Making Disciples In America: The Line in the Sand?

The reality is, the time for drawing a spiritual line in the sand when it comes to disciple making has passed us by. As Christ followers working to lead a generation to faith in Jesus Christ, we are now fighting as spiritual insurgents in a war of moral and spiritual satanic occupation in the USA. The saying, so goes the churches, so goes the culture is true. But so go the pastoral leadership, so go the churches. And ultimately, so goes Biblical education, so goes the leadership...

The fact is, the collective church (defined as millions of believers gathered into thousands of churches led by their pastoral leadership under the lordship of Jesus Christ) has lost its edge on influencing the culture. In that light, most would agree that we must shift from program driven ministries to people and relationship driven ministries that bring about Romans 12:2 life change. In other words, spend time and resources equipping believers in the church to not just share their faith, but to make disciples (the two should go hand in hand). This is a long and arduous process, on that many youth pastors (and pastors) really don’t know how to undertake.

Here is the cold, hard reality. One day, baring Jesus’ return, we will all die; period. At that point, each of us will stand before Jesus and give personal account for our lives. When Jesus asks me to show Him what I did with my talents (Matthew 25), I don’t want to be in the position of having much to say but little to show. Why would I want to present a gift to my King of a multitude of lukewarm church members that Jesus has already promised He would spew out of His mouth anyway?!?!? We are commanded to MAKE DISCIPLES; NOT CONVERTS. How many Christian leaders will stand before Jesus and present to him thousands or millions of lukewarm "converts" who are not worthy of the Kingdom and will ultimately, regardless of their church membership status, spend eternity in Hell?!?!?

I think we can already see a picture of this dreadful day of Judgement in our churces today. Look closely at how many students are falling away from Christ withing two years of high school graduation. Some place that number as high as 70-80 percent. These kids started out on the journey but somehow lost their way when they left the fold. Kids, I would guess, who had strong feeling of love for the Lord but no practical training on how to walk with Jesus for a lifetime.

This is the state of the American Church today; whether observing legacy churches or the emergent church movement; the numbers are nearly equal across the board. That’s why I believe that the vast majority of churches, and by default their leaders, are going to be dismayed and saddened at the Judgment.

We have some serious choices to make in the near future. The question is, what will the result of those choices be? For ourselves? For the church? For the culture? For Christ?