THE BIBLICAL BASIS
We have noted that making disciples is essentially
helping people to be transformed and conformed to the
image of the Lord Jesus Christ and biblically, this is in
line with God’s desire.
(A) GOD’S ETERNAL PURPOSE
“For those God foreknew he also predestined to be
conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might
be the firstborn among many brothers.”
Romans 8:29
Here it is clear that Christ-likeness is the eternal
predestination purpose of God for believers. Being
disciples and making disciples is therefore in the main
flow of God’s eternal purpose for His people. Certainly,
God’s children cannot just be satisfied with being
converted and remaining as babes in Christ. The church
cannot condone a situation where believers remain
stagnant in their spiritual formation and become like
members belonging to a social club.
(B) GOD’S WORKING THROUGH HIS SPIRIT
“And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the
Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his
likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes
from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”
2 Corinthians 3:18
The scriptures confirm the work of the Holy Spirit in
the transformation of believers into the likeness of the
Lord Jesus. This takes place through a face-to-face
encounter with the glory or personal presence of the
Lord. How does this happen? The believers must make
themselves available to encounter the presence of the
Lord personally and corporately, and God has given the
disciplines of grace to facilitate this. The disciplines of
grace include prayer, the reading and studying of God’s
word, meditation, worship (personally and corporately)
and the sacraments (including the communion at the
table and baptism).
It is important to realize that God seeks a people for
Himself; a bride for the bridegroom Jesus; a temple
made up of living stones (believers); a spiritual body
with Jesus as the head and a family with the Lord Jesus
as the firstborn. It is not individualism that God seeks;
God is seeking to transform a people for Himself, a
people who would truly reflect and declare His glory.
Spiritual formation and transformation take place in
the context of a healthy church, brought about by the
ministry of the Holy Spirit as God’s people make
themselves available to encounter Him in the disciplines
of grace. This is part and parcel of the process of making
disciples. As God’s people become more conformed to
the image of the Son, they will begin to love what the
Lord loves and hate what God hates. Victory over sin
and a holy life becomes more and more a reality and less
and less a struggle as Christ is formed in us.
(C) BELIEVERS’ HOPE AND PURSUIT
“Dear friends, now we are children of God, and
what we will be has not yet been made known. But
we know that when he appears, we shall be like
him, for we shall see him as He is. Everyone who
has this hope purifies himself, just as he is pure.”
1 John 3:2-3
We see this hope that we will be like the Lord
Jesus when He appears. And certainly, this hope and the
pursuit of purity have very much to do with spiritual
formation and disciple-making. The eternal
predestination purpose of God for believers to be
conformed to the likeness of His son will be perfected
and confirmed at the second coming of the Lord Jesus. In
the meanwhile, believers who perceive this purpose of
God and this hope in Him have a strong motivation to
purify themselves in the process of discipleship and to
make themselves ready for this glory that is to come. The
process of transformation begins here and now in Christ,
for us as God’s children, born again as citizens of
heaven, with the potential to grow until Christ is truly
formed in us.
D) GOD’S CALL TO HIS PEOPLE
Besides the Apostle Paul and the Apostle John, the
Apostle Peter also had much to say about God’s call to
believers to be conformed to the image of His son in the
process of disciple-making.
“But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy
in all you do, for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I
am holy.”
1 Peter 2:15-16
“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a
holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you
may declare the praises of him who called you out
of darkness into his wonderful light.”
1 Peter 2:9
Take note of the descriptions: ‘chosen people’,
‘royal priesthood’, ‘holy nation’, ‘a people belonging to
God’. Believers are collectively chosen to belong to
God, to be holy, to be priests to God and in that light and
capacity, we are to declare God’s praises. We are to
share the gospel and to proclaim the love and mercy of
God in the Great Commission, not just by our words, but
also in our lives by reflecting His character and His glory
as light in a world of darkness and as salt of the earth.
The messenger must look like the Christ he proclaims,
and resemble what he is talking about in the sharing of the gospel.
He does it in complete reliance on God and His
Spirit and he declares a righteousness not of his own but
a righteousness given to all those who would believe and
receive the Lord Jesus as Savior and Lord, in genuine
repentance. It is a righteousness, beginning with
justification, worked out through sanctification and
spiritual formation here on earth and perfected and
confirmed when the Lord Jesus comes again.