Before graduating from seminary in May 2001, one of the last classes I completed was a three credit independent study on evangelism. I learned many valuable things from that study which I implement in my ministry to this very day. It became very clear to me that Jesus called his followers to “make disciples” and that making disciples is the right thing for his followers to do. Then, I read James 4:17 which states, “Whoever knows the right thing to do and doesn’t do it is sinning.” This verse convicted me that not only are we sinning if we are taking illegal drugs, getting drunk, or having sex outside of marriage, but also if we are not actively making disciples. I believe there are two parts to the process of making disciples. First, evangelism which includes leading people to Jesus. And second, teaching new believers to obey all that Jesus taught.
Around this time, I perceived in my spirit that I was spending all my time around other believers. My wife is a believer; my family members are believers; I was actively involved in a Christian church with believers; I was attending a seminary with believers, etc. I perceived from the Lord that I had no significant interaction with lost people.
The Lord then took me back to a memory from my youth. I grew up in Pennsylvania but traveled to Indiana with my family regularly to visit my maternal grandparents and other relatives. On several occasions while visiting, my maternal grandfather would take us to a U-pick blueberry patch. The first time we did this, we were told that the cashier would weigh the buckets of blueberries that we picked and charged us per pound, but they would not weigh us, so we were permitted to eat as many blueberries as we wanted while we were picking. This was sweet music to the ears of a high school boy. An employee would always tell us where we should go to begin picking, and it was always at a location that was a long walking distance from the store. In my excitement as we were walking, I would pick berries right away and eat them on the way. I soon realized that there weren’t many berries on those bushes because they had already been picked over.
Fast forward back to the time when the Lord brought this memory to my mind. He showed me that if I spend all my time in fields that have already been picked over or harvested, I won’t be able to harvest much. He showed me that I was living every moment of my daily life in “fields” with other Christians and not with lost people. I received the very clear message from the Lord that if I wanted to reach the lost in order to make disciples, I had to spend time communicating with and getting to know lost people. This may seem intuitively obvious to the reader, but for any Christians who are like me, we grew up in somewhat of a Christian bubble and perhaps unknowingly isolated ourselves by spending a huge majority of our time interacting with other believers.
Jesus went to the seashore which was the place of employment for Peter, James, and John who were fishermen. He went to the tax office and found Matthew Levi the tax collector. He went to Levi’s home and met other tax collectors and sinners there and ate with them. After meeting Zacchaeus, he went to his home to be “the guest of a sinner” (Luke 19:7).
In the process of making disciples, we must begin to pray to God for wisdom and direction on where to go to reach lost people. Then we can begin to interact with them. As we get to know them, we can pray and trust the Lord to open doors of opportunity to ask them questions about where they are spiritually and to share spiritual insight with them.