Greg Ogden’s Personal Disciplemaking Journey

As I was entering into my second year of college, I received a phone call that would change my life. On the other end of the call was Don, a seminary student who was leading an outreach to middle school students (ages 12-14). About 130 students came regularly to what Don called Campus Club.

He wanted to know,

“Greg, would you be on a team of your fellow college students to minister to 130 bundles of energy on Wednesday nights?”

Responding to God's call

I did not hesitate. I said “yes” immediately.

Each Wednesday night I got a group of 7^th grade boys. It was evident to me that I had not received any help in growing my faith at that age, so perhaps I could be of some assistance to them. New believers need a supportive community to build their identity in Christ.

"Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in Him. For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life."
John 3:14-16

Don would challenge us to not only come on Wednesdays for the weekly program, but to meet the kids on their turf at other times. I remember being outside their schools in my red VW bug picking up kids to play basketball or to go to their homes to meet their parents.

But then I would get a bonus. Don would call up periodically to get together. Often the location was a local park bench or tennis court. I have vivid recollections sitting side by side with Don on a bench next to the tennis court after our tennis match.

Don would open his Bible and share with me Scriptures that were impacting his life. He did not just read a text and leave it at that. He would open his heart and show the significance of this truth in his life at the time. Sometimes that meant admitting that the Scripture revealed things he needed to change.

Don became my first model of disciplemaking. The implicit message I received was, if you are going to impact others, you have to go deep, be open and transparent, and spend consistent time together.

What I took from my experience, and perhaps the prevailing models of the day, was that discipling was a one-to-one relationship. The hope was that spending time together with one other person covering foundational topics, that a chain of disciplemaking would develop from that one person.

Paradigm Shift

Thus for years my disciplemaking paradigm, the very definition of it, was a one-to-one relationship. In these relationships with men (men with men; women with women), I was putting together a variety of content: core theology like John Stott’s Basic Christianity; how to study the Bible and pray; how to apply our faith to the workplace; what does it mean to be a Christian husband and father, etc.

I remember scrambling to pull together material on a just-in-time basis. Yes, we would get close and grow deep, but I had no idea how to help these men to disciple others. I cannot think of one person who ever adopted a lifestyle of investment in others in my one-to-one disciplemaking relationships.

I would then have what I call "two epiphanies" (God encounters) that would change forever the way I understood intentional, relational disciplemaking. My frustration was mounting because of the lack of multiplication.

Burst of energy births Discipleship Essentials

 The first epiphany occurred late one afternoon as I was doing my usual jog around a high school track. I enjoyed these times, because I just set my mind adrift. Exercise was a way to set aside the stresses of the day and be renewed physically, emotionally, and spiritually. This particular day my mind seemed to have shifted into neutral. Then suddenly, without warning, though not consciously thinking about discipling, I had what I have described as an arrow from God pass through by body.

In a flash, laid out in my mind’s eye, was the format of what many years later would become Discipleship Essentials. Each chapter would consist of 4 parts:

1. The cover page of the chapter would be the core truth, theme or the big idea that would be the central theme of that lesson. It would be in a question-answer format of a catechism which I would author.
2. This was followed by a memory verse(s) with interactive questions that amplified the core truth.
3. The third section would be a little longer biblical text called an “Inductive Bible Study” which also which rooted the Core Truth in Scripture.
4. The fourth part would be a reading which I would write that was a contemporary discussion of this truth. 

The surprising thing about this “revelation” is that I am not generally a visual person. I do not see in pictures as some seem to do. I generally deal with ideas and concepts.

This image came with a jolt of energy. It felt like a call from God to write this material.

That is the birth story of how many years later my book Discipleship Essentials came to be.

The Origin of the MicroGroup

But equally important, there was second epiphany that occurred in close proximity. I was completing my Doctor of Ministry degree at Fuller Seminary and needed a ministry project to wrap it up. By this time I had at least a rudimentary version of what would later become Discipleship Essentials. My faculty advisor suggested I take this material and use it in different settings to evaluate the effectiveness of the size of the groups. We came up with 3 models to compare effectiveness of multiplication:

1. 2 individuals, 1-on-1;
2. 10 people in a small group setting;
3. 3 people in a very "micro" group of the same gender.

A young man by the name of Eric had approached me to see if I would mentor him. Since I had no idea what mentoring meant, I suggested that Eric be one of my participants for the threesome (later called a triad). When Karl was added as the third person, we started to meet over lunch at a place equidistant from our work places. Almost immediately I was impressed by the change in dynamics from the one-to-one relationship by simply adding a third. We now had a circle.

The first thing I noticed was the rise in energy level. I would consistently walk out of our time together thinking,

“Wasn’t that fun!”

The sense of the presence of the Holy Spirit was tangible.

I now had the basic ingredients for an intentional, relational, transforming, and multiplying experience of disciplemaking. When we combine biblically-based content with a transformative, relational context, we have a setting for accelerated growth. I also then found that the participants were empowered to fulfill the Great Commission because each person could replicate this experience by starting their own group. The simplicity of the size of the group made it doable for almost anyone. I had the sense that God had orchestrated our path for emphasizing MicroGroups.