Spring is here, yay! Green grass, flowers, warmer temperatures, sunshine, birds singing — I love this stuff! (Okay, sorry to the folk in Newfoundland who had snow last week. That is not fun since I bet you’re as ready for spring as the rest of us.)
So, I’m surveying the spring foliage and realize, uh oh it’s time to dig up some dandelions. They’re yellow and pretty but they will take over the lawn. So, they must be removed.
But wait!
Then I read a piece on social media that says dandelions are needed for our rapidly declining bee population to survive. And we need the bees for life itself on this planet (or something like that, it was important, I remember that) Sooooo, I’m not digging up my dandelions. I’m on the Bee’s side.
Change and flexibility are important in life and discipleship.
Are we willing to change our plans?
What kind of plans? Well, kind of any plans.
Sometimes we receive new information or realize there are unique considerations. And with new information, we need to be willing to flex or change. That’s the thing about a relationship with the living God — we could be wrong and ill-informed and God could tell us to reverse, pivot or change direction. If God says it then we do it!
The cool thing about the Bible is that as often as you might have read it you can still learn new things and they will change you.
In making disciples do we listen for the leading of the Spirit or do we recruit our dream team and go for it using our skills and good management and promotion? (The right answer is “listen to the Spirit”)
We have to be careful not to let a good plan, techniques or programs run our disciplemaking.
YOU CAN listen to the Spirit and use your skills. God gives us resources, skills and gifted people. But we need to be willing to change plans and how we use those resources, skills and gifted people as God directs.
as each person is different and their discipleship is different
we need to listen to the Spirit’s leading
And as each person is different and their discipleship is different we need to listen to Spirit’s leading as to how to help them grow into the disciple God is making. We can’t just use a cookie cutter approach to disciplemaking. Which is also why curriculum based discipleship is flawed. It doesn’t usually take people’s uniqueness into account.
So, yes, let’s use resources. But let’s also be listening to the Spirit as we are guided into how best to nurture a particular disciple. Resources plus the customized guidance of The Holy Spirit.
Yes! That’s the gig. Discipleship isn’t a mass production factory process. We’re unique followers of Jesus who listen to the Spirit as we make unique disciples of Jesus.
