{"id":9900,"date":"2023-05-23T12:00:05","date_gmt":"2023-05-23T17:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/?p=9900"},"modified":"2023-04-19T14:11:00","modified_gmt":"2023-04-19T19:11:00","slug":"disciples-make-disciples","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/2023\/05\/23\/disciples-make-disciples\/","title":{"rendered":"Disciples Make Disciples"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cDid that kid just do a backflip off the top of a ladder?\u201d That was one of the first thoughts I remember having about Jon. It wasn\u2019t exactly what a youth pastor wants to see on a Wednesday night but, at the same time, I\u2019ll admit it was kind of awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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Jon had come to our youth ministry with some of his friends. He didn\u2019t believe in Jesus and claimed to be an atheist. He came for the more social aspects of our youth services. We were a pretty fun group. There were people he knew and could relate to. Jon had a great sense of humor and we connected on a few things we had in common. I enjoyed spending time with him and the guys he hung out with. Week after week I\u2019d see Jon come into our service, have a great time, stand for worship, hear a sermon, and when it was that altar call moment - nothing. Didn\u2019t move an inch. Maybe I wasn\u2019t a good enough preacher. Maybe that\u2019s still true. Every week I prayed for Jon before the service and it seemed like every week was the same result.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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Jump forward a little and it\u2019s summertime now and we\u2019re preparing to take a small group of young people to YouthQuest. I don\u2019t remember all the details around it but just a few weeks out from the trip, someone dropped out leaving a fully funded spot out there for someone to use. I had to choose. I could have picked from handfuls of kids that were in our youth group that already knew Jesus but, to me, the choice was clear. Jon was going to YouthQuest and he didn\u2019t even believe in Jesus - yet. I asked him if he wanted to go and have some fun. He said \u201cSure\u201d because he liked the group of young people that we were taking on the trip. For weeks leading up to YouthQuest, I prayed for Jon and it was at that YouthQuest that Jon met Jesus, and his life was transformed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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Hard to believe that story happened almost 20 years ago. Every time I think about it I am reminded of this story from Luke 5.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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\u201cOne day while Jesus was teaching, some Pharisees and teachers of religious law were sitting nearby. (It seemed that these men showed up from every village in all Galilee and Judea, as well as from Jerusalem.) And the Lord\u2019s healing power was strong with Jesus. Some men came carrying a paralyzed man on a sleeping mat. They tried to take him inside to Jesus, but they couldn\u2019t reach him because of the crowd. So they went up to the roof and took off some tiles. Then they lowered the sick man on his mat down into the crowd, right in front of Jesus. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the man, \u201cYoung man, your sins are forgiven.\u201d <\/span>Luke 5:17-20 NLT<\/span><\/p>\n

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An important part of the discipleship journey is coming to the place where we understand the responsibility of carrying others to Jesus. It\u2019s been said that \u201cDisciples make disciples, who make disciples, who makes disciples\u2026..\u201d I think an important part of that is realizing that, just like the men who carried their friend to Jesus, we may have to pick a friend up to get them into Jesus\u2019 presence. It\u2019ll be inconvenient. It\u2019ll be hard. You may have to tear the roof off someone\u2019s house, but it\u2019s worth it. Notice what Jesus\u2019 response was. He saw THEIR faith - not the young man\u2019s faith. The act of faith by getting into a discipleship relationship with someone who doesn\u2019t know Jesus yet might seem backward. That\u2019s why it\u2019s an act of faith. There was a group of us all walking together through life. Some knew Jesus well, and some were just starting the journey, Jon wasn\u2019t left out because he didn\u2019t believe, he came to believe because he could belong. As a disciple, who is it that you need to carry to Jesus in faith?<\/span><\/p>\n

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Bishop Scott Hampton currently serves as the Conference Superintendent of the Great Plains Conference of the IPHC. He is also privileged to serve on the IPHC Council of Bishops, Discipleship Ministries Council ,and the Southwestern Christian University Board of Trustees. Scott, his wife Heather, and their children (Shanna, Karsyn, and Paxton along with granddaughter Kinsley) live in Amarillo, TX area.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"excerpt","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":9901,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","filesize_raw":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,1,171],"tags":[1518,1404,1514,16,1031,1521,1471,1460,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-9900","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-discipleship-ministries","8":"category-general","9":"category-leadership-2","10":"tag-1518","11":"tag-article","12":"tag-disciple","13":"tag-discipleship","14":"tag-discipleship-ministries","15":"tag-journey","16":"tag-q2","17":"tag-scott-hampton","18":"tag-youthquest","19":"entry"},"title_es":"","content_es":"","author_name":"Scott Hampton","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2023\/04\/SHampton.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4T9u2-2zG","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iphc.org\/discipleship\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}