Building A Discipling Culture 3rd Edition

How to release a missional movement by discipling people like Jesus did.

"Much ink and many pages have been devoted to all of the missional issues facing the Western church today. As our culture becomes more post-Christian with each passing day, we are all realizing that what has worked in the past is no longer working, that we are far less effective for the Kingdom than we were even 10 years ago. But we would suggest it isn’t because we don’t know what the Great Commission states or the imperatives of the Gospel, or that our church services just aren’t getting it done. It’s because we are in the midst of a discipleship crisis in the Western church. The people sitting in our pews are rarely becoming like the people we read about in Scripture. They may come to a worship service, join a small group or even tithe, but their lives just don’t seem to look like Jesus’ life. The truth of the matter is that we don’t have a missional problem or leadership problem in the Western church. We have a discipleship problem. If we make disciples like Jesus made them, we’ll never have a problem finding leaders or seeing new people coming to faith. The central issue is that we have no idea how to make disciples who can do the things that Jesus did for the reasons Jesus did them. Building a Discipling Culture is the product of more than 25 years of hands-on discipleship practice in a post-Christian context that has turned into a worldwide discipling movement, dealing specifically with how to make the types of missional disciples Jesus spoke of. We all want to make disciples. Most of us are unsure how to do it. Dallas Willard put it this way: 'Every church needs to be able to answer two questions. One, do we have a plan for making disciples? Two, does our plan work?' For most of our church communities, we have a plan, but the plan isn’t working. If you find yourself in this situation, this book is for you." -- Publisher's description.

Christ commanded the church to make disciples, to produce people who love and obey God, bear fruit, and live with joy. The crisis at the heart of the church is that we often pay lip service to making disciples, but we seldom put much effort behind doing it. For the pastor who is ready to put words into action, The Disciple-Making Pastor offers the inspiration and practical know-how to do so. Bill Hull shows pastors the obstacles they will face, what disciples really look like, the pastor's role in producing them, and the practices that lead to positive change. He also offers a six-step coaching process to help new disciples grow in commitment and obedience and practical ideas to integrate disciple making into the fabric of the church.

Jesus promised that his sheep would hear and know his voice, but what does his voice sound like? How does he speak to his people today? How can the contemporary church embrace prophetic ministry in a way that will both resource discipleship and empower mission? Prophecy did not die out with the early church and remains a vitally important gift, bearing much fruit in the lives of disciples if well taught, responsibly handled, and ministered with love. There is a great need in the church today for a healthy, holistic and biblical prophetic ministry that will equip God's people to become more radical followers of Jesus and engage more effectively in the world around them. This is a book for all those who seek a mature and outward-looking expression of prophetic ministry. It provides a way forward for everyone who desires to hear God's voice with clarity, as well as bringing greater understanding of the role that prophets play today.

"While the theory and theology of missional church are important, this book is about practice-a practical guide to MCs written by some of the people who were there at the beginning of their inception and know them inside out. This book, while helpfully summarizing all the theory on Missional Communities, is fundamentally about how to make them work in your church community."--From back cover

Jesus told his followers to "go make disciples of all nation," but somewhere along the line the church has fallen behind. Today there are few churches focused and structured to intentionally make disciples the way Jesus made disciples. However, there is a new breed of leadership determined to see disciple-making take center stage in the life of the local church. In Bold Moves, Pastor Craig Etheredge reveals the seven steps necessary to transition any church to become an intentional disciple-making church. He also brings to the table over twenty years of experience in leading churches to become thriving, healthy, multiplying churches.