Transforming Discipleship [antikvár]

Introduction A Story of Transformation I admit I stumbled onto a discovery, yet it has become one of the most amazing aha?, of my pastoral ministry. This discovery M^as the result of an experiment. I had written a first draft of a discipleship curriculum, which turned into the final project for my doctor of ministry degree.^ The focus of the project was to use this curriculum in the local church and then to evaluate its effectiveness. Up to this point in my ministry I had equated making disciples with a one-to-one relationship. After all, wasn't the Paul-Timothy model the definition of discipling? The point was to grow a disciple who would make a disciple, and so on. My adviser in the doctoral program suggested that I consider a variety of contexts in which I could test the curriculum and then track the varied dynamics of a discipling relationship. One of the options I chose was to invite two other people to join me on the journey to maturity in Christ. I did not anticipate the potency that would be unleashed in what I have come to call a microgroup (a group of three or four). It would forever change my understanding of the means the Holy Spirit uses to transform people into Christ's image. Eric's Story of Transformation To illustrate the power of microgroups, let me tell the story of Eric's transformation. Eric was one of my first two recruits on this discipleship adventure. He had approached me stating his interest in a mentoring relationship. In retrospect Eric's spiritual ambivalence at the time may