What is the motive behind the model?
Recently this question surfaced with regard to the Church Planting (CPX) model and Discovery Bible Study (DBS) tool we implemented in Uganda. Oftentimes I would connect with a person with a premeditated DBS checklist in mind. To get full marks I would religiously implement the ministry tool as though implementing the tool is the great commission. What are you thankful for?, tick. Prayer requests, tick. Share a story, tick. What does the story say about God, you and other people?, tick, tick, tick. Who are you going to share this story with?, tick. When I reflect on these conversations my conscience struggles with the to-the-point rationale, making the motive of CPX and DBS seem heartless.
It doesn't have to be this way. Perhaps if I was naturally fit for the office that is evangelist, I wouldn't be as cautious. Plus, the more I practice implementing the tool the more comfortable I become and as a result more skilled and useful too. Still my resistance towards the model has to do with the motive, as posed in the question above. Whereas a natural evangelist or someone who has experience with the DBS tool might go about ministering this way second naturely, others may tend to wonder: Is this what meeting the great commission—to go and make disciples—looks like?
For example, I'd say evangelism is a prevalent attribute of the church in Uganda. The experiences I've had with the DBS tool are most relative to Uganda as well. I've been there twice, once in 2016 where we demonstrated to the local pastors of a remote village close to Makodes, how to use the DBS tool to disciple others whether they are saved or not. Then recently in Kampala for eight days where, not only did we go out intending to find and make disciples, I can swiftly recall two encounters where locals approached me, head-set on evangelizing. This wasn't as prevalent in the surrounding nations or at least not within the perimeters we found ourselves moving, from what I can remember. Nonetheless on both occasions, I left Uganda feeling bereaved, with questions unanswered as to what's driving the evangelism wagon and what the motive is behind the CPX model, of which DBS is a tool.
As far as I can tell from the life we recently shared with Wilson and his household, who together taught us how to use this model and why; leave the church building and implant church in people; their motives aren't heartless. Wilson is disciplining a seemingly meager total of eleven brothers and sisters—after nearly five years of exercising this model. Each of these are discipling others and so the fruition multiplies. For a moment, in ignorance, I rendered Wilson and company heartless in the way they go about making disciples, but soon I realized: As much as it takes time to bear lasting fruit, it requires fortitude to continually planting seeds. For, if the model would have a disciple heartily spend himself/herself on every seed scattered, who does the seed's growth depend on: the Spirit of God, or the disciple evangelizing? Likewise:
"So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ."
Ephesians 4:11-14
Biblically speaking the motive behind the model is pure, guided by the great commission: go and make disciples. Whether or not CPX makes sense to me—after only eight days of exploring and witnessing the model in action... when the motive is making disciples, the model matters little. I wondered whether this is something I have yet to learn and it is. Still, a part of me knows this is familiar territory, that ministry takes its course in the body of Christ innately with or without a method to guide us. Ministry is tough. No model works. We don't make the difference as Isaiah notes and bring salvation to the earth, (26:18). For so long as God keeps waiting and Jesus keeps saving; we live on. God help us. God forgive us. We live on.
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