Devo - Making Disciples

Making Disciples
John 17:6-19

Jesus didn’t pour his life into hundreds of people to carry his message forward to the world. Instead, Jesus made disciples of twelve men through intentional, committed relationships. This devotion comes from the Becoming a Disciple series and the sixth message titled Make Disciples.”

Commit your life to Christ, become a disciple, and then make disciples because that’s the commission. That’s the last command from our Commander in Chief. Make disciples. How did Jesus do it? He did it through intentional, committed relationships. He prayed all night, and then he chose twelve to be with him. And he knew in these three years, these twelve men (one replaced with Paul) are going to change the world, are going to bring salvation to the world.

Not thousands of relationships because he was man. One hundred percent God, one hundred percent man. He couldn’t have a thousand intentional, committed relationships. He couldn’t have hundreds of intentional, committed relationships. Jesus could not even have dozens of intentional, committed relationships. He could have one dozen. The God of the Universe could only handle twelve men, twelve followers to pour his life into.

Why? Why did Jesus do that? If we could come up with why Jesus did this, then we would know why we are called to do it the same way. Here’s Greg Ogden’s thought – I agree with him. When he poured his life into these twelve men for three years, it was the only way to permanently transfer his methods, and his message, and his mission into their lives.

You know this. You tell your teenagers this. Who you hang around with, you’re going to be like. Alright? Who you are choosing to spend time with in close relationship, you’re going to become like that person. And so, Jesus says, for me to change the world, I’m going to make twelve followers become like me. And I’m going to pour my methods, and I’m going to pour my message, and I’m going to pour my mission into them, and they’re going to take over from there.

This is what Jesus did. His relationship with these twelve was very intentional. And he did walk alongside them through all kinds of situations in life. And he did encourage them, and he did equip them, but he also did challenge them. He challenged each of them to grow into maturity in him.

Jesus impacted thousands, but he only really trained twelve. He had the seventy. He had the one-hundred and twenty at the end, but really, he focused on just training twelve in intentional relationships. Jesus Christ gave his life on the Cross for the world, and then he entrusted twelve followers to get that news out.

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