, cities, and regions.

What would it look like for you and your church to be ready?

Learn more about disciple-making resources at Discipleship.org and evangelism equipping at Intentional Churches.

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The success of Disciple Making Movement churches (DMM) is not based upon large weekend gatherings.

Rather, DMMs multiply disciples by utilizing Discovery Bible Study Groups or Three-third Groups. These smaller, decentralized groups are the primary strategy of multiplication. They are nimble, based upon the ministry of everyday disciples and are not focused on large Sunday gatherings.

Effective as they are, we cannot find entrenched examples of DMMs in North America.

But there is hope for North American churches. There are churches in the USA with disciples of Jesus reproducing disciples.

“There is hope for North American churches. There are churches in the USA with disciples of Jesus reproducing disciples.”

Based upon the national research conducted by Grey Matters, the team at Discipleship.org (with the help of Exponential) discovered that there are just under 5% of churches in North America that are reproducing disciples.[3] Reproducing disciples is more time-consuming and it requires harder work than multiplying disciples (which I believe is based upon a special movement of the Holy Spirit), but reproducing disciples is still exciting, important ministry.

Those who reproduce disciples do it intentionally in the context of personal discipling relationships over time—often over a period of three years. Those who multiply disciples also do it intentionally, but there is a special culture, inspired by the Holy Spirit, where multiplication happens faster, with disciples being multiplied in three-to-six months as a part of rapid growth. Again, we are not witnessing the establishment of this kind of movement yet in North America. But we do witness churches that reproduce disciples.

Most of the churches reproducing disciples hold weekend gatherings and guide people into discipling relationships in small groups and smaller, transparent-space groups.[4]

Moving People into Discipling Groups

How do the churches that are reproducing disciples move people from weekend gatherings into small groups?

Jim Putman is one of the country’s leading experts and practitioners in creating disciple making churches that are reproducing disciples and disciple makers. He is the founder of Real Life Ministries in Post Falls, Idaho, a church which has planted many reproducing churches and, in the midst of all their church planting, they still witness a weekend attendance of around 8,000.

The Basic Strategy in Weekend Gatherings

Here is the basic strategy that Jim and his team utilize in the church’s weekend gatherings. He calls it the 3-C Strategy:

• Challenge
• Celebrate
• Connect

The kind of churches that we are talking about have heavily invested in staff who focus on raising up disciple makers. That means that, when people attend weekend gatherings, there are lots of everyday disciple makers who have been prepared to help those who attend the church to be discipled outside the large gathering in small groups or transparent groups.

At a weekend gathering, the attendees will be encouraged to get into a group in the following ways:

Challenge

People will be presented regularly with a vision of discipling groups during the teaching time and through other means during the weekend service. They will hear stories of discipling groups and how they help people to truly live as disciples of Jesus. They will also be challenged in every large gathering to take the next step. That next step is typically a step into an environment where they can make connections to help them meet people from a discipling group they can then check out (see below).

Celebrate

The large gathering will celebrate the key elements of church culture. The key slogan says it all: people imitate what church leaders celebrate. So, the leaders of the weekend services share stories and progress in disciple making. There is a celebration of baptisms in discipling groups, new discipling groups, new leaders of discipling groups, and new apprentices of discipling groups. Discipling group attendance is celebrated more than weekend service attendance, although both are important.

Connect

Since the goal is to get as many people as possible to join a group, there are specific practices and habits designed to help people take the next step toward a discipling group. Typically, people who are attending the weekend service will need bridge gatherings—from guest reception connections to men’s breakfasts to women’s gatherings—because people typically need to connect with people outside a group before they will join a discipling group. A smaller number can jump directly from the weekend service with a connection made to a group leader there or with staff help into a small group.

Visualizing the Process

In churches that are reproducing disciples (by everyday disciples making disciples), we witness at least an 80% participation rate in discipling groups (with some going up to 100%). To help you visualize the process of people moving from hearing about a church to attending a church to joining a discipling group, look at the following two funnels. The first is from Real Life Ministries (where Jim is lead minister/pastor) and the second is from my church, Harpeth Christian Church (where I serve as lead minister/pastor).

[1] See www.2414now.net for details.

[2] Discipleship.org provides the following definition of a Disciple Making Movement (DMM): “A rapid and exponential increase in disciple making churches (1,000 or more) within a local culture who plant multiple churches and these churches are churches who multiply disciples, groups, and churches of obedience-based disciples so that we can see at least four generations of churches produced in six streams of disciple-making activity and these streams multiply consistently into churches (100 churches or more within 2 to 5 years).”

[3] “National Study on Disciple Making in USA Churches: High Aspirations Amidst Disappointing Results,” https://multiplication.org/product/national-study-on-disciple-making-in-usa-churches/

[4] See more details on the transparent space in Harrington and Absalom, Discipleship That Fits: The Five Kinds of Relationships God Uses to Help Us Grow.

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This is an incredibly common question in the disciple-making movement I have been a part of. When is someone ready to be sent out to make disciples?

Start With Jesus

I first want to turn to Scripture and look at what Jesus modeled in His ministry. As Paul says, our goal in discipleship is to have people imitate us as we imitate Christ. We must always start with Jesus.

It is widely known that Jesus had twelve disciples. After roughly three years of intimate, everyday life with Jesus, they received the Great Commission and were sent to make disciples of all nations. At the same time, Jesus also sent the Twelve and other disciples to practice ministry while they were still being formed. They learned by being with Him and by joining Him in the work.

I am not saying that three years is a magical number. But it is important to notice that their formation was not three years of meeting once a week in a discipleship group with a sinful person like me. It was three years of surrendering every day and every moment to walking alongside the embodied Creator of the universe, who knows no sin.

From that perspective, it can feel discouraging to even attempt to make a disciple when I am still so far from the goal. But that should not slow us down or stop us. It should give us a clearer picture of the goal.

The goal is to send out disciples who make disciples of all nations, baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, teach them to obey everything Jesus commanded, and trust that He will be with them.

To do that effectively, we must first be disciples who increasingly look like Jesus and walk surrendered lives. We must know the teachings of Jesus and obey them well enough to share them and teach others to obey them too.

Anyone Can Share Their Testimony

There are many examples in Scripture of people receiving healing or ministry from Jesus and immediately going to tell others what happened. This is evangelism, and it is an aspect of discipleship.

Those people were not yet teaching others to obey everything Jesus commanded because they did not yet know all He had commanded. But they could tell the truth about what Jesus had done for them.

Anyone, at any point, can share a testimony. We should train and equip people to express their story of life change clearly. That can happen minutes or years after a radical encounter with Jesus.

Ask the Holy Spirit From the Beginning

Even in the earliest stages of discipleship, we should turn our eyes and ears toward the Holy Spirit and ask whom He is leading us to invest in. Then we trust Him in that process.

I have been walking with a group of guys for about two years. Since day one, I have told them, “You guys are going to repeat this process,” while trying to trust the Holy Spirit in it.

At the end of the first year, I asked, “Who is going to bring someone into this group next year so we can multiply?” No one else brought anyone, so I added somebody. I will be honest: I was a little discouraged.

But the truth was that they were praying about it and thinking about it. They simply did not yet have the boldness or readiness to ask those people. So we kept praying and talking about it.

This year, almost two and a half years in, one of the guys came to the group on his own and said, “I have invited two of my friends. One of them is a brand-new Christian, and I want him to walk in a discipleship group with me.”

I was ecstatic. I was so thankful that he had the boldness and readiness to do that, and it was all prompted by the Holy Spirit. There was nothing I did to declare him ready or fit to make disciples. He had been asking the Spirit whom he was being led to and whom the Spirit wanted him to invest in.

When Someone Still Has Not Moved

If sharing and investing are not beginning to happen naturally, the person may need an “I see you” conversation.

If your discipleship groups are like mine, the people you are discipling may have already walked through all of Scripture at least once. They may have a general understanding of the metanarrative of Scripture and the character of God. They have an example of a godly life to follow, but they have not yet moved to action.

That is worth a specific conversation. Ask whether something is holding them back, such as shame, pride, another area of sin, or simply ignoring prompts from the Holy Spirit. It’s worth mentioning that early in the process of being a disciple, my eyes were mostly on myself and how I was changing and growing. As I have grown in Christlikeness, my attention naturally has shifted to those around me and their needs/desires.

Different People Will Disciple Differently

Some people will be much better at sharing their testimony. Some will be better at walking others through the teachings of Jesus. Some will be better at praying with people, quietly serving others, or interceding for them.

Some people will have clear discernment and authority where darkness is present in people’s lives. Others will be natural gatherers who pull groups together.

We cannot assume that everyone will disciple exactly the way we do. But we can know that the Holy Spirit will not lead someone to focus only on their own sanctification for the rest of their life.

We must encourage people to look outward and prayerfully consider whom the Lord is highlighting for them to invest in, pray for, intercede for, care for, or share their testimony with.

This also highlights the beautiful gift of the family of God. We were meant to live and grow in relationship with one another, and it’s in that context where we are best discipled.

Where are you on your journey of being a disciple? Have you begun to invite someone on that journey with you? What step might the Spirit be prompting you to take next toward Him?

The post Joining Jesus’ Mission | When Am I Ready to Make Disciples? appeared first on Discipleship.org.

If you want to know what a person values, watch how they spend their time. No matter what a person claims, what they actually do with their time will tell you what their priorities really are.

People who follow Jesus should make sure to follow Him in this area. Jesus’ highest priority was to do what His Father wanted Him to do. He said, “The one who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what pleases him” John 8.29 NIV.

That’s exactly what we’re called to do. In the same way that Jesus’ priorities matched the priorities of His Father, people who follow Jesus should match their priorities with Jesus’.

Following Jesus means putting Him before yourself

Living like this requires us to be sacrificial and counter-cultural because so many of the messages we receive tell us to put ourselves first and do whatever we want to do. But Christians live for Christ, not for themselves. The Apostle Paul says, “My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” Galatians 2.20 NLT.

As Christ changes us, our priorities begin to change

As Jesus lives His life through you, His desires, priorities, and agenda replace our desires, priorities, and agenda. Or, maybe a better way to say it is that our desires, priorities, and agendas start to align more and more with His.

What were some of Jesus’ priorities? A review of the Gospels reveals several things. Gathering with others for worship was important to Jesus. As His public ministry was starting, Jesus went to the synagogue in Nazareth on the Sabbath day, which is described as something He normally did (Luke 4.16).

Prayer was also important to Jesus. Luke reports that “Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed” Luke 5.16 NIV. There are more than seventy references in the Gospels to Jesus either praying or talking about prayer. Additionally, Jesus prioritized service of others (Mark 10.43-45), obedience to God’s Word (Matthew 4.1-11), sharing the Gospel (Luke 19.10), and cultivating relationships.

Seeking God’s Kingdom changes everything

Throughout His life, Jesus’ priorities were aligned with His Father’s desires. He wasn’t concerned about missing out on anything else because He knew the truth that seeking God’s Kingdom is the key that unlocks everything else that really matters in life. “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you,” Matthew 6.33 ESV.

This post originally featured by our friends at Disciple First.

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First and foremost, I need to give a shout-out to Bobby Harrington. Bobby, you have been such an incredible leader. We would not be where we are today without you. You have been a trusted voice in the disciple-making world for a long time, and it is such an honor to be able to build upon the foundation you have laid. We honor you, and we love you.

As we look ahead, we are incredibly excited about the future direction of Discipleship.org. We have some new initiatives getting ready to launch, but the heart of the vision remains the same:

We want to see every church in America become a true disciple-making church.

If you have been dreaming about what it could look like to create a disciple-making pathway in your church—or what it means to truly be a disciple who makes disciples—and you need help, we want you to reach out to us.

That is why we are here.

We want to come alongside you or connect you with one of our partner organizations that can help you pursue the change you are dreaming of within your church. Together, we want to saturate this nation with the gospel and see a movement of disciple making take shape.

If you need help, please reach out to us. We are here for you.

We love you. We are in your corner, and we cannot wait to see what God does through you, through the churches that are part of this organization, and through all of our incredible partner organizations.

The best is yet to come, and we believe God is going to do tremendous things.

Let’s pray for a revival of disciple making in our churches until the return of Jesus.

Amen.

Watch the short message here.

The post The Future of Discipleship.org: A Message from Josh Howard appeared first on Discipleship.org.

It is with great pleasure that I am announcing to you that Josh Howard and the Ignite the Nations group has taken over the leadership of Discipleship.org.

For the last 2+ years, I have worked with Josh on a weekly basis where he has established both his competency and experience as a speaker and leader of disciple making and disciple making movements. On September 1, 2026 he took over all leadership of Discipleship.org and we believe that it can significantly multiply the impact of this ministry, of which you have been a part.

I will be serving as the founder and advisor to Josh and his team. This transition gives me the opportunity to focus my efforts in disciple making through RENEW.org. The mission of RENEW.org is to renew the teachings of Jesus to fuel disciple making and I believe that my unique gifts and aptitude are best focused on shoring up the teachings of Scripture in the face of the challenges of progressivism and in the midst of the undermining of Judeo-Christian beliefs in our culture. I am also transitioning out of my role as lead pastor at Harpeth Christian Church over the next 21 months, so I will have a sole focus.

Many of you have created blogs and eBooks for Discipleship.org and we are trusting that we can continue to use them and I’m sure Josh will be asking for even more material in the future. If you’d like to reach out to Josh, you can email him at: josh@discipleship.org.   

Please join with me in welcoming Josh as we all look forward to an even brighter future through the ministry of Discipleship.org.

For King Jesus,

Bobby Harrington

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God is doing something new in this generation. Can we perceive it? Reports of revivals on college campuses and a hunger that is birthing in middle school and high school students for Jesus are making headlines. I visited a friend on a Saturday morning recently where he leads a group of young men, probably 16–22-year-olds, all pouring their hearts out to Jesus in prayer and worship. Another friend recently shared with me that her 11-year-old niece is leading her family, on her initiative, in Bible studies, engaging the Word of God after school every day, and clearly and boldly hearing and proclaiming the voice of God. She commented, “It’s as if the Lord Himself is discipling her heart.”

Yes, as followers of Jesus, we carry the mandate to “make disciples of all nations,” but it’s important that we listen, watch, and are aware of what God is doing and saying in each season and partner with Him. When I look around and see this generation in the midst of “darkness covering the earth,” I also see, “but the LORD will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you” (Isaiah 60:1–2). He is doing it!

Could this be a time when the LORD is planting a generation in the midst of a global Babylon, just like Daniel and his friends? Could this be a generation that has a resolve and integrity that is immovable and steadfast in Jesus and His ways? Could this be a generation that knows how to pray, fast, and walk in the fruit of the Spirit regardless of where God plants them? Could this be a generation that has both the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Jesus and shares that revelation from rooftops to dining halls of kings?

A Daniel Generation Prayer

Father, we praise You and bless Your holy name. You are God, and there is none like You.

Jesus, we honor You as King and LORD! Your grace is sufficient for us.

Holy Spirit, You are THE disciple-maker! You lead us into all truth, You reveal Jesus to us, You sanctify us, and You give us power to be Your witnesses to the ends of the earth.

Father, You are a God of generations. We ask You to reveal to us what You are doing in this next generation so that we can partner with You in discipling them. We have seen You show Your grace and mercy on college campuses, on football fields, through influencers online, and even in young children. Holy Spirit, we see You drawing and opening the eyes of this generation to Jesus. We thank You and praise You, as these are our friends, children, and grandchildren.

Lord Jesus, we pray for this generation, that they would be steadfast in their identity. Though they live in this world, we pray they do not let the world live in them. Like Daniel and his friends, they had a place and position and a name in Babylon, yet their hearts, standing, and identity remained in You.

Lord, let this generation encounter Your abundant love and grace. May they comprehend the depth, length, width, and breadth of Your love. May they experience the reality of Your Presence and the Abiding Spirit in their lives. May they have visions and revelation by the Spirit and in Your Word of the glory and majesty of Jesus.

Lord Jesus, would You give this generation boldness, courage, and integrity in the midst of this age? Lord, would You give them a resolve, like Daniel, to not take the bait of comfort, opportunity, acceptance, and even belonging? As Daniel, with honor and respect to others, found favor in the midst of the world to remain true to You, would You strengthen and empower this generation to live holy lives that are uncompromised and consecrated unto You?

Lord Jesus, we declare to this generation, “Arise and shine, for your light has come and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you!”

Father, would You mark this generation to know You, to know Your resurrection power, and the fellowship of Your sufferings (Phil. 3)? Though they may face the furnaces of darkness from the world, the flesh, and the devil, Jesus, would You walk amongst them not only for their deliverance but for the deliverance of nations?

When the political spirit tells them to bow, may they be found kneeling only before You! Holy Spirit, would You endow them with power to bear witness to Jesus in their comings and goings, in the boardrooms, classrooms, Discord rooms, and “upper rooms.” Jesus, receive the reward of Your suffering in this generation.

God, we release this generation to You. They are Your children. They are children of Light. Give us wisdom and discernment to know how to disciple, walk with, encourage, and release them to be sent ones for Your Kingdom and Your renown.

In Jesus’ name.

The post A Daniel Generation Prayer appeared first on Discipleship.org.

After the volcano did its thing, we all trudged over to the T.I. show, the Strip’s family entertainment for kids. The show’s “story” was that a ship of female pirates was in battle against a ship of male pirates. The female pirates wore bras and underwear and had choreographed dance moves. The male pirates were shirtless and had glistening torsos.

The lead female pirate’s name was … Cinnamon. But, as she told a captured male pirate, “You can call me Cin.” She barked orders to her mates like, “Let’s dance, girls! Whooo!”

Finally, the lady pirates sink the guy pirate ship and take all the male pirates captive. And what punishment do they administer? At their arrival on her ship, Cinnamon yells, “Do you pirates want to party? Yo, DJ, kick it!” And the show became a half-naked dirty dancing extravaganza.

As we walked away afterwards, one of the ten-year-old girls broke our silence by asking, “Does T.I. stand for Totally Inappropriate?”

I laughed, but I was a little rattled. I’d just moved my family to this city to reach the very people who put on that show, and forty-eight hours in, I already felt something closing off in me toward them.

Here’s what’s interesting: I moved to Las Vegas to reach sinners, but on my first night in the city, I found myself offended by them. As I watched the show, I could feel myself judging the people who created it and the women who were degrading themselves by being in it.

Then it hit me: Sinful people never seemed to repel Jesus. He didn’t ignore their sin or pretend it didn’t matter, but He refused to reduce people to the worst thing they had done. The people most religious leaders avoided were the very people Jesus moved toward. He saw the sin clearly, but He saw something deeper too: a person created by God, loved by God, and worth pursuing.

As people who are seeking to live more sinless lives, we’re turned off by sin, and so it’s way too easy to look down on sinful people. It can be so natural to just see the sin, to define people by their sin, and to judge them for their sin.

But that is not God’s heart. It’s not what we see Jesus doing when He interacts with sinful people in the Gospels.

Think about Zacchaeus. Everyone else saw a traitor and a thief. Jesus saw a man worth having dinner with. The crowd defined Zacchaeus by what he had become; Jesus treated him according to what grace could make him. Jesus didn’t excuse the mud. His love brought Zacchaeus close enough for the restoration to begin.

A Prayer

I learned a life-changing prayer awhile back. Unfortunately, I didn’t pray it before I started walking the Strip that night. I wish I had. It would have kept me from getting so far off of Jesus’ path for me. I’m not sure where I first encountered this prayer. I think it might have been in Brian Jones’ book, Second Guessing God.

The prayer? Every time you interact with someone, pray, “Jesus, give me Your heart for this person.”

When you pray this prayer, you begin to see beyond the sin to the person God loves.

The Mud, or the Masterpiece

I love the way John Burke talks about this in his book No Perfect People Allowed. He says: If one day you found, in your attic, a Rembrandt painting covered in mud, you wouldn’t focus on the mud or treat it like mud. In fact, your primary concern would not be the mud at all—though the mud would need to be removed. You would be ecstatic to have something so valuable in your care! But if you tried to clean the painting up by yourself, you might damage it. So you would carefully bring this work of art to a master who could guide you and help you restore it to the condition originally intended.

We need to pray for Jesus’ heart because it allows us to see the masterpiece behind the mud. It can be difficult to not let people’s personality defects and sin annoy us and to be patient with people and love them despite their imperfections. But that’s exactly what God does with me! I thank Him for that every day. So, if that’s what we hope for from God, should we give other people any less?

The truth is, this kind of grace doesn’t come naturally to us. It has to come from God. And thus the prayer: Jesus, give me Your heart for this person.

How about trying a little holy experiment? For the next forty-eight hours, before every interaction, silently pray, “Jesus, give me Your heart for this person.”

Pray it before you walk into a meeting. Pray it when the difficult person calls. Pray it when someone irritates you, disappoints you, or lives in a way you don’t understand. Pray it for the server who gets your order wrong, the neighbor who gets on your nerves, the family member who knows exactly how to push your buttons, and the stranger you would normally judge from a distance.

Then pay attention. The other person may not change, but something in you might. You may become more patient, more curious, and slower to judge. You may begin to see past the mud to the masterpiece God has never stopped seeing.

I wish I had prayed that prayer before walking the Strip seventeen years ago. I can pray it today.

Jesus, give me Your heart for this person.

The post Give Me Your Heart appeared first on Discipleship.org.

Disciple-making can easily become focused on strategies, programs, and practices. Those things can be helpful, but disciple-making must begin with prayer. Before deciding whom to pursue or how to invest in them, we need to slow down, become attentive to God, and invite the Holy Spirit to guide us.

Throughout this exercise, you will be invited to remember the people who have helped you follow Jesus, recognize the people God has already entrusted to your care, and consider where He may be inviting you to invest next.

Discipleship is not merely an abstract idea or church program.

Discipleship has a name.

It looks like the people who patiently helped us follow Jesus. It looks like the people God has already entrusted to our care. It looks like the friend who does not yet follow Jesus, the person quietly sitting at the edge of faith, and the mature believer from whom we still need to learn.

For each section, slowly read the Scripture and prayer. Then actually set a timer for three minutes.

Try not to move on before the timer ends, even if the silence initially feels uncomfortable or a name comes to mind immediately. Remain present, continue listening, and give the Holy Spirit room to bring people or invitations to your attention.

The goal is not to force an answer. If no one comes to mind, that is okay. Simply resist the urge to rush, fill the silence, or manufacture a response. The Holy Spirit does not need more time to speak, but we often need more time to become quiet enough to listen.

Begin With Prayer

Meditate on Psalm 139:23–24:

Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my concerns.
See if there is any offensive way in me;
lead me in the everlasting way.

Pray

Holy Spirit, thank You for Your presence, grace, and help.

Search my heart and guide my thoughts as I pray.

Help me see the people in my life through Your eyes and recognize how You are inviting me to respond.

Take a moment to breathe, become present to God, and release anything competing for your attention.

Remember Those Who Invested in You

Meditate on Hebrews 13:7:

Remember your leaders who have spoken God’s word to you. As you carefully observe the outcome of their lives, imitate their faith.

Pray

Holy Spirit, bring to mind the people who have discipled me along the way.

Help me remember those who showed me kindness, grace, and compassion and intentionally invested in my relationship with You.

Set a timer for three minutes.

Try not to move on until the timer ends.

Who helped you understand the Gospel?

Who modeled a life with Jesus for you?

Who remained present when following Jesus became difficult?

Allow specific names and faces to come to mind. Thank God for each person and the ways He used them in your life.

Remember Those You Have Invested In

Meditate on 1 Thessalonians 2:8:

We cared so much for you that we were pleased to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own lives, because you had become dear to us.

Pray

Holy Spirit, bring to mind the people You have given me opportunities to love, encourage, and guide toward a deeper relationship with You.

Help me recognize where You have already been working through my relationships.

Set a timer for three minutes.

Try not to move on until the timer ends.

Who has God already entrusted to your care?

Where have you shared not only biblical truth but also your time, attention, and life?

Thank God for the privilege of participating in their journey.

Notice Someone Who Does Not Yet Follow Jesus

Meditate on Colossians 4:5–6:

Act wisely toward outsiders, making the most of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you should answer each person.

Pray

Holy Spirit, bring to mind someone in my life who does not yet follow Jesus or whose life is centered around something other than Him.

Help me recognize how You are already present and at work in their life.

Show me how to pray for them, invest in them, and represent Jesus to them with grace and truth.

Set a timer for three minutes.

Try not to move on until the timer ends.

Resist the urge to fix, pressure, or manage them. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you see this person with compassion and show you how to love them faithfully.

Trust Him with the results.

Notice Someone on the Edges of Faith

Meditate on Psalm 34:8:

Taste and see that the Lord is good.
How happy is the person who takes refuge in Him!

Pray

Holy Spirit, bring to mind someone who regularly attends church but may not have tasted and seen Your goodness for themselves.

Perhaps they have forgotten the beauty of the Gospel, become discouraged, or never learned how to walk closely with You.

How would You like me to show up for them? How could I help them take one step closer to You in this season?

Set a timer for three minutes.

Try not to move on until the timer ends.

Pay attention to the person who comes to mind. Write down their name without immediately deciding how you need to respond. Remain present and continue listening.

Notice Someone Who Can Invest in You

Meditate on 1 Corinthians 11:1:

Imitate me, as I also imitate Christ.

Pray

Holy Spirit, bring to mind someone further along in their spiritual journey whom I could learn from.

Give me the humility and courage to ask for their wisdom, guidance, and investment.

Set a timer for three minutes.

Try not to move on until the timer ends.

Discipleship requires the humility to recognize that we still need to be discipled.

Who demonstrates a life with Jesus that you would like to imitate? Who could help you follow Him more faithfully in this season?

Remain open to asking for help rather than assuming you must grow alone.

Take One Faithful Step

Meditate on James 1:22:

But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

Look back over the names you wrote down.

Pray

Holy Spirit, what is one simple, faithful step You are inviting me to take?

Give me the courage to respond without trying to control the outcome.

Don’t rush into a complicated plan. Choose one person and write down one practical step you can take this week.

It might be:

• Sending an encouraging message
• Sharing a meal
• Asking a meaningful question
• Offering to pray together
• Extending an invitation
• Sharing something God has taught you
• Asking a mature believer to invest in you

Don’t try to respond to every name at once. Choose one person and one faithful next step.

Disciple-making does not always begin with a program, curriculum, or formal meeting. Often, it begins by noticing a person, listening to the Holy Spirit, and responding in love.

Discipleship has a name.

Whose name is God bringing to your attention today?

The post Joining Jesus’ Mission | Discipleship Has a Name appeared first on Discipleship.org.

That’s the day President John F. Kennedy stood before Congress and announced that America would land a man on the moon before the decade was out. I want to jump in a time machine, go back to that moment, and tell JFK, “Drop the mic! Just trust me. Right now, drop the mic!”

The mission he gave was bold and audacious, and in the middle of the Cold War, with the Soviet Union already ahead in the space race, it seemed nearly impossible.

NASA’s engineers got to work. But they hit a wall. The math simply didn’t exist yet to plot a trajectory to the moon and back. One miscalculation, and astronauts would burn up on reentry.

That’s when Katherine Johnson enters the story. If you’ve seen Hidden Figures, you know her—one of the Black female mathematicians NASA hired as human “calculators.” They were brilliant, and they were overlooked. In one scene, Katherine is mistaken for a janitor.

But it’s Katherine who makes the breakthrough. Staring at a blackboard full of equations that wouldn’t work, she has a realization: everyone has been searching for new math, when the answer was old math all along. That shift—not a total overhaul, just a shift—unlocks the problem. A few years later, we land on the moon.

An Even Bigger Mission

Jesus stood before His disciples and gave a mission of His own: “Go and make disciples of all nations… And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:18–20).

Sadly, there was no possibility of a mic drop, as it happened about 1,840 years before the invention of the microphone. It was a revolutionary mission, and many would have called it impossible, especially because Jesus gave it to a motley group of very ordinary people who would later be called unlearned and ignorant “idiotai” (read: idiots) (see Acts 4:12).

These Bad News Bears got to work and made miraculous progress.

But can I suggest that 2,000 years later we’ve hit a roadblock? Look at the numbers, and you see the church—especially in the West—is not growing. The number of disciples seems to be regressing. For a people who believe everyone needs to hear the good news, that is the worst news possible.

We have the right desire, but is it possible we’re not doing it the best way? The question isn’t whether our strategies are wrong. It’s whether there’s a better way—a shift, not a revolution. I want to show you that shift. But first, let me tell you my story.

“I Don’t Need You”

In college, God began pulling my attention off the United States and onto the nations. I knew I was an idiotai, but I felt called to the most unreached places on earth. At a missions conference, I got on my knees and prayed, God, I don’t care if I’m in Haiti for fifty years or a gas station for five minutes. I just want to be used by You.

I didn’t expect an answer. I got one.

God whispered, “Josh, I don’t need you.”

I was stunned. I’d just surrendered my life to His call—what did He mean He didn’t need me? I had assumed God had a massive task and needed my help to pull it off. That day I realized He doesn’t. He’s God. He’ll raise up rocks to praise His name if we won’t.

Then came the second half of that sentence, the part that changed my life: “I don’t need you. But I need you to know that I want you.”

For a lot of us, pride convinces us we’re God’s solution—that our ministry, our church, is the answer. It isn’t. Jesus is the answer. The moment we stop believing we’re needed and start responding to being wanted, everything changes. That’s what sent me, eventually, to India.

A Math Problem in India

About ten years ago, eight of us sat in a room dreaming about reaching 1.3 billion Indians with the gospel. (India could lose a billion people and still be one of the five largest nations on earth.) Every day, at least 25,000 people in India die without knowing Jesus—over 150,000 worldwide. That number broke our hearts.

Someone floated an idea: “What if we reached 100,000 people a year? That would be incredible!” I did the math. At that rate, reaching India would take 13,000 years. Add a zero—a million people a year—and it would still take 1,300 years.

Addition, even addition on steroids, was never going to finish the job.

So we got on our knees. We fasted. We asked God to show us another way. A few weeks later, I stumbled across a book by a man named Ying Kai, who moved to South China and, instead of adding people to his own church, focused on multiplying disciples and mobilizing every believer he could into the harvest. In ten years: 200,000 churches started, a million people baptized.

I closed the book in tears. God, if You did that in China, You can do it in India.

From Addition to Multiplication

Our team decided to make the shift—from addition to multiplication—and it changed nearly everything about how we operated:

• Our job description flipped. We went from players to coaches. Our job wasn’t just to do ministry, but to train everyone else to do it too.
• Our structure flipped. Leaders moved from the top to the bottom—lifting and supporting, not commanding.
• Training became universal. If you were breathing, you were being trained to share the gospel and make disciples who make disciples.
• Sunday morning changed function. Instead of treating our gathering as “the game,” we started treating it as the locker room—where the team gets equipped to go play the real game all week.
• We released control. And in exchange, our influence multiplied exponentially.

Multiplication became our filter for every decision. Pastors sometimes ask me when we split a house church into two. I tell them: that’s addition—maybe even division. We’re after multiplication. We don’t wait for a group to hit thirty people and split it. We cast vision and train every single person to reach their own friends and family, make disciples, and start their own house church.

Last year, our movement started 11,525 churches. Not churches we have—churches we launched in twelve months. That’s 960 a month. 221 a week. 31 every single day.

That’s not us. That’s God. And it’s the power of multiplication.

Here’s one more piece of math. Say I’m the only believer in India, and I disciple one person this year. Next year, we each disciple one more—four of us. The following year, each of those four disciples one more, and so on. How long to reach all of India that way? About thirty-two years.

Addition at 100,000 people a year: 13,000 years. Multiplication starting with one person: thirty-two years.

When it comes to the Great Commission, multiplication is the only math that actually works.

The 45-Degree Shift

Picture a plus sign: +

Now turn it 45 degrees.

You get a multiplication sign: ×

Not a 360-degree overhaul. Not even a 180-degree reversal. Just 45 degrees—and the output changes completely. 100 + 100 = 200. 100 × 100 = 10,000.

What if the shift your ministry needs isn’t a total demolition and rebuild, but a 45-degree turn in how you think about disciple-making? What if a few small shifts in mindset could produce an exponential increase in your results?

They can. I’ve watched it happen in a nation of 1.3 billion people, through a team of ordinary, unreached-minded believers who decided to stop adding and start multiplying.

Are you ready to make the shift?

Josh Howard is the co-author of The 7 Practices of Disciple Making Churches (Renew.org, 2026). The book profiles the seven principles shared by every Level 5 multiplying church in North America—and shows how any church can begin the journey.

The post Mic Drop: The 45% Shift that Changes Everything appeared first on Discipleship.org.

In the first few years of marriage, my wife and I served in student ministry. We grew up immersed in student programs and had been deeply shaped by leaders and pastors who invested in us. We loved that season of growing up and wanted to give away what we had been given! So, we jumped in as small group leaders in our local church, her serving the girls and me the guys. We went into it with a shared, deep desire to see our students grow in hunger for Jesus and His Word.

Around the same time, Cortney and I had the privilege of walking through some of Dann Spader’s work on walking like Jesus. We were discovering in that season that Jesus was a master of asking questions—questions that were the right questions at the right time in the right way. “Questions seem to open doors in people’s hearts and minds,” Dann would say. We saw that to be true and began working on listening and asking good questions in our groups.

I was thrilled with the kinds of conversations we were having in our group, but it didn’t seem like anyone was having an “aha” moment where hunger was stirred within them for more of God. Until one day when we were reading in Matthew chapter 7.

It says in verses 21-23, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’

For one of my students, we will call Jason, the words “I never knew you” jumped off the page. Jesus opened a door in Jason’s heart to receive the truth that He wanted to know him personally.

Pause.

I shared all the things about the questions for a couple of reasons. I believe we were being obedient in following Jesus’ methods and model to create space and opportunities for getting to know Jesus. We prayed with intentionality and planned well. When we were in the moment, we paid attention to how the Spirit was leading. Those are good things, but those things alone aren’t what made the difference. Jesus used our obedience to set the stage for what only His power could do. It’s Him. It’s His power and His love. It’s not us. However, Jesus has invited us to play a significant role in partnering with Him to love, share truth about Him, and create space where He can come and do what only He can do.

Jason was ready to know Jesus at the level Jesus wanted to be known. There’s so much more to his story and journey, but I want to share one more part.

We began meeting regularly and diving into things like Bible reading, prayer, and identity. I noticed over time that no matter how much I told him or “taught him” about prayer and being with Jesus, it wasn’t quite clicking for him. He was still confused and not totally sure what to do in those alone times.

Then the Lord prompted me, “Stop trying to tell him what to do—just do it with him.”

“Aha” moment.

We went into the auditorium where we were meeting and knelt before the Lord. I brought him into what I do when I sit before the Lord and literally just had him do it with me.

It clicked. He said, “I have never experienced anything like that before. I didn’t know I could talk to God like that and that He would meet me here.”

I was being discipled as I was learning to disciple. Jesus is good like that.

I am encouraged as I remember this journey to keep asking for opportunities to share my life with others, and I hope you will too.

Jesus is on the move. Let’s move with Him.

The post Joining Jesus’ Mission: Discipling a Student appeared first on Discipleship.org.