Written by: gfesadmin on November 8, 2012

I woke up this morning at 3:45 a.m. and knew that I would not fall back to sleep.  This is not uncommon for me.  Many have the same experience after passing age 60, I am 63.  The upside is that I am awake when the house is very quiet and I can read and write uninterrupted which is what I have been doing for the past 5 hours.  During this time I have written a number of emails to people in Eastern Europe with whom I am doing some discipleship.  I am so thankful for email, messaging, facebook, skype, etc.  But, I look forward to those ministry trips when I can engage personally and relationally.  Media fills some gaps, but does it also create crutches?

To the extent that discipleship includes some transfer of information, or content, the development and advance of media has certainly helped discipleship.  Briggs noted the comment by Martin Luther about the printing press as “God’s highest gift of grace” (pg. 24).  Printing good material for easy distribution certainly helps discipleship and providing the Bible to all believers was certainly an aim of the reformers (pg. 63).  

I submit that the advance of print media has contributed to the demise of obedience based discipleship and to the rise of rationally based discipleship.  This advance ran parallel to Enlightenment ideas which where circulated by books and periodicals with amazing speed.  There is now little information that is not easily available to the public.  Armed with numerous translations of Scripture, commentaries, and other printed and audio media, a believer is lulled into thinking that discipleship is mostly the intellectual (rational) cataloguing of spiritual content.  

This has largely effected the North American Church and was greatly enhanced by the Sunday School movement of the 18th century.  Even to this day, many churches offer “classes” which are advertised in their bulletins as being “discipleship” opportunities.  Christian book stores offer many “how to” discipleship books divided up into convenient 13 chapters that fit nicely into a 3 month quarter of lessons.  This dynamic has contributed to the demise of obedience based discipleship which relies upon relationships and community.  

Someone once said that there is no spiritual growth apart from accountability.  If that is true, then discipleship that is rooted in relationships where obedience is readily observed is critical to the advance of the Kingdom.  The advance of non-personal media has certainly contributed to the discipleship enterprise.  But, it must not totally replace the personal and relational dynamics that contribute to obedience and ultimately to the maturation process we call “discipleship.”  

I’m off to meet with a pastor with whom I have a mentoring relationship.  We confirmed our meeting and talking points by sending text messages and email.  I resourced him by email with attachments.  We talked by phone yesterday.  But, today we meet, face to face.  I get to look into his eyes during difficult questions.  I watch for how he responds to humor and to accountability.  I get to encourage him personally.  

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