Rad GC -- Baptizing

In Radical, David Platt analyzes the Great Commission for its implications with regard to modern missions.  Today, we consider his understanding of the importance of "baptizing" in the way missions should be done.  Although he sees baptism as "the clear, public, symbolic picture of the new life we have in Christ," he puts more emphasis on how baptism "pictures our identification with one another in the church."  He writes, "Baptism unites us as brothers and sisters who share the life of Christ with one another."  The part baptism plays in disciple making is that new believers are brought into the body of Christ and see the life of Christ in action.  As they see the love of Christ shared before their eyes, they absorb this new way of life and make it their own.  Christianity is more caught than taught.

This lesson repeats the emphasis of yesterday.  The relational element is crucial.  Jesus ate, slept, traveled, worked, and laughed with twelve men every day for at least three years.  They saw not only His actions, but also His reactions.  They remembered His words and reproduced His ways.  If Jesus the Master Teacher made disciples this way, what makes us think we can achieve the same results with much less investment?  A few classes meeting a couple of hours a week won't approach the level of commitment and results that are needed.  People need a model.  The old saying goes, "What you do speaks so loud that I can't hear what you say."  Our children do what we show them, not what we tell them.

When Avery Willis taught the principles of discipleship in MasterLife, he demonstrated the power of multiplication in the number of disciples that could be made by doubling every year.  Two becomes four, four becomes eight, and so on until it becomes possible to disciple the population of the entire world in 33 years.  As he said, "Anyone can count the number of apples on an apple tree, but no one can count the number of apple trees in an apple."  But he also showed what happens when our disciple-making is half-hearted.  One-half doubled becomes one-fourth, one-fourth becomes one-eighth, and so on with continuing decline in each succeeding iteration.

I heard an evangelist say once that he liked to be around new Christians because their zeal renewed him.  He also said, "Most new believers have to backslide for six months before they can fit in to the average church."

What kind of environment do our churches offer new believers?  Let us pray that as they are baptized and brought into the body that they will find all they need to attain "the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Ephesians 4:13).  Let's pray that they will see modeled in us a passion to take the gospel to the nations.