Evangelism or discipleship we need both and it’s a real problem. The Lord has been working on me for the past five years. He has me attached to an aggressive special forces evangelistic church. I’ve had a hard time with it. Because they have a clear call and they are anointed in that direction.

But I come from the discipleship camp. My current church does not do any discipleship, as I understand it. It’s been interesting to see that my skills which are focused on walking in the Spirit, understanding scripture, and working under the anointing in your daily life are seen of no value to them.

My goal is to teach people how to develop a personal relationship with Jesus, how to live in a constant state of holiness, how to allow the Holy Spirit work in and through us in everyday living. I focus a lot on things like praying without ceasing as an ongoing lifestyle. How do you make that work better in your life, and how to use that to minister to those you live with, work with, and fellowship with. These things have no place in this church.

As I was pondering this stuff this morning at church [an evangelical church online] the Lord showed me some stuff. Pastor Gary was teaching on Romans 14 about the church dealing with the differences within the churches. I flashed on how I constantly feel under condemnation in Evangelical churches. It’s such a basic difference that I rarely find anyone who can even discuss it.

How about this? In the lists of of the Lord’s gifts in Ephesian four, only one of them is focused on evangelism. “And his gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, and teachers, ¹² to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ,” EPHESIANS 4: 1-2 RSV

Here’s the way I teach it: God has it set up so that He calls a person and sends them out to start a church (or whatever). That’s an apostle. The apostle has the vision and calling. But an apostle needs a person who hears clearly from the Lord to give him or her direct input from God about how to implement the call. That’s the ministry of a prophet.

Once the apostle and prophet have the ministry up and running they need people to join them in the work. To get fresh bodies you need an evangelist who preaches the Gospel and introduces people to Jesus. This describes many evangelical churches.

What they end up with is a bunch of converts who have no idea how to fit themselves into their place in the Kingdom of God. For that they need pastors and teachers. A pastor is a shepherd who cares for the sheep. In our culture, we call these people counselors and healers. But I’m at the tail end of all this as one who is called to be a teacher. What’s the teacher’s job? To explain to the rest of the bozos how this all works.

Evangelism or discipleship, we need both and it’s a real problem.

This difference is so strong, that there is no place for me to work in the evangelistic church I attend. That’s very sad. The sheep have almost no help in everyday living. The impetus for this post showed up when the Lord led me to check out the great commission and Mark’s final instructions. I found what I was looking for and I was surprised at how strong the differences are.

Mark’s vision is strongly evangelistic: ¹⁵ He said to them, “Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.¹⁶ He who believes and is baptized will be saved. But he who does not believe will be condemned. There is not even a hint of discipleship. There’s no place for people like me there.

The Great Commission is all about discipleship: ¹⁸ And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.” Preaching is not mentioned. Making disciples and teaching them is the vision here.

We need all five of the leadership gifts

Evangelism or discipleship? We need both and all five of the gifts which Jesus gives to the church leadership are required. If your group is missing any of them, you need to begin praying for the rest of them—people who can fill things out so the body can be edified.