The Art of Making Disciples - 8 simple principles from Apostle Paul’s life in Thessalonica

Are you interested in making disciples? Are you desirous of being obedient to the great commission of our Lord? You might be going, nope! that is not for me, that is for the missionaries and the church to figure out. Well it doesn’t look so in the Bible when we read Mathew 18:18-20, the last few words of the Lord here on this earth. If you even take a casual look at it, leave alone studying it in depth, it is pretty obvious that it is a clear mandate given to everyone who follows Him and who will follow him in the future, it is not optional, it is an invitation for every believer to labour with Him in making disciples.

If you are considering this seriously let me begin by reminding that there are no short cuts or easy methods here. To start with there are two ground rules which are unchanging and  non- negotiable -  the first one is to be continuously controlled and empowered by the Holy Spirit as He is the one who helps us to be a bold witness and secondly to be always prepared to share the Gospel. As people come to know Jesus and start following Him we go along-side them in their journey to maturity and help them in their walk with the Lord. But many of us don’t have much ideas on what do we do with these new believers to help them grow to be Christ- like. This is where these simple principles come in handy, these are timeless principles of making disciples from the master disciple maker and missionary of all time – Apostle Paul.

Apostle Paul’s visit to Thessalonica was a brief one, He and Silas were there for hardly three weeks. (Acts 17: 2) But in those three weeks they raised up a group of believers to launch a church and also entrusted the leadership to the local people as they had to hastily leave to Berea due to persecution. Many times people ask how long does it take to start a church or pioneer a group in a new place. Here in this instance apostle Paul could do it in three weeks, unbelievable right! But that is what it says here, when we win people to Christ in a new place and identify the leaders and equip and empower them, trusting that they will take charge and we fade out of the picture in a short span of time this is what happens – we have a believing community there. But Apostle Paul does not leave it there, he does not leave the new believers high and dry to figure out on their own the difficult process of Christian growth, he writes two letters to them  to strengthen and encourage the believer’s to press on and grow.

It is in his first letter to Thessalonians that you find him sharing his heart of a disciple maker and sometimes as you read through you wonder, did he do all that in such a short span! As I read through I came across 8 amazing principles of disciple making from Apostle Paul’s life in Thessalonica. Take a look at them.

1.      Praying for the ones we are discipling: (1Thess 1: 2)

Apostle Paul says, we ‘always’ thank God for all of you and ‘continually’ pray for you. It is something that he does regularly as a way of life. He considers them an integral part of his life and takes time to remember them in his daily prayer.  He is not making this as a casual statement to be taken lightly even though most of the time we just glance over those verses in a casual manner. In fact this is something that apostle Paul repeats in most of his letters to the different churches. Do we take time to really thank God for the people whom God is entrusting in our hands to disciple? Do we pray for them by name? Do we know their personal needs and struggles? If not, we are missing it altogether because praying for them is such a crucial principle to be seriously considered if we want to make disciples who will truly become Christ-like.

2.     The gift of Appreciation:

Apostle Paul appreciates the believer’s in Thessalonica for their faith, love and hope in chap 1 vs 3.  He appreciates them for their endurance and great Joy in the midst of severe persecution and suffering. Vs 6. He also goes on to applaud their work in spreading the gospel to other places. Vs 8.   Paul was not stingy in his appreciation, in fact he was lavish in his praise for the believers on the things that he saw them growing and excelling. You see this trait a lot in his individual letters to his dearest disciple

Timothy. Appreciation is the environment in which maximum growth happens, it is one of the most powerful ways to encourage a person, people love to hear feedback on what they are really doing well. It is not trying to flatter or please our disciples but to genuinely encourage them for the positive things and progress that you observe in them. Just a few words of appreciation can encourage and motivate a new believer to press on and move forward with great enthusiasm in his journey. 

3.     Share the Gospel with boldness in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Apostle Paul says in 1Thess 1: 5 that the Good news they shared was not just with words, but with power and with the Holy Spirit. Again in chapter 2 verse 2 he says that before they came to Thessalonica they faced severe persecution and suffering in Philippi but God enabled them to be brave and tell the good news in Thessalonica. Without sowing we cannot reap and we need to sow boldly the seeds of the gospel in order to make disciples. Be ready to use every opportunity to share about Jesus and his love.

4.     Be clear on the why?

Why are we making disciples? What is our motive and what is driving us? Is it out of error, impure motives, to trick people, to please people using flattery or to cover up our greed wearing a mask? No! Apostle Paul emphatically says in chapter 2:4, we speak as those approved by God to be entrusted with the Good news, the only motive being to please God. It is the love of Christ that compels us to love the people around us. The ultimate end of making disciples is to glorify God. Are we clear on our motives of being involved in making disciples? It is very important for us to sit down and ask why am I involved in making disciples and get the motive right. 

5.     Being Gentle like a Mother caring for her little one: vs 7 – 8

This is a beautiful picture of a disciple and the disciple maker, the picture of a nursing mother caring for her child, apostle Paul says that’s how we cared for the believers. The reason being, motivated by love for them. He says we were happy to share not only the good news, but even our own very lives. vs 8. The disciples are not things to be used for our agendas and then thrown off, they are not there to run our programs or organize our events and they are not mere numbers to be ticked off in the number crunching games that happens in most missions. They are people created in the image of God. They are precious in the sight of God, Jesus laid down His life for them on the cross. Do we really care for each one of them? Do we truly love them so much that we are willing to happily share our very lives with them? At one point apostle Paul declares in vs 20, “Truly you are our Glory and our Joy” what an amazing perspective to have as we make disciples.

6.     Be a worthy model to imitate:

Apostle Paul was very confident in saying that they lived among the Thessalonians as

holy, righteous and blameless people. They toiled hard and never became a burden to

any one of them. 1 Thess 2: 9-10. For a new believer from another faith the only model

that he or she will see is another Christian and we as disciple makers how much careful

we must be in presenting ourselves as good models of Christ for them to imitate.

Apostle Paul could boldly make that statement, “imitate me as I imitate Christ” but can

we confidently say that? I am not sure, we are not perfect people, but we are certainly

growing and we can always strive to be a good model for our disciples to imitate.

7.     Equip and encourage them to multiply:    

The believer’s in Thessalonica became an example to others in Macedonia and southern Greece and the Lords teaching spread from them to everywhere. 1 Thess 1: 7-9. They impacted many other people far and wide, their transformation story became the talk of the town in other places. Our disciple’s need to be equipped and empowered to share their story of life change and the good news to others, they need to multiply into the lives of many others around them. The Lords teaching needs to go out from them and touch and transform lives around them.

8.     Be a loving father :

Apostle Paul says we dealt with each one of you as a father deals with his own

children, encouraging, comforting and urging you to live lives worthy of God. vs 11

12. As disciple makers one of our key role is to encourage and comfort, we need to

continuously urge them to live holy lives. As they face the ups and downs in their

spiritual journey we need to go alongside and help them walk through and come out

victorious. In fact Apostle Paul later says that he is longing to see them and wanted to

visit them badly. What a powerful picture of a disciple maker- as a loving father who

deals with his own children – it is not easy to forget that one.

These eight simple principles of disciple making can truly transform the way we make

disciples, I am sure that this will help us see disciples in a totally new perspective that

God wants us to see and invest deeply in their lives so that they will be equipped for

every good work and that they will grow and mature to the stature of Jesus Christ.  It is

only apt to conclude in the words of Apostle Paul in chapter 2: 19&20, “You are our

hope, our joy, and the crown we will take pride in when our lord Jesus Christ comes,

truly you are our glory and our Joy”