Session 4: More Information on Discipleship Strategies
Making Disciples One Conversation at a Time is a wonderful resource for those seeking to
develop skills in personal conversation. This is where real change can take place as we meet
either one-on-one, or in very small (max. 3) groups for challenging each other and
stimulating ourselves to greater heights in Christ. This book also has study questions at the
end of each chapter and can be used as a small group study, though if you do so, I would
recommend covering more than one chapter per week, as it is an easy book to read, and the
questions are not overly complex. The last two chapters are a little more US-oriented than I
would like, but the author is a US citizen and has done much of his ministry in the US.
Each One Win One by Louie Bustle and Stan Toler is a MUST READ for anyone interested
in evangelism and discipleship ideas. The structure and plan are very well laid out, and you
can scale the model to fit your Sunday School class or an entire church. I have implemented
this strategy into my Sunday School class, and I would encourage you to do the same. The
take-home point of this strategy is to develop leaders and prayer cells. Then have the big
group work towards a periodic evangelistic campaign. It is a very exciting plan, and has a
proven track record – I like that!
Each One Disciple One by Louie Bustle and Stan Toler is the sequel to the first book. It has
a lot of repetition from Each One Win One, but one thing I really like about the new book is
that it has lessons for when your friend becomes a Christian. It then has another set of
lessons that takes the person deeper into the faith and discusses sanctification, holiness, and
ministry. The two books compliment each other very nicely, but if you only have the funds
for one, get the Each One Win One book!
Basic Bible Studies by Chic Shaver (yellow cover) is a good tool for people to be introduced
to the Christian Faith. This makes them go home and dig through their Bible to learn God’s
principles and the basic beliefs of the church. There is a second series of lessons on
sanctification (pink cover) which I have heard is really good, and I will be working through
that with any new Christians that I will disciple. These are excellent resources to have
around for when someone comes in and says “I just led my friend to the Lord, now what?”
All of these resources can be ordered from www.NPH.com, but if you can network with
churches around you and create a single bulk order and go through the Caribbean Regional
Office there might be up to a 40% discount off the price you see listed online. Shipping will
be the problem, and that is why if you order all your Sunday School materials and
discipleship materials at one time (i.e. twice per year) you may be able to see significant
savings!
So, what if your friend becomes a Christian, do you stop being discipled by someone else?
No! Every Nazarene should have a discipleship partner, and they should be discipling
someone else with the intention of getting them to the point where they can disciple yet
another person the same way. The following pages show the concepts I am going to teach
my Sunday School class for the initial two years, along with which person will be teaching,
and who will be mentoring.
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An Idea for the Implementation of Each One Win One
After listening to the Master Teacher presentations and reading “Each One Win One” you
may be convinced that small groups and prayer cells are probably the direction to go, but you
may still be wondering how it all fits together. Below are two scenarios, one for just your
Sunday School class and the other if the entire church has bought into this growth model.
Sunday School growth model:
Sunday School is run in 6 month sections, with an emphasis on finding a leader within the first
two months and training them to teach their own Sunday School after the first 6 month section.
The original teacher would go on to teach the next discipleship class (D2) while the new
teacher would teach the Discipleship 1 (D1) class they had just taken. Both the Discipleship 1
and 2 teachers would train up another leader in their classes who would be ready to teach
Discipleship 1. Here is a visual of what that might look like:
Suggested Curriculum for Discipleship Classes
(D1)Intro to Being a Disciple
Discipleship
Chic Shaver1
Cost
Chic Shaver 2
Each One Win One
Bible
(D2) Teaching Disciples
(D3) Going Deeper
(D4) Advanced
Each One Disciple One
Richard Foster’s
Bonheoffer’s
Michael Henderson
Bible
Celebration of Discipline
Hal Perkins: Discipleship
Bible
of Discipleship
Bible
1st 6 Months
2nd 6 Months
3rd 6 Months
4th 6 Months
Teacher 1:
D4
Teaches D1
Teaches D2
Teaches D3
Teaches
Teacher 2:
D3
Learns D1
Teaches D1
Teaches D2
Teaches
Teacher 3:
D2
Learns D1
Teaches D1
Teaches
Teacher 4:
D2
Learns D1
Teaches D1
Teaches
In this scenario the Sunday School teacher would place special effort into meeting with the
new leaders that he/she has identified. Even after the new leaders have begun teaching their
classes the first teacher should spend time with them, perhaps on the “Henderson” model.
These meetings could be discussing the lessons they have been working on for D2 and
helping their D1 teachers with questions they have and holding them accountable for their
spiritual walk.
In this model you would emphasize that your students become Big Brother/Big Sisters every
6 months and that they meet in prayer cells outside of class. Your Sunday School class
would be like the “Discipleship Cell” mentioned in Each One Win One. New believers or
unbelievers visiting your church should be allowed to visit an advanced class with their
friends if they want to, but they should be encouraged to attend the D1 class as soon as they
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are comfortable in doing so. In fact, you could even encourage your advanced student to go
with them for a couple weeks to the D1 class just to help them settle in well.
How does a system like this work with children’s ministries? We know of some churches
pioneering intentionally small groups with children. We know that some do prayer cells for
children, and we know that some in our classes will feel led to children’s ministries. This is a
new area, however, and we would love feedback on ideas you may have relating to Each One
Win One children’s version.
In this scenario presented above, Sunday School is being used for discipleship training. This
means that you will necessarily have a less “all-inclusive” format that many are used you in
Sunday School. Inclusivity means that you are focused on being “seeker friendly.”
Advanced classes should instead focus on building disciples, accountability, and helping the
attendees to be effective in their ministries on other days. This may not appeal to the visitor,
but you will find that your classes grow and thrive anyway because of the evangelistic
campaigns that your classes come together for every six months. A “seeker-friendly” class
could be started for situations like this, or the D1 class would be an obvious choice for being
seeker-friendly. As you know already, God does not work through strict formulas, and that is
why this concept is just presented as a scenario. If you find that your church is more
effective in outreach and discipleship modifying aspects of this scenario, please let us know
so that we can create that scenario as well! And through all attempts to build believers the
priority is to follow in the path the Christ leads us on, and to give God all the glory for
results. Like the farmer, we can work and till the soil, but God provides the harvest!
Church-wide scenario:
A more traditional Each One Win One scenario would have:
 Main service is highly evangelistic in nature
 Evening service focused on building disciple-makers (training Big Brother/Big Sisters
etc.)
 Mid-week prayer cells for the unchurched
 Discipleship cell for leaders in the prayer cells to gain encouragement and help from
pastor and other cell leaders
 Evangelistic Campaign once every six months
In this scenario Sunday School could become one of the above cells or training opportunities,
or it could fill another need that the pastor identifies. Either scenario should have both
pastoral and board support, as both will likely cause rapid growth and the growth pains
associated with it.
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