When We Say, “Discipleship”, They Hear, “Programs”

31/05/23

Jesus’ final words to his disciples were a call to action, a directive of future action now that they had witnessed the culmination of Jesus’ earthly ministry in his death and resurrection.

‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.’ Matthew 28:18-20

Effective ministry is framed around biblically driven theology (the why), strategically driven principles (the what), and contextually driven practice (the how).

When it comes to the topic of discipleship, Jesus’, “Great Commission”, provides for the Church the first two elements of this framework.

Why do we go and make disciples? Because of the ongoing presence and authority of Jesus in this world, which will culminate in his return at the end of the age.

What do we do as we go and make disciples? We baptise them and teach them to obey the commands of Jesus.

How do we go and make disciples? Well, the very nature of contextually driven practice is that it will express itself differently according to the particular time and location of the local church that is seeking to faithfully follow Jesus’ directive. Christians in every age, every country, across every region, city, suburb and town ought to consider how to best disciple those who God has placed in their proximity.

The upside to contextually driven practice is that we have the freedom to creatively imagine and deliver our discipleship in ways that resonate with those that God has gifted us. Previous children’s and youth ministry practices included Sunday School Superintendents who ran age grade classes with textbooks, rote memorisation, and exams. I have the freedom to assess those practices, learn from their respective strengths and weaknesses, and reimagine a renewed practice of ministry that will resonate with young people in early 21st Century, suburban Sydney.

Of course, with every good thing there are shadows. One of the shadows of contextually driven practice is that our ministry can be shaped by the priorities and values of our surrounding culture in a way that runs counter to the theology and principles of discipleship. When the counter-Christian values of our culture drive our ministry practice, then the result will be discipleship that is less effective than it might otherwise be. One such value that has influenced church life, and children’s and youth ministry specifically, is the value of efficiency.

Efficiency, the “true test of orthodoxy”[1]

Throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, values of the industrial revolution were seeping out of the factory and into wider society. The most “successful” factories were those that utilised highly specialised, systematised, and efficient processes to create useful products at the other end. These concepts began to influence the church and its ministry to young people. Discipleship was reimagined as an industrial process. Put a child or young person on the assembly line, provide specialised teaching and training at the correct developmental stage, and voila, a mature disciple of Jesus is produced at the other end who can now be useful in the church and in society.

The industrialisation of discipleship contributed to a focus on programmatic practice in the church. The value of programs is that they can be efficiently produced and implemented. It allows the discipleship “experts” (i.e., vocational ministry staff) to organise a church’s ministry with age and stage appropriate engagement that church members, “Have not the technical training to do as it ought to be done.”[2] Efficient programs are those that the children’s or youth minister creates to best shape the spiritual lives of the young people in our church. Successful churches are those that have the largest number of specialised groups for the different ages and stages in the church.

There are at least two lasting impacts that industrialised values have on children’s and youth ministry today. The first is the emphasis on age and stage specialised ministry. If your children’s ministry were to double in attendance this year, what would you do? Many would immediately plan to split the group according to year group to provide “better” discipleship engagement that was developmentally appropriate.

The second lasting impact is the prioritisation of programs, run by trained ministry experts, as the space in which discipleship happens. If you noticed that the teenagers in your youth ministry were lacking in their biblical literacy, what would you do? Many would start planning a program to enhance their teen’s biblical engagement by providing further Bible Study opportunities throughout the week and recruiting the relevant leaders.

Finally, it is not just the church leadership that has been formed by the values of the industrial revolution. It is also the parents of those in our ministry. Most areas of a child’s life are outsourced to specialists in efficiently run programs. Whether it is education, sport and fitness, music and art, or entertainment, the normative expectation is that there is a specialist program that will teach my child the essential skills or preferences that I desire for them. And for Christians parents, who rightly want their children to grow in their knowledge, love and obedience to King Jesus, we are this specialisation and efficiency in our churches as well.

Because of the values of our culture, it is no surprise that when we say, “Discipleship”, they hear, “Programs”. This is what our parents have been enculturated to expect, and it is what we have been enculturated to provide.

The question is whether this value of efficiency, expressed in the contextually driven practice (how) of specialised programming, is in fact the best expression of the theology (why) and principles (what) of going and making discipleship that Jesus calls us to in Matthew 28.

Is efficiency a counter-Christian value of our society, or one that has resonance with biblically driven theology? How might we assess our programmatically driven ministries and what correctives might we put in place to enhance effective youth and children’s ministry?

These are the questions I will take up in Part 2. Who could you discuss them with?

[1] W. A. Hobson, “Editorial,” Florida Baptist Witness, February 4, 1915, 6-7. Hobson continued by stating that evangelism and efficiency were “the two great fundamental things in the teaching of Christ and his apostles.” Cited in W. Ryan Steenburg & Timothy Paul Jones, “Growing Gaps From Generation to Generation: Family Discipleship in Modern and Postmodern Contexts”. Ch.9 in Trained in the Fear of God: Family Ministry in Theological, Historical, and Practical Perspective (Grand Rapids, MI.: Kregal, 2011), 154. Much of the following section is indebted to this chapter from Steenburg and Jones.

[2] Richard Morse Hodge, “What Should be the Training of Pastor’s Assistance?” Religious Education 3, no. 4 (October 1908): 152. Cited in Steenburg and Jones, 154.