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Re: Testimony of Discipling [message #10447 is a reply to message #10441]

Sat, 30 November 2013 11:28

Gary
Messages: 1025
Registered: August 2008
Location: Indiana

Senior Member

wishing34 wrote on Fri, 29 November 2013 11:58

Gary,

Quote:

The concept of getting and training disciples was hardly or rarely mentioned.

As I recall how we were . . . getting disciples of our own was actually taught against.

We thought in terms that new converts immediately became disciples of Jesus , never of another human being.
We expected that God Himself was actively in their lives discipling them daily in the Word and in the school of trials.

Jman,

Thanks for sharing this. I will try to answer each one, a paragraph at a time. Very good overview of how it was taught, I agree we were not taught to personally disciple people.

If you think about it though, I always thought people came in to the movement because of all our excitement of what Jesus was doing. It's hard to tell someone what really happened in the beginning. The Spirit of God was so strong in the meetings it was like Jesus was walking the aisles. I would leave the meetings and for days on end there would be a strong anointing of the Spirit on me from the worship and hearing the Word. There was a great hunger in all of us. We were being discipled by HEF and to this day it guides our thinking in many areas. This man spent a lot of time in prayer, fasting, and study of the Word. He was not like the Pastors we see out there today. He was a good example in all of this. Jesus did say to us to go make disciples, I had just not given it much thought as I followed the example the Lord set before us, for that time in our lives. But now I am thinking the Lord is moving us all one step at a time into His greater anointing.

This concept (discipling) does sound interesting. I have wondered (before this topic even came up), if you minister to someone should we not try to follow up and if someone comes to the Lord do we just leave them to go to some church and become part of the system. Just some things here that I have considered. I can see a benefit in continuing to minister or disciple people towards the Lord. Like Jesus said most are like sheep having no shepherd. Also being led in the Spirit in this is important and I agree with what you and Marilyn discussed: that, money or some form of submission to "us" is not of the Lord. We have to be very sensitive to the Spirit in this.

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{{{ For Marylin's benefit -> what we called the school of trials was our belief that God would tailor-make tests (trials)
in our lives wherein He would allow the devil to attack us in some way. As we faithfully overcame ( there is that
"overcome in all things" idea ) the test/trial we would learn spiritual lessons - maybe patience, stronger faith, the need
for more holiness, etc. We believed that God was discipling each of us Himself, One on one tutoring, the Holy Spirit
within each of us - through the use of these trials/tests }}}

This is very good assessment, While we in the West do not suffer persecution, like in China or some muslim country, trials become the pathway into the Kingdom for us here. We can run and try to get out of the trials or we can accept them as from the Lord and yield to the Holy Spirit to do the work in us. I don't think that when we try to take care of ourselves and do our part that we are running, but its when someone tries to get out of the trial and does not run to the Lord. Hope that's understandable.

I have found when everything is going great in life it becomes easier to slack off when spending time with the Lord. But when the trials come our way, we should see the need to be walking closer to the Lord. This is why Paul mentions that he glories in trials and tribulations. This is clearly taught in the Bible, trials and yielding to the Spirit in them.

Quote:

Then we expected that the 5-fold gift of teaching would instruct us in the Scriptures. New converts would
listen to many, many audio tapes as they learned the various topics.

This may of been the flaw in our armor. All alone listening to tapes, and accepting things without being able to ask questions. Jesus disciples could talk with him as well as John the Baptist who could talk with his disciples concerning the things of the Kingdom. (Just thinking out loud here at least considering discipling others would be a benefit to some).

Many of the ministers who set under Freeman started to look for and to find new things that we needed to give up as proof of our obedience to the Lord. There was no way HEF could monitor what all these guys were telling us and at times I thought it became a competition on who could find the latest or newest thing that we had not thought of. Somethings they said were very logical and even HEF followed what some of them said in his pulpit.

It wasn't money or submission to them but what could we give up for the Lord which led to legalism and some peer pressure. We could all make up a ten page list. But we live and learn and thankfully the Lord has been merciful in this learning process.

If you take the literal meaning of disciple or discipling the word means:

Quote:

dis�ci�ple
[dih-sahy-puhl] Show IPA noun, verb, dis�ci�pled, dis�ci�pling.
noun
1.
Religion .
a.
one of the 12 personal followers of Christ.
b.
one of the 70 followers sent forth by Christ. Luke 10:1.
c.
any other professed follower of Christ in His lifetime.
2.
any follower of Christ.
3.
( initial capital letter ) a member of the Disciples of Christ.
4.
a person who is a pupil or an adherent of the doctrines of another; follower: a disciple of Freud.

As number four suggests, a person who adheres to the doctrines of another. Ultimately we only submit to Christ and His doctrines. So even if we have disciples, "everything is to be centered around Christ and His teachings".

I don't know Marilyn maybe the word mentoring would be better, but if your use to saying disciples I see if its understood correctly then that's fine. It just sounds strange to our way of thinking over here.

Just some thoughts on this.

=============================================

Quote:

Btw: John the Baptist was before Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came to indwell the believers.
Believers now should have the Holy Spirit within which enables the school of trials
- see John 14:26 <- this was future tense to John the Baptist

Jman

Jman for a long time I would read the NT and then would go to the OT, this was my routine for daily Bible reading. Now for a time I have just been reading the Gospels. I wanted to see what did Jesus really say, and what were His disciples reaction. I have been very blessed in doing this for now, as things I never seen before leap out of the scriptures. I have been reading them over and over at least for now till the Lord moves me on.

I ran across an interesting statement a few days ago concerning what you shared above in this statement. Here in Luke I will share this portion of scripture as I am not trying to expound on all the things that Gabriel the angel is telling Zacharias. This statement concerning John:

He will also be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb.

I don't have all understanding of it but it clearly says that John would be "filled" with the Holy Spirit from even the time he was in his mothers womb.

Both parents were considered "righteous" before God:

6 And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless. 7 But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and they were both well advanced in years.

Anyway I just thought this was very interesting that John was filled with the Spirit before Pentecost. John was a vessel prepared by God and prophesied by Isaiah, that he would one day, go before and prepare the way of the Lord.

Again I have been very blessed by just reading the Gospels and would encourage anyone here to try it for a season.

Lord Bless,
Gary

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