discipleship at Greenridge
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What is a Disciple?
At Greenridge, we’ve boiled this very big concept down into a simple statement: A disciple is a Christian who seeks to know Jesus more and to obey all that He has commanded. In other words, disciples are people who have trusted Jesus to pay for their sins and committed themselves to follow Him as their Lord.
A disciple has certain needs that must be met in order to grow in their knowledge of Christ and in their obedience. These needs can be divided into two broad categories: Content Needs and Community Needs. The Content Needs of a disciple includes all of the head-knowledge and tools that are necessary and helpful for living lives that honor Christ. The Community Needs of a disciple include all of the relational interactions that a Christian requires in order to be held accountable to apply all of the head-knowledge.
What is Discipleship?
Put simply, discipleship is the process of helping people know Jesus more and obey all that He has commanded. The last command that Jesus gives to his disciples before he ascends into heaven is this: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20 ESV). In this command, Jesus tells his people to be about the business of not only making new disciples, but also making current disciples better disciples.
Greenridge has taken on the task of building a Discipleship Ministry that provides a means by which the needs of disciples can be met. We have a developed a Discipleship Process that should be used to help guide people from being a new believer to a disciple-maker. This process is based on the Mission Statement of the church and aims to meet both the Content Needs and the Community Needs of a disciple.
The Discipleship Process
The Discipleship Process at Greenridge reflects the church’s mission and is divided into four parts.
1. We first want people to Connect with God by becoming a Christian. This is the most important connection with God that a person will ever make, so we obviously want every person to begin here. If someone is not yet a Christian, then they cannot have a personal relationship with God, and they cannot begin living as God created them to live.
People also Connect with God through corporate worship, that is, gathering with other believers to remember God’s goodness toward us and to respond with praise, repentance, and commitment to Him. At GBC we provide the opportunity for members to participate in corporate worship on Sunday mornings at 9:30am.
Corporate worship aims to minister to both the Content and the Community Needs of a disciple, but we believe that it takes more than attending corporate worship to grow in Christ. Thus, we want to encourage and challenge members to participate in a deeper level of commitment as disciples.
2. The next step in the process is to Grow Together in our Relationship with Jesus. At GBC, this is the level of the Discipleship process at
which the Content and Community Needs of a disciple are heavily addressed. Concerning Content Needs, the church offers Equip Classes on Sunday mornings at 11:00am for the purpose of providing disciples with the knowledge and tools necessary to know Jesus more and to obey his commands. These classes seek to cover a large number of issues that disciples need to address in order to honor Christ with their lives.
Greenridge also offers Home Groups so that the Community Needs of disciples might be met. Home Groups are weekly or twice-monthly gatherings of disciples that focus on building Christian community. The goal of a Home Group is to provide a place where disciples will be encouraged and challenged to progress in their walk with Christ through Accountability, Member Care, and Pursuing Kingdom Growth.
At this stage in the Discipleship Process, members of Greenridge should be engaged in areas of personal growth. But again, corporate worship and growing in Christ are not the only aspects of being a well-rounded disciple of Christ. From here we want to challenge and encourage our members to move to the deeper level of commitment of serving others.
3. By Serve all People we mean serve all kinds of all people. It is impractical and impossible for one person to serve every individual that they come in contact with. However, it is possible and expected that the church as a whole would not intentionally limit its service to a certain kind of people or group of person. Jesus is our ultimate example of humble, obedient service (Luke 22:24-27; Philippians 2:4-11); he has served every human being that has ever lived by dying on the cross and rising from the dead.
The church provides several ways for people to serve: from the Youth Ministry to the Children’s Ministry, from Friends Unlimited to Clarksburg CAN. Serving is also a huge aspect of the Home Group ministry, expressed through the care that Home Group members display toward one another.
4. The final step in the Discipleship Process is one that flows naturally from the others and that is to Share the Gospel. This is a huge part of our purpose as disciples of Christ. We are God’s messengers and ambassadors to give people the good news that Jesus died to reconcile them to God.
We hope that disciples at Greenridge will be actively engaged in praying for opportunities to share the Gospel with lost friends and neighbors. To help facilitate this, Home Groups are expected to consistently and persistently pray together for evangelistic opportunities for their members. It is also expected that Home Group members will lovingly prod one another to share the Gospel with the people they are praying for.
The Discipleship Process is one that is meant to be circular. As people engage in worship and growth, they begin to serve, building relationships that will eventually lead to Gospel conversations. The church’s prayer, then, is that as its members are serving and sharing the Gospel, lost people will recognize their need, repent, and believe the Good News. When this happens, these new believers will then begin by Connecting with God, then move to Growing with other believers in their relationship with Jesus until, finally, they are Serving and Sharing the Gospel. This is a process that will hopefully and prayerfully lead to disciples making disciples.
At Greenridge, we’ve boiled this very big concept down into a simple statement: A disciple is a Christian who seeks to know Jesus more and to obey all that He has commanded. In other words, disciples are people who have trusted Jesus to pay for their sins and committed themselves to follow Him as their Lord.
A disciple has certain needs that must be met in order to grow in their knowledge of Christ and in their obedience. These needs can be divided into two broad categories: Content Needs and Community Needs. The Content Needs of a disciple includes all of the head-knowledge and tools that are necessary and helpful for living lives that honor Christ. The Community Needs of a disciple include all of the relational interactions that a Christian requires in order to be held accountable to apply all of the head-knowledge.
What is Discipleship?
Put simply, discipleship is the process of helping people know Jesus more and obey all that He has commanded. The last command that Jesus gives to his disciples before he ascends into heaven is this: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20 ESV). In this command, Jesus tells his people to be about the business of not only making new disciples, but also making current disciples better disciples.
Greenridge has taken on the task of building a Discipleship Ministry that provides a means by which the needs of disciples can be met. We have a developed a Discipleship Process that should be used to help guide people from being a new believer to a disciple-maker. This process is based on the Mission Statement of the church and aims to meet both the Content Needs and the Community Needs of a disciple.
The Discipleship Process
The Discipleship Process at Greenridge reflects the church’s mission and is divided into four parts.
1. We first want people to Connect with God by becoming a Christian. This is the most important connection with God that a person will ever make, so we obviously want every person to begin here. If someone is not yet a Christian, then they cannot have a personal relationship with God, and they cannot begin living as God created them to live.
People also Connect with God through corporate worship, that is, gathering with other believers to remember God’s goodness toward us and to respond with praise, repentance, and commitment to Him. At GBC we provide the opportunity for members to participate in corporate worship on Sunday mornings at 9:30am.
Corporate worship aims to minister to both the Content and the Community Needs of a disciple, but we believe that it takes more than attending corporate worship to grow in Christ. Thus, we want to encourage and challenge members to participate in a deeper level of commitment as disciples.
2. The next step in the process is to Grow Together in our Relationship with Jesus. At GBC, this is the level of the Discipleship process at
which the Content and Community Needs of a disciple are heavily addressed. Concerning Content Needs, the church offers Equip Classes on Sunday mornings at 11:00am for the purpose of providing disciples with the knowledge and tools necessary to know Jesus more and to obey his commands. These classes seek to cover a large number of issues that disciples need to address in order to honor Christ with their lives.
Greenridge also offers Home Groups so that the Community Needs of disciples might be met. Home Groups are weekly or twice-monthly gatherings of disciples that focus on building Christian community. The goal of a Home Group is to provide a place where disciples will be encouraged and challenged to progress in their walk with Christ through Accountability, Member Care, and Pursuing Kingdom Growth.
At this stage in the Discipleship Process, members of Greenridge should be engaged in areas of personal growth. But again, corporate worship and growing in Christ are not the only aspects of being a well-rounded disciple of Christ. From here we want to challenge and encourage our members to move to the deeper level of commitment of serving others.
3. By Serve all People we mean serve all kinds of all people. It is impractical and impossible for one person to serve every individual that they come in contact with. However, it is possible and expected that the church as a whole would not intentionally limit its service to a certain kind of people or group of person. Jesus is our ultimate example of humble, obedient service (Luke 22:24-27; Philippians 2:4-11); he has served every human being that has ever lived by dying on the cross and rising from the dead.
The church provides several ways for people to serve: from the Youth Ministry to the Children’s Ministry, from Friends Unlimited to Clarksburg CAN. Serving is also a huge aspect of the Home Group ministry, expressed through the care that Home Group members display toward one another.
4. The final step in the Discipleship Process is one that flows naturally from the others and that is to Share the Gospel. This is a huge part of our purpose as disciples of Christ. We are God’s messengers and ambassadors to give people the good news that Jesus died to reconcile them to God.
We hope that disciples at Greenridge will be actively engaged in praying for opportunities to share the Gospel with lost friends and neighbors. To help facilitate this, Home Groups are expected to consistently and persistently pray together for evangelistic opportunities for their members. It is also expected that Home Group members will lovingly prod one another to share the Gospel with the people they are praying for.
The Discipleship Process is one that is meant to be circular. As people engage in worship and growth, they begin to serve, building relationships that will eventually lead to Gospel conversations. The church’s prayer, then, is that as its members are serving and sharing the Gospel, lost people will recognize their need, repent, and believe the Good News. When this happens, these new believers will then begin by Connecting with God, then move to Growing with other believers in their relationship with Jesus until, finally, they are Serving and Sharing the Gospel. This is a process that will hopefully and prayerfully lead to disciples making disciples.