The Mission of the Church - Equip Disciples

In a previous post, I mentioned that Village Seven's mission is:

To make, equip and deploy disciples who live out and proclaim the gospel through word and deed in Colorado Springs, the West and the World.

In this statement, we define "make disciples" as leading people from unbelief to belief in the power of the Holy Spirit. We define an equipped disciple as one who is prepared to engage with his heart, head, and hands in God's mission (for more on what it means to be an Equipped Disciple, see this post).  To deploy disciples means to help people actually engage in God's mission.

In an earlier post, I outlined how we seek to make disciples. Here is our strategy to equip disciples.

1)  Worshipping

a)    Worship that is Gospel-Centric shapes the head, engages the heart and challenges God’s people to God-glorifying life and deeds. 

2.  Shepherding

a)   The primary venue for shepherding is through Sunday morning communities with the implementation of the Shepherding Plan approved by the Session. This may be supplemented by small groups, as necessary.

b)    Begin Life-on-Life Discipleship program with the aim of equipping disciples according to the definition in this document.

c)   Develop systems and structures to help new people, and especially new members, connect with a Sunday morning community.

 

3.  Teaching

The purpose of teaching is to equip disciples to live in step with the truth of the gospel with their hearts, heads, and hands for the glory of God.

a)    Community Leaders, Elders and Teachers must understand the definition of an equipped disciple and must give an account for how their teaching/shepherding addresses the entire definition of an equipped disciple.

b)   Community Teachers will state in their course objective the primary focus of equipping disciples for all areas of life, use class interaction while developing clear applications on equipping, look for ways of telling stories of application that present models of disciples, need to have a defined next step.

c)    Village Seven Elders and teachers will equip our people to engage the un-churched where they live, work, and play by demonstrating through personal story word and deed ministry, providing quarterly evangelism training, incorporating evangelism training in the Life-on-Life Discipleship, and equipping people to invest and invite in their neighbors.

d)   The Inquirers’ Class will be redesigned so that it explains the gospel, explains what it means to live out of the gospel, introduces them to V7PC and Presbyterianism. It also connects people to the shepherding and equipping ministries of the church. The Inquirers’ Class will include a visit to a community. Elders and community leaders will be informed that they are visiting the community so that they can follow up with them after their visit.

e)    Offer ‘Disciple Making’ classes, seminars, and conferences for all members that address key discipleship topics that we believe are important for all church members.  These ‘Disciple Making’ classes will be designed to help new and seasoned members of Village Seven to live in step with the truth of the gospel with Heart, Head, and Hands using their time, talents and treasure.

f)     Create a Leadership University that is designed to equip and train the leaders needed to accomplish this mission. This Leadership University will include training for church officers, ministry leaders, shepherds, disciplers, and those interested in vocational ministry.