What Are the Most Important Practices in a Christian’s Life?
Ask the Pastor with J.D. Greear
J.D. Greear
4.8 • 630 Ratings
🗓️ 2 October 2023
⏱️ 7 minutes
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Summary
Each week, we’ll be posting a special short version of each 12 Truths and a Lie podcast on Ask Me Anything. To listen to the full version and subscribe, just visit AccessMore at www. accessmore.com/pd/12-Truths–A-Lie-Podcast-by-JD-Greear
With everything that goes on in church, do you ever wonder, “What exactly is the most important thing we’re doing here?” Most churches keep themselves-and their members-really busy. They judge their success by how many people attend or how many baptisms they’ve done. But heaven doesn’t celebrate any of those numbers. It only celebrates disciples.
In this episode of “12 Truths and a Lie,” Pastor J.D. shows us the heart of Jesus’ mission. It’s found right in the Great Commission. But it’s not “going,” “teaching,” or “baptizing.” At the center of it all is one command: “Make disciples.” Disciple-making wasn’t a special assignment for a select few, but the central calling for every follower of Jesus.
You’ll learn all about Jesus’ call to become a disciple, along with the five identities of every follower of Jesus-worshiper, family member, servant, steward, and witness. Most importantly, you’ll learn how you can discover your role in the disciple-making process. Because God’s method for reaching the world isn’t big ministries with uber-talented preachers, but everyday Christians, filled with the Spirit, making disciples everywhere they go.
In other words, God’s method … is you.
Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question. We’ll pick Ask Me Anything back at the end of the year.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back to Ask Me Anything where Pastor J.D. Greer answers your questions. |
| 0:22.5 | We are actually in the middle of a bonus series as J.D. is answering some of life's biggest questions. |
| 0:28.5 | This series is called 12 truths and a lie. |
| 0:32.6 | In this episode, we're going to talk about what are the most important practices in a Christian's life. |
| 0:37.8 | So let's start with what is known as the Great Commission that Jesus gave to his disciples. |
| 0:44.3 | Matthew 2819 says, go into all the world and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, |
| 0:51.3 | teaching them to observe all things that I've commanded you. |
| 0:53.7 | And behold, he says, I'm with you always to the end of the age. Now, in English, there are several |
| 1:00.2 | verbs in that sentence. Go, make disciples, baptize, teach, but in Greek, there's actually only one |
| 1:05.4 | verb, and that verb is make disciples. All the other words that are translated as verbs into English are actually what we |
| 1:12.0 | call participles in Greek, which means they modify the verb. The verb in that sentence is the central |
| 1:17.7 | thing, and that means the other things are extension of or applications of that verb. You say, |
| 1:24.2 | thank you, J.D., for the grammar lesson, so what? Make disciples is the only |
| 1:30.2 | verb in the Great Commission, which means that it is central to what it means to follow Jesus. |
| 1:35.8 | And that means everything else that we do, the going, the teaching, the baptizing, and all |
| 1:41.7 | the rest is an extension of that. They're the participles to the central verb, |
| 1:46.7 | make disciples for everything else that the church does make disciples is the center. It's the core. |
| 1:52.7 | I first learned that concept from a book I read in college. It was written in 1962. I wasn't |
| 1:58.1 | in college then, but it's a classic book, which, you know, the definition of a |
| 2:01.8 | classic book is a book lots of people have heard about, but nobody's read. This is a classic book |
| 2:05.9 | I would encourage you to read. It's called the Master Plan of Evangelism by Robert Coleman. |
| 2:11.6 | In that book, Coleman says, and I quote, the Great Commission is not merely to go to the ends |
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