Redeeming the time by making disciples is one of the most impactful ways to live purposefully, as it aligns with the Great Commission Jesus gave us in Matthew 28:19-20+. Here’s how you can redeem the time through intentional disciple-making:
1. Start with Your Own Walk with Christ
- Deepen Your Relationship with God: Spend regular time in prayer, Bible study, and worship. Discipleship begins with being a disciple yourself. Paul command us to "Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ. ." (1Cor 11:1+) See Walking Like Jesus Walked!
- Live a Christlike Life: Demonstrate a life of integrity, love, and obedience to God. Your actions will inspire others and validate your message. See Integrity - A Whole Heart.
2. Identify People to Disciple
- Pray for Guidance: Ask God to reveal who He wants you to disciple. This could be a friend, family member, co-worker, or someone in your church. Be ready and willing when God brings this person into your life!
- Look for Willing Learners: The meaning of disciple is "learner." Seek out individuals who are desire to grow in grace and knowledge (2 Peter 3:18+) and are willing to invest time in learning what it means to follow Christ.
3. Build Intentional Relationships
- Spend Quality Time: Prioritize time with those you’re discipling.
- Show Genuine Care: Build trust by showing interest in their lives, struggles, and growth.
- Be Available: Be willing to invest in their lives, even beyond scheduled meetings.
4. Teach the Word of God
- Focus on Scripture: Help them understand and apply God’s Word to their lives. Meet regularly to teach them how to study the Bible (especially inductive Bible study) and focus on honing the skill of observation, the most neglected and poor understood component of in depth Bible study. Here is a short powerpoint to walk through with your disciple.
- Model How to Study the Bible: Teach them how to study, interpret, memorize (see suggested verses by topic) and meditate on Scripture for themselves.
- Teach Obedience: Encourage them to become doers of the Word and not merely hearers only who delude themselves (Jas 1:22+). Emphasize that discipleship is not just about knowledge but more importantly is about obedience. Jesus emphasized this point when He declared to His first disciples “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments." (John 14:15+). Jesus is not looking for smarter sinners, by disciples who are more and more like the Savior.
5. Model a Christlike Life
- Be an Example: Like Paul (1Cor 11:1+), let them see your faith in action—how you deal with challenges, make decisions, and interact with others.
- Share Your Journey: Be open (and vulnerable) about your own struggles and victories in faith. This helps them relate and learn from your experiences.
6. Encourage Spiritual Growth
- Set Goals Together: Help them identify areas of growth, such as prayer, Bible reading, evangelism, or serving others.
- Provide Accountability: Check in regularly (even daily by text messaging if not by phone) about their progress, encouraging them to stay committed to spiritual disciplines. When keeping them accountable, the last question you want to ask is "Just you just lie to me about anything you said?"
7. Equip Them to Make Disciples
- Teach Them to Disciple Others: Emphasize that discipleship is about multiplication. Show them how to invest in others as you’re investing in them. Teach them the Pauline pattern of disciple making...
The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. (2Ti 2:2+)
- Involve Them in Ministry: Give them opportunities to share their faith, serve others, and use their gifts.
- Encourage Independence: Gradually empower them to grow in confidence and maturity so they can disciple others.
8. Pray Without Ceasing (1Th 5:17+)
- Pray for Their Growth: Regularly intercede for the people you’re discipling, asking God to transform and equip them. The prayer I love to pray for my disciples (a prayer one individual prayed for me daily for over 10 years) is Colossians 1:9-14+ one of Paul's most complete prayers...
For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience; joyously giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light. For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
- Depend on the Holy Spirit: Remember that true growth in Christlikeness comes from God's Spirit (see 2Cor 3:18+). Jesus declared "It is the Spirit Who gives life; the flesh profits nothing (How much?); the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life." (Jn 6:63+). Your role as "Paul" to your "Timothy" is to plant and water, and to trust that God's Spirit is "causing the growth" (1 Corinthians 3:6+). Or to say it another way, you are like a servant of the Lord who "sets the table" filled with pure milk and solid food, but the disciple has to partake of their own volition. You are passing the football, but they still have to catch it! Regarding your part as their "Paul," let Paul's words sink into your heart and mind...
Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, Who also made us adequate (Who will make you adequate?) as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. (2Cor 3:5-6+)
9. Make It a Way of Life
- Use Everyday Moments: Discipleship doesn’t always have to be formal. Use everyday conversations and activities to model and teach Christ’s ways. In his last letter which was to his young disciple Timothy Paul alluded to discipleship as a lifestyle writing...
"You followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, persecutions, and sufferings." (2Ti 3:10+)
- Involve Your Community: Create a culture of discipleship in your church, family, or small group, where others are encouraged to grow and make disciples. Remind your fellow believers that making disciples is not an option but in fact is obedience to Jesus' last command in Mt 28:19-20+
Go therefore and make disciples (THIS IS THE ONLY SPECIFIC COMMAND - matheteuo in aorist imperative see our need to depend on the Holy Spirit to obey) 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.”
10. Focus on Eternal Impact
- Keep the Mission Central: Making disciples is about investing in what has eternal value—helping others know and follow Christ.
Only one life, ’twill soon be past,
Only what’s done for Christ will last. - Trust God with the Results: Even small acts of obedience in discipleship can lead to ripple effects in God’s kingdom.
Adoniram Judson a famous missionary to Burma wrote that "A life once spent is irrevocable. It will remain to be contemplated through eternity… the same may be said of each day. When it is once past, it is gone forever. All the marks which we put upon it, it will exhibit forever… each day will not only be a witness of our conduct, but will affect our everlasting destiny… How shall we then wish to see each day marked with usefulness! It is too late to mend the days that are past. The future is in our power. Let us, then, each morning, (enabled by God's Spirit) resolve to send the day into eternity in such a garb as we shall wish it to wear forever. And at night let us reflect that one more day is irrevocably gone, indelibly (forever) marked."
By prioritizing disciple-making, you not only redeem your time but also multiply its impact through others who continue the mission. Is there someone God has placed in your life that you feel called to disciple? If so, how can you take the first step today?
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