In this five-part series from Justin Gravitt, author of The Foundation of a Disciplemaking Culture, you’ll learn why a disciplemaking culture is needed now. This first post explains the meaning of “a disciplemaking culture” and the leadership opportunity in creating and sustaining one.
“A disciplemaking culture? What is that?” No one should be surprised at the confusion this phrase causes. Its two main concepts, disciplemaking and culture, are famously difficult to pin down. Since we already chased down a robust definition of disciplemaking, let’s tackle what’s meant by culture, and then clarify what we mean by disciplemaking culture.
What is Culture?
Discussing culture can feel a bit like hosting a late-night infomercial—“But wait, there’s more!” Culture saturates everything. It influences the thoughts people think, the decisions they make, and the directions they resist. I’m not suggesting culture is all powerful, but it is inescapable. When humans come together, there is no such thing as a cultural vacuum. We carry culture with us. When we connect, we cannot not create culture.
As all-encompassing as culture is, not one of the 727,969 words in the New International Version is the word culture. At the same time, there’s not a single verse in Scripture that isn’t dripping with culture. Not. One. Culture is a population’s way of life. It includes the shared language, beliefs, values, stories, history, practice, and habits of a people. It’s what most of the people believe,
think, and do most of the time. It forms the (mostly invisible) operating system for that population.
Culture is the canvas upon which we paint. It’s the operating system that guides our lives. It’s the water in which we swim and the fabric from which we sew. Think these statements are hyperbolic? Consider the impact the dominant religion of a place has on its inhabitants. In Thailand, where Buddhism is by far the dominant religion, believing that each person has many lives is common. In America, where Christianity continues to dominate religious life, the normal belief is that we each have one life. People in these countries typically carry this belief regardless of whether they follow the rest of the religion.
Consider the impact that one belief might have on how a person engages their life. What about the difference in living in a place where relationships and fun are more important than hard work and accomplishment? Wouldn’t that deeply mark how a person engages his life and work? How he see himself and others?
Culture is built from the collective values and beliefs of a group. It takes into account their stories and history, their normal behavior and practices, their preferred modes of communication and impartation of the culture’s beliefs and values—all these things and more. Culture is about what is real right now and what is going to be real in the future.
Disciplemaking Cultures Reflect Jesus
Disciplemaking cultures make disciples who look and act like Jesus. A disciplemaking culture transforms from the inside out. When Jesus is our model, our message, and our method, then people start trying to act like Jesus!
Healthy disciplemaking cultures transform individuals who are far from a leader’s direct input. It happens just like Mark 4:27–29 describes:
Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.
Jesus’ aim wasn’t to simply save a few, train them, and protect them from the world. It wasn’t to gather thousands of followers, connect them to each other, and then serve them while they did good deeds in the world. No, His goals were to (1) invest in a few, train them, and then launch them into the world; (read Luke 19:10) (2) develop a culture among the Twelve that was marked so deeply by surrender and mission that it would transform everything it touched; and (3) build a movement of disciplemakers who would change the world from then until eternity. And to the amazement of historians and social scientists, His methods worked! A disciplemaking culture should be the goal within every local church and ministry because it was Jesus’ goal. In a disciplemaking culture people are influenced toward Jesus
automatically, because a disciplemaking culture spins outward and infects everything by propelling disciplemakers into every crevice of society—neighborhoods, workplaces, and associations, even crossing national boundaries.
This isn’t hype. Jesus and His disciples proved it.
Church history is full of cultures that have had some or all the ingredients of a disciplemaking culture in their DNA. Unfortunately, many of these cultures have faded away, while others have fallen victim to distraction, drift, neglect, and the tyranny of the urgent. We need to get back to the ways of Jesus, making disciplemakers and building cultures of disciplemaking that are centered on His example.
There is no greater leadership opportunity than culture building. In fact, the primary gift of leaders is the culture they cultivate and eventually pass on. If you believe that, then the need to be intentional in culture building is as great as the need to be intentional in disciplemaking. After all, building a disciplemaking culture starts with making disciples. Can you imagine the difference a disciplemaking culture would make in your church, ministry, women’s group, or small group? Can you envision the ripples such a culture could make? I trust you can. And I believe that you are hungry to build such a culture.
Justin G. Gravitt
Justin G. Gravitt has been on staff with The Navigators since 2000, where he has planted or grown disciplemaking ministries on multiple college campuses, overseas, and most recently has helped churches across the United States grow intentional disciplemaking cultures. He and his family live in Dayton, OH.