Multiplication - Member Devo
“The Church is multiplying and global. We exist for the glory of God and to multiply his image bearers throughout the 7 billion in this world. We exist to make disciples who make disciples who pass the message of Jesus onto the next context and the next generation. We are a church that plants churches”.
Watch the Video Letter on Multiplication
Read Acts 2: 42-47, Genesis 12:1-4, Acts: 1:8, Genesis 1:28, Matthew 28:19-20
My husband and I live in a tiny back house with very little space. However, what we did manage to fit in our outdoor patio, is a table that seats twelve people. While it is just the two of us (for now), we wanted to create a space to share meals and ultimately, life with other people. Why is the table important? Because discipleship happens over the regular everyday parts of life, like eating meals.
In Acts 2 you see the church (the family), coming together to learn, fellowship, eat together, and pray. They shared supplies and took care of one another in their homes, in the normal everyday part of life. The result? Multiplication, God added to their numbers. We are called to make disciples of Jesus Christ in all of life (Matthew 28:12-19). In fact, this is not a new calling to God’s people. In Genesis 12, God calls Abraham to go to his people, the land of his family, in doing this God would bless Abraham. So that Abraham can be a blessing to others. Through Abraham, the blessing of God was multiplied throughout history (V3). Starting with creation (Genesis 1:28) God gave Adam the command to be fruitful and multiply, to fill and subdue the earth.
You see family, multiplication is your calling. In the last devotional, we read that our identity is that of a family, but not just any family, you are a part of God’s family. This is not an analogy but an actual family and your very identity. This means that you are now a part of the family business. What is the family business? To make “disciples who make disciples who pass the message of Jesus onto the next context and the next generation.”
Making disciples is not the job of the pastors, the missional community leaders, worship team, kids teams, or church staff. This calling is for all of us, in of life, to all the world. Jeff Vanderstelt in a book called Saturate put it like this, “The mission of Jesus is yours to participate in. It has always been God’s intention to choose normal, everyday people and to show his amazing power and glory through them.” The question is how are you making disciples in the everyday part of life? How do you leave margin in your life for multiplication? It requires you to break down the walls of your comfort to disciples.
Multiplication can be difficult and time-consuming. You might be wondering, why you ought to create margin and time in your life in the regular parts of life and can be difficult and busy. You see the blessing that God promised to Abraham in Genesis 12, the blessing that would bless all the families of the earth? That blessing is Jesus. Jesus Christ who died for our sins while we were still sinners, to redeem us and not only forgive us of those sins but brought us into his very family. This is why we are called to make disciples, because Jesus has redeemed you and he wants to use you, right where you are at, to redeem other people and bring them into his family as well.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
How can you bring someone along in your grocery trips, meal times, house chorus, to disciple them to Jesus? Some of the most impactful moments for me happened in the Target aisles, shopping with someone who discipled me.
In what ways do you need to create margin in your life to allow for multiplication?
How can you bring someone in the ministry and space you are already involved in?