Why You Should Know How to Share the Gospel and Disciple Others

Several years ago I had a friend who I started talking to about discipleship. I looked him in the eye and asked him, “If you lead someone to Jesus today, would you know how to help that person grow in the Lord?” A kind of glazed look came over my friend’s face as he realized that he really didn’t know what would come next if he lead someone to Christ.

My friend isn’t alone. In fact, my experience in Christianity in the West tells me that very few people know how to share Christ and fewer know how to disciple those they lead to Christ. This hinders the spread of the Gospel.

Before we go too far, I feel like it’s important to say that I understand not every Christian is going to be an evangelist. I don’t primarily consider myself an evangelist and many of the people I know who share the gospel regularly aren’t evangelists either. But every believer should have a basic understanding of how to share the gospel and disciple new believers. This is part of what Paul means when he says that “we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,” (Ephesians 4:15). Every believer is called to be a witness and a disciple (and therefore a disciple maker), but not every believer is called to be an evangelist. 

You are called not just to be a Christian and pursue your calling, but regardless of your calling to lead people to Christ along the way. And as you lead them to Christ, you will need to baptize them and instruct them in following Jesus. Don’t settle for anything less than that.

If you are an elder or teacher in the body of Christ, make sure that those around you can articulate the gospel and know how to respond when someone says yes to it. This can make the difference between leading one person to Christ and many more people coming to Christ through the testimony of a new brother or sister.

For those of you who don’t know how to share the Gospel with those around you, here is a clear, simple, reproducible way to share it that we’ve used many times with those we know:

Many times, though, leading people to Christ is the easy part. Teaching them to obey the Risen Christ and helping them to lay aside their old lifestyle is much harder.  So next week, we’ll look at a process we’ve used here to raise up disciples.

Until then, what do you think is the main difficulty you have in sharing the gospel and discipling new believers? Let me know in the comment section.

Photo Credit: The Bible by Chris Yarzab