The final type of discipling is that
of coaching. On a sports team the coach doesn’t play the
game. And he doesn’t make the plays. But if a team is
performing poorly, the coach is often the one that gets the
blame.
Jesus sent his disciples out into the
world to preach that the kingdom of heaven was near. Jesus
didn’t go with them. He had already trained them. They knew
what to do. But Jesus wasn’t leaving his disciples alone. If
there would have been problems, Jesus would have been
available to help.
A coach may seem like he doesn’t do
much and doesn’t affect the end result but a coach is very
important. A coach is the most passive of the four types but
that is because he or she is watching the entire time. A
coach will come alongside a person and explain, “Here’s what
you are doing wrong.” A coach evaluates where things go
wrong and comes up with a strategy on how to make things
better.
For an example, lets go back to the
obnoxious coworker. The disciple comes home from work and
tells their coach, “I just can’t love this guy. He is rude,
he curses at me, and he questions everything that I believe
in. I know that the Bible teaches us to love our neighbor
and I know he is my neighbor, but I don’t know how I can
love him.”
A coach would look at the situation
and say, “Have you ever wondered why he is so rude. Maybe
there is something in his past that makes him very angry at
Christians. Perhaps you could talk to him and let him know
that whatever problems he may have had with a Christian
before, we are not all alike.”
Or maybe the coach says, “I know that
guy must be obnoxious. But so were you at one time. God
still loves this guy just as much as he loves you. If
someone hadn’t taken the time to become your friend and
teach you about the Lord, you’d probably be very similar to
this guy right now.”
In Luke 10 Jesus sends out seventy two
disciples in the same manner. They return and report "Lord,
even the demons submit to us in your name." Jesus uses this
success as an opportunity to coach as well. He tells them
the reason they have succeeded was because God gave them
authority to cast out demons.
A coach doesn’t just have to look for
negative things to correct. A coach can find positive things
to reinforce. And when something succeeds, the coach can ask
the disciple if they know why they succeeded. If they don’t
know, the coach can explain why they succeeded doing
whatever they did.
These are the four different types of
disciple making. Just like everything we have discussed, you
are probably better doing one type than the others. Some
people are natural teachers. Others may be shy around people
but make excellent models. And others may be good problem
solvers and be excellent coaches.
It doesn’t matter how you disciple a
person. In fact, you may go through all four types with a
person, modeling for them in the beginning until they
recognize that there is something different about you and
Christians. Then you will walk with them as a mentor. After
that, you can instruct them about deeper things. Finally,
you can be their coach and they will come to you with their
problems and you will help solve them in a Christian manner.
We are called to make disciples and
using these methods you can not only reach out to the lost,
but you can come alongside them, work with them, and make
them a disciple of Jesus Christ.
Next Chapter -
Your Story and Others
